Data on where kids go to school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

They DCPS EOTP schools are “improving” only by DCUM standards. Did you really look at the participation rate for DCPS EOTP? My IB has 19% participation rate, I don’t think that is going to improve anytime soon.

That's sad for your school, but yes, I do think EOTP DCPS are improving overall, slowly. IB participation rate is just one factor and is affected by external things like proximity of other schools, it doesn't tell you that much about the school itself.

[Anonymous]

IB participation rate is affected by a lot of things. The proximity of other schools is one, another is preschool capacity-- if a school has to turn away some of its IB preschoolers due to capacity constraint that will make for a lower rate, but it doesn't make it a worse school. Having full Dual Language so kids who want English-only get IB rights elsewhere will bring down the IB percentage, but it doesn't mean anything bad about the school. If part of the zone has grandfathering rights at its former IB school, so that certain kids have IB rights at two schools, again, that doesn't mean anything about the quality. I agree that 19% is pretty low, but IB participation rate isn't a very good metric in general.

Similarly, things that bring in OOB kids can affect the IB percentage but aren't well-correlated with quality. For example, offering self-contained classrooms tends to bring in more OOB kids and their siblings, but it doesn't make the school a worse school. Offering a lot of preschool seats brings in OOB kids who were shut out of their own preschool, but it's not a bad thing and it doesn't mean poor quality.

[Anonymous]

You can see some information about private school enrollment here: https://edscape.dc.gov/page/pop-and-students-private-school-enrollment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IB participation rate is affected by a lot of things. The proximity of other schools is one, another is preschool capacity-- if a school has to turn away some of its IB preschoolers due to capacity constraint that will make for a lower rate, but it doesn't make it a worse school. Having full Dual Language so kids who want English-only get IB rights elsewhere will bring down the IB percentage, but it doesn't mean anything bad about the school. If part of the zone has grandfathering rights at its former IB school, so that certain kids have IB rights at two schools, again, that doesn't mean anything about the quality. I agree that 19% is pretty low, but IB participation rate isn't a very good metric in general.

Similarly, things that bring in OOB kids can affect the IB percentage but aren't well-correlated with quality. For example, offering self-contained classrooms tends to bring in more OOB kids and their siblings, but it doesn't make the school a worse school. Offering a lot of preschool seats brings in OOB kids who were shut out of their own preschool, but it's not a bad thing and it doesn't mean poor quality.

Participation rate tells you how the neighbors feel about their IB school. For some reason none of the things that you mentioned affect the participation rate in elementary schools WOTP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

Talking about closing schools is a heck of a lot easier than actually doing it. Do you close the lowest performing schools? If so, you are closing the schools with the highest % POC and making the average commute longer for poorer parts of the city? Do you close better performing schools and force those families into feeder patterns with terrible schools? No politician is touching this third rail.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IB participation rate is affected by a lot of things. The proximity of other schools is one, another is preschool capacity-- if a school has to turn away some of its IB preschoolers due to capacity constraint that will make for a lower rate, but it doesn't make it a worse school. Having full Dual Language so kids who want English-only get IB rights elsewhere will bring down the IB percentage, but it doesn't mean anything bad about the school. If part of the zone has grandfathering rights at its former IB school, so that certain kids have IB rights at two schools, again, that doesn't mean anything about the quality. I agree that 19% is pretty low, but IB participation rate isn't a very good metric in general.

Similarly, things that bring in OOB kids can affect the IB percentage but aren't well-correlated with quality. For example, offering self-contained classrooms tends to bring in more OOB kids and their siblings, but it doesn't make the school a worse school. Offering a lot of preschool seats brings in OOB kids who were shut out of their own preschool, but it's not a bad thing and it doesn't mean poor quality.

Participation rate tells you how the neighbors feel about their IB school. For some reason none of the things that you mentioned affect the participation rate in elementary schools WOTP.

They do, though. Hardly any other schools nearby is a factor-- if Walls or Latin were closer for example that could make a difference. No Dual Language so no alternative feeder options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

Talking about closing schools is a heck of a lot easier than actually doing it. Do you close the lowest performing schools? If so, you are closing the schools with the highest % POC and making the average commute longer for poorer parts of the city? Do you close better performing schools and force those families into feeder patterns with terrible schools? No politician is touching this third rail.

And do you de-stabilize the nearby schools with an influx of students who are below grade level? That's not going to be a winner politically. Nobody's going to go for this, the era of DCPS closures is over. They might replace leadership or try some "turnaround" scheme, dunno if it will make a difference. But just saying "close it" is naive and only someone with a poor understanding of the logistical factors would think that's a good idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

I don't believe the DME has updated their projections since 2019, and obviously the pandemic changed everything. But in 2019 they were projecting that by 2027 DCPS would have 61,925 seats and 61,697 students.

See https://ggwash.org/view/71802/can-dcps-survive-the-coming-enrollment-surge for a complete discussion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

I don't believe the DME has updated their projections since 2019, and obviously the pandemic changed everything. But in 2019 they were projecting that by 2027 DCPS would have 61,925 seats and 61,697 students.

See https://ggwash.org/view/71802/can-dcps-survive-the-coming-enrollment-surge for a complete discussion.

