Silence on Powell

[Anonymous]

The past few years we heard great things about Powell. Now it never seems to be mentioned on here.

Is the school still improving? Has the principal kept moving in the same direction as Docal?

Just wondering. We are an in-bounds family for Powell and looking to gather information and experiences from others.

[Anonymous]

I'm interested in this as well. We're considering the Spanish program.

[Anonymous]

Still great. Do a tour. Talk to parents of current students.

[Anonymous]

The Principal who started driving the change and everyone loved left.

[Anonymous]

I'm a parent. The school is great, but the need for promotion is gone. School is at capacity, completely full, just as a renovation is being completed for next school year. So all that promotion does basically is increase the number of in-bounds lottery participants.

Principal Docal was amazing and had a great story to tell with the school but Principal Lyons-Lucas has been great for the school as well. The prior avenues for growth were things that adults could do-be inspired to enroll, help get funding for a renovation. The challenge now is going to be dual-language programmatic success. Lyons-Lucas has been an advocate for the program and for English-language learners.

If you want a dual language program for your children, it's a great program, and parents can point out teachers we have been really happy with and others we'll be happy to have in the future. If you want great test scores for the majority of students and tons of peers for your child-of-two-grad-degreed-parents, well, it's hard to promise that anywhere in DCPS, but I want to believe great things are possible.

It's important for people to not think that because some "critical mass of white parents" or whatever matters to you has joined the Powell community that suddenly it has all the elements of a community-responsive, PTA-driven, gifted-options upper Northwest or specialized charter school. It does not. Powell has people who mostly speak Spanish and people who mostly speak English in its community and not everyone can be around at school before school, during school hours, or after hours to coordinate, meet, and make friends.

But your kids can join the school community, learn a lot, make friends with names you've never heard before, learn to speak Spanish from fluently bilingual teachers (and learn their subjects in those languages as well) and experience a level of integration not very common in American education.

But to your original point, about promoting the school, with enrollment basically zero-sum, all it does is make more informed people enter the lottery and decrease the chances of less-informed inbounds families getting their children into the school. If you want to know more about it do the Tuesday tour.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a parent. The school is great, but the need for promotion is gone. School is at capacity, completely full, just as a renovation is being completed for next school year. So all that promotion does basically is increase the number of in-bounds lottery participants.

Principal Docal was amazing and had a great story to tell with the school but Principal Lyons-Lucas has been great for the school as well. The prior avenues for growth were things that adults could do-be inspired to enroll, help get funding for a renovation. The challenge now is going to be dual-language programmatic success. Lyons-Lucas has been an advocate for the program and for English-language learners.

If you want a dual language program for your children, it's a great program, and parents can point out teachers we have been really happy with and others we'll be happy to have in the future. If you want great test scores for the majority of students and tons of peers for your child-of-two-grad-degreed-parents, well, it's hard to promise that anywhere in DCPS, but I want to believe great things are possible.

It's important for people to not think that because some "critical mass of white parents" or whatever matters to you has joined the Powell community that suddenly it has all the elements of a community-responsive, PTA-driven, gifted-options upper Northwest or specialized charter school. It does not. Powell has people who mostly speak Spanish and people who mostly speak English in its community and not everyone can be around at school before school, during school hours, or after hours to coordinate, meet, and make friends.

But your kids can join the school community, learn a lot, make friends with names you've never heard before, learn to speak Spanish from fluently bilingual teachers (and learn their subjects in those languages as well) and experience a level of integration not very common in American education.

But to your original point, about promoting the school, with enrollment basically zero-sum, all it does is make more informed people enter the lottery and decrease the chances of less-informed inbounds families getting their children into the school. If you want to know more about it do the Tuesday tour.

Are more upper class families staying past K?

[Anonymous]

It's as if 16:12 didn't read 16:10's post.

[Anonymous]

It was a rough transition with the new administration (Principal) last year, but all have overcome those kinks. I still believe communication could be better especially with the teacher/staff turnovers. Teachers and support staff are all friendly and inviting.

This is our 4th year at Powell and I don't have any complaints where it would drive us to jump ship. Our IB is John Burroughs, but we've chose Powell for the dual-language program. We've thought about entering the lottery for DC Bilingual, but our kids have made friends and we love the Powell community.

Powell has come along way from the days of the disconnect between parents of various income levels; its a none issue today.

We plan to stay until 5th which is three years away, but are unsure about MacFarland.

[Anonymous]

Have the mean girls and trolls that predominate DCUM failed to noticed that there are a few schools that rarely, if ever, get mentioned on DCUM? And when they do, the school communities deprive the threads of oxygen and they die a quick death. Well established schools have a certain cadence and machinery that chugs along without noise and drama. To the OP: instead of being concerned about lack of noise of DCUM, have you considered that it's actually a positive?