HB Woodlawn and ATS

[Anonymous]

It does amaze me ATS has more kids in a classroom but are seeing better results. We did not apply because I thought our zoned school would be best with smaller class sizes. I am not a fan that they do not have homework and it was a very tough transition for our oldest when they went to middle school. Not sure why people hate on ATS so much when they are doing something that works for a lot of people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It does amaze me ATS has more kids in a classroom but are seeing better results. We did not apply because I thought our zoned school would be best with smaller class sizes. I am not a fan that they do not have homework and it was a very tough transition for our oldest when they went to middle school. Not sure why people hate on ATS so much when they are doing something that works for a lot of people.

As is HBW! It's been a wonderful experience for my shy, introverted kid who would've gotten lost in a bigger school. Not everyone needs that kind of smaller environment (and many would find it too small and claustrophobic), but for those who do, HBW is a tremendous resource the county has. Why would we get rid of it? It doesn't make any sense!

[Anonymous]

I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

The new part of WL maybe as big as a school but is not an independent school with cafeteria etc so that’s a no go.

[Anonymous]

Agreed! Why doesn’t APS realize there is some sort of success happening with these schools and create more of them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

The new part of WL maybe as big as a school but is not an independent school with cafeteria etc so that’s a no go.

They can share the cafeteria with the rest of the WL kids. This is a great idea!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

Or they could just improve the instruction at all the other schools so every kid can have "the best."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

Or they could just improve the instruction at all the other schools so every kid can have "the best."

ATS and HB are self-selecting populations. In the case of ATS, you're judging a program by its standardized test results when everything about ATS is leading up to getting good standardized test results. That's not everyone's goal.

HB has the second most affluent student population among the high schools. I think most high school kids would benefit from more independence, but let's not confuse correspondence with causation here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

Or they could just improve the instruction at all the other schools so every kid can have "the best."

It's not just about being "the best." HB has a particular model that works well for some and doesn't work well for others. There are kids who get that lottery seat then transfer out after a couple years, or more likely for HS, for many reasons.

The issue is they don't have enough seats for those who do want it. That's why it's a great idea to use WL to create those seats in a new HB program. Neither transforming all HS to the HB model nor getting rid of HB altogether would be an ideal outcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

Or they could just improve the instruction at all the other schools so every kid can have "the best."

ATS and HB are self-selecting populations. In the case of ATS, you're judging a program by its standardized test results when everything about ATS is leading up to getting good standardized test results. That's not everyone's goal.

HB has the second most affluent student population among the high schools. I think most high school kids would benefit from more independence, but let's not confuse correspondence with causation here.

ATS and HB also have teachers who applied to teach there. The requirements to teach at those schools are different -- at HB, for instance, they don't have guidance counselors. Middle school teachers are the counselors for their homeroom, and HS teachers take on a counseling load for 6-8 students including college counseling. Working in a school with different behavior standards than regular schools also requires different teaching styles. You can't just have every school change to the ATS or HB model.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wonder what “private school experience” means to PP other than the fact that her kids weren’t able to get in. Private schools range from progressive (Sidwell, Potomac, Georgetown Day etc.) to traditional (e.g. catholic schools) and many many schools in between. Some are speciality schools such as Montessori schools, bilingual/immersion schools teaching a specific language. There is no one “private school experience.” There are three things that most private schools have in common though: (1) you have to apply to get in (2) most students pay tuition and (3) the school tends to have low student-teacher ratios and small class sizes. (2) and (3) don’t apply to ATS. ATS has large classroom sizes, a high student teacher ratio and very large grade level cohorts. This begs the question what is ATS doing right that enables it to achieve such high results with such large classroom sizes? It is motivated parents, a specific teaching methodology or both? ATS is an example of public education gone right. Low student teacher ratios are just not workable for public schools so we need to figure out how to teach effectively with larger classroom sizes. It is obviously still worth aiming for the lowest student ratio possible. For what it’s worth my kids go to Jamestown, which has a more “private school” vibe than ATS since it is much smaller.

For me private school means that parents take the initiative to place the child and have capacity and competency to navigate that process, and a school that will not be overcrowded. Overcrowding is really what a causing all the ire at HB; they enjoy a capped school size in a brand new $$$ building (oh and I know they wanted to stay in their old building on its enormous acreage, same difference), while the rest of the county contemplates remote school and night classes.

Sorry if you don't get that "remote learning" and "night school" are things people say to get parents riled up to get elected officials to spend more money expanding school capacity, and not things that will actually happen in ultra-wealthy Arlington Virginia.

What expanded school capacity? We still don’t have 4th high school.