What a dumb article. Can DCPS "survive" FFS. Of course it will survive, it's not going to drop dead of a heart attack. If they need to open new buildings, they do have some they can use. If they need to add additions, that's doable in some places. If they need to reboundary, fine, they did it in 2014 and they can do it again. It's nothing to be so apocalyptic about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

I don't believe the DME has updated their projections since 2019, and obviously the pandemic changed everything. But in 2019 they were projecting that by 2027 DCPS would have 61,925 seats and 61,697 students.

See https://ggwash.org/view/71802/can-dcps-survive-the-coming-enrollment-surge for a complete discussion.

What a dumb article. Can DCPS "survive" FFS. Of course it will survive, it's not going to drop dead of a heart attack. If they need to open new buildings, they do have some they can use. If they need to add additions, that's doable in some places. If they need to reboundary, fine, they did it in 2014 and they can do it again. It's nothing to be so apocalyptic about.

This article seems especially stupid now that Foxhall and MacArthur are happening, and the 2023 boundary review is commencing. Yes it's all so expensive and politically hard, oh noes, somehow they're doing it anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

Talking about closing schools is a heck of a lot easier than actually doing it. Do you close the lowest performing schools? If so, you are closing the schools with the highest % POC and making the average commute longer for poorer parts of the city? Do you close better performing schools and force those families into feeder patterns with terrible schools? No politician is touching this third rail.

And do you de-stabilize the nearby schools with an influx of students who are below grade level? That's not going to be a winner politically. Nobody's going to go for this, the era of DCPS closures is over. They might replace leadership or try some "turnaround" scheme, dunno if it will make a difference. But just saying "close it" is naive and only someone with a poor understanding of the logistical factors would think that's a good idea.

+100 to both of these posts. A lot of the politician-talk seems to be grandstanding but who knows? The new Ward 5 council person is consistently raising that the major problem with DC education is there are too many schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IB participation rate is affected by a lot of things. The proximity of other schools is one, another is preschool capacity-- if a school has to turn away some of its IB preschoolers due to capacity constraint that will make for a lower rate, but it doesn't make it a worse school. Having full Dual Language so kids who want English-only get IB rights elsewhere will bring down the IB percentage, but it doesn't mean anything bad about the school. If part of the zone has grandfathering rights at its former IB school, so that certain kids have IB rights at two schools, again, that doesn't mean anything about the quality. I agree that 19% is pretty low, but IB participation rate isn't a very good metric in general.

Similarly, things that bring in OOB kids can affect the IB percentage but aren't well-correlated with quality. For example, offering self-contained classrooms tends to bring in more OOB kids and their siblings, but it doesn't make the school a worse school. Offering a lot of preschool seats brings in OOB kids who were shut out of their own preschool, but it's not a bad thing and it doesn't mean poor quality.

Participation rate tells you how the neighbors feel about their IB school. For some reason none of the things that you mentioned affect the participation rate in elementary schools WOTP.

They do, though. Hardly any other schools nearby is a factor-- if Walls or Latin were closer for example that could make a difference. No Dual Language so no alternative feeder options.

No, they don’t. We are not talking about your opinion. Look at the data! None of the elementary schools WOTP has the low participation rate that you see EOTP.

[Anonymous]

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Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

Talking about closing schools is a heck of a lot easier than actually doing it. Do you close the lowest performing schools? If so, you are closing the schools with the highest % POC and making the average commute longer for poorer parts of the city? Do you close better performing schools and force those families into feeder patterns with terrible schools? No politician is touching this third rail.

And do you de-stabilize the nearby schools with an influx of students who are below grade level? That's not going to be a winner politically. Nobody's going to go for this, the era of DCPS closures is over. They might replace leadership or try some "turnaround" scheme, dunno if it will make a difference. But just saying "close it" is naive and only someone with a poor understanding of the logistical factors would think that's a good idea.

+100 to both of these posts. A lot of the politician-talk seems to be grandstanding but who knows? The new Ward 5 council person is consistently raising that the major problem with DC education is there are too many schools.

Do you have a cite? I do think we don't need any more schools at the moment and some charters are on shaky footing. It seems like budget-wise, better to have 50 schools that are mostly full rather than 60 schools that have a lot of empty seats.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

I don't believe the DME has updated their projections since 2019, and obviously the pandemic changed everything. But in 2019 they were projecting that by 2027 DCPS would have 61,925 seats and 61,697 students.

See https://ggwash.org/view/71802/can-dcps-survive-the-coming-enrollment-surge for a complete discussion.

What a dumb article. Can DCPS "survive" FFS. Of course it will survive, it's not going to drop dead of a heart attack. If they need to open new buildings, they do have some they can use. If they need to add additions, that's doable in some places. If they need to reboundary, fine, they did it in 2014 and they can do it again. It's nothing to be so apocalyptic about.

This article seems especially stupid now that Foxhall and MacArthur are happening, and the 2023 boundary review is commencing. Yes it's all so expensive and politically hard, oh noes, somehow they're doing it anyway.

Or maybe some people in positions of responsibility read the article four years ago when it came out and took some steps in response.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking at the numbers in reverse is fascinating. Some charter schools are pulling 50, 80, 100+ kids from individual neighborhood schools.

Wow. So are some DCPS schools. McKinley is pulling 166 kids from Dunbar, Coolidge is pulling 100, Wilson/Jackson Reed is