Where to buy in DC if great PK3 is the goal

[Anonymous]

First time posters here so please be gentle.

We are looking to buy in DC from out of state. DS is 6 months old. What neigborhood will give us the best odds of a great PK3 placement?

[Anonymous]

It depends on what you mean by "great". For example, is language immersion important to you? Montessori? A path to a good middle and high school?

There are many "great" schools that do not offer PK3, but accept some students for PK4 and everyone in the boundary for K and up, and feed into the only adequate by-right high school. Is there a reason you only care about PK3, like do you know you are moving away after that?

[Anonymous]

That seems like a really foolish way to buy a house.

[Anonymous]

Op here. Yes - we only care about PK3 and 4. We intend to be in DC only 3 or so years. Language immersion in not important. Since we do have the flexibility to buy almost anywhere in DC, we would love to be strategic about it with regards to schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That seems like a really foolish way to buy a house.

+1. If you are willing to pay for quality private preschool, you could buy a much less expensive house and come out way ahead for the year. Not true if you're planning to be in DC past PK3.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That seems like a really foolish way to buy a house.

+1. If you are willing to pay for quality private preschool, you could buy a much less expensive house and come out way ahead for the year. Not true if you're planning to be in DC past PK3.

Not sure its the worst reason to buy that I have ever heard.

[Anonymous]

I would buy my house based on where I wanted my child to go to kindergarten. Prek3 is not a guarantee in the neighborhoods you will be looking (I assume).

[Anonymous]

You have a couple of options.

a) IB for a DCPS school that has high test scores (or however else you determine greatness) AND PK3. Examples: Shepherd, Brent if you care about test scores; Cleveland or Oyster if you want Spanish immersion. But the odds of you getting into that school for PK3 without a sibling is not great.

b) Do the lottery and in April buy a house convenient to the school you get into (probably a charter).

c) Live wherever you like and send your kid to private preschool.

Honestly, I'd go with C. It isn't hard to get into private PK3 since so many kids go public. There are no popular schools without long PK3 waitlists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. Yes - we only care about PK3 and 4. We intend to be in DC only 3 or so years. Language immersion in not important. Since we do have the flexibility to buy almost anywhere in DC, we would love to be strategic about it with regards to schools.

Then you have a lot of good options. What is your budget for the house, and where do you work?

The problem that you face is that PK3 is not guaranteed the way K and up is. So at the good schools, it is great but only a small fraction of kids living in the boundary are admitted. Therefore your sweet spot is a school that is not quite great, but still good enough for preschool (even if you wouldn't choose it for upper grades). I would suggest you target the schools that admitted all or almost all of their in-boundary students for PK3. In your sweet spot would be Cleveland (the English-only program), Seaton, Langley, Burroughs, Amidon-Bowen, Van Ness, SWW@FS, I'm sure there are others but those are the ones I know of.

https://dcps.dc.gov/page/my-school-dc-lottery-results Data is here, but bear in mind that these are first-round lottery numbers. A lot of the kids on the waitlist will get in by the time school starts. Waitlist movement data is here: https://public.tableau.com/profile/aaron2446#!/vizhome/MSDCSeatsandWaitlistOfferData/MSDCPublicDisplay (as of sometime in early June).

So basically you would pick your in-boundary school when you buy the house, then add to your lottery list other neighborhood schools that you might get into as an out-of-boundary student, and then fill out the rest of your list with charters and hope for a good number.

These schools are not very different from one another. They are mostly high-poverty schools with a gentrifying preschool program. So you are likely to be fine with most of them and should consider your budget and commute, not just schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. Yes - we only care about PK3 and 4. We intend to be in DC only 3 or so years. Language immersion in not important. Since we do have the flexibility to buy almost anywhere in DC, we would love to be strategic about it with regards to schools.

Why are you buying a house at all?

[Anonymous]

Depends on your budget. I would recommend trying to buy IB for Hyde-Addison (Georgetown), Ross Elementary (Dupont) or Marie Reed (adams morgan).

[Anonymous]

It's a lottery.

[Anonymous]

You shouldn't buy if you are only going to be here for 3 years.

[Anonymous]

IB for Ross PK3 does not guarantee a spot. Most spots for PK3 go to IB families with siblings enrolled.

[Anonymous]

We did this. We gamed it out down to the 3 or 4 blocks that worked and bought there.

It is a location that is IB for Ross but also would have drawn a "proximity preference" for our second choice had we not gotten Ross. We ended up getting Ross of the wait list but would probably also have gotten our second choice if it had not come through.