Um, they are spending $200M to double capacity at the career center. That's your additional secondary seats. If you wanted that $200M spent on something else, you should have gotten involved in capacity planning 10 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll say it again — I don’t think we should get rid of the special programs, I think we should find a way to offer more of them. Create a second ATS and house it at whichever of the neighborhood elementary schools is currently most underenrolled. Those parents would be IRATE but all the parents who get into the new ATS would be thrilled. Then use part of the WL building for a new HB Woodlawn. That way W-L doesn’t have to be so big and APS doesn’t have to find additional space for a new HB Woodlawn. Just use the WL space.

+ 1 million

Or they could just improve the instruction at all the other schools so every kid can have "the best."

ATS and HB are self-selecting populations. In the case of ATS, you're judging a program by its standardized test results when everything about ATS is leading up to getting good standardized test results. That's not everyone's goal.

HB has the second most affluent student population among the high schools. I think most high school kids would benefit from more independence, but let's not confuse correspondence with causation here.

Here we go again. A person who’s kids don’t know to ATS claiming that they know what ATS does. No ATS doesn’t teach to the test. The reason they have such high scores is because they believe structured literacy and focus on phonics and phonemic awareness as opposed to balanced literacy. While the rest of APS was using Lucy Calkins and does phonics on the fly, ATS was using Wilson’s reading and Heggerty. They also have an ELA curriculum that they made that is knowledge rich (focus on social studies). They were so successful in fact that APS adopted Heggerty a few years ago for all schools. Now the entire country is moving towards structured literacy & knowledge rich ELA curriculums. Virginia passed a literacy act and APS adopted CKLA which is phonics based and is knowledge rich. Hopefully this means that the quality of all APS schools goes up. ATS also has a two hour ELA block as opposed to a much shorter block in other APS schools.

[Anonymous]

My Lord, people. The same complaints about HBW and ATS have been going on by parents who are jealous for decades. Test scores at both reflect nothing but self selection. Kids who don’t get in and have the same sort of parents do just as well at neighborhood schools. In fact, I know many education obsessed parents who think HBW isn’t rigorous enough for their kids. One family I know (this has been awhile) had a kid who was very happy at HB’s middle school but insisted they transfer to the neighborhood school for high school because they though the education was too soft. Kid ended up at Harvard Law.

There’s another thread just posted on Arlington college acceptances by high school. Take a look. Note that there’s no difference in college acceptance rates for HBW compared to the neighborhood schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wonder what “private school experience” means to PP other than the fact that her kids weren’t able to get in. Private schools range from progressive (Sidwell, Potomac, Georgetown Day etc.) to traditional (e.g. catholic schools) and many many schools in between. Some are speciality schools such as Montessori schools, bilingual/immersion schools teaching a specific language. There is no one “private school experience.” There are three things that most private schools have in common though: (1) you have to apply to get in (2) most students pay tuition and (3) the school tends to have low student-teacher ratios and small class sizes. (2) and (3) don’t apply to ATS. ATS has large classroom sizes, a high student teacher ratio and very large grade level cohorts. This begs the question what is ATS doing right that enables it to achieve such high results with such large classroom sizes? It is motivated parents, a specific teaching methodology or both? ATS is an example of public education gone right. Low student teacher ratios are just not workable for public schools so we need to figure out how to teach effectively with larger classroom sizes. It is obviously still worth aiming for the lowest student ratio possible. For what it’s worth my kids go to Jamestown, which has a more “private school” vibe than ATS since it is much smaller.

For me private school means that parents take the initiative to place the child and have capacity and competency to navigate that process, and a school that will not be overcrowded. Overcrowding is really what a causing all the ire at HB; they enjoy a capped school size in a brand new $$$ building (oh and I know they wanted to stay in their old building on its enormous acreage, same difference), while the rest of the county contemplates remote school and night classes.

Sorry if you don't get that "remote learning" and "night school" are things people say to get parents riled up to get elected officials to spend more money expanding school capacity, and not things that will actually happen in ultra-wealthy Arlington Virginia.

What expanded school capacity? We still don’t have 4th high school.

Um, they are spending $200M to double capacity at the career center. That's your additional secondary seats. If you wanted that $200M spent on something else, you should have gotten involved in capacity planning 10 years ago.

Yes. This has all been figured out over a period of many years, with planning, public engagement, advisory councils, focus groups, elected officials’ platforms, debates, letter writing campaigns, etc. No one will ever be completely happy. But now we have the brand new Dorothy Hamm School, a world-class Heights Building, a revamped historic Ed Center and Planetarium, new elementary schools, new school boundaries, and the final piece in the puzzle is the new Career Center/Arlington Tech, the Amazon / Arlington Community HS, and maybe newer boundaries in few years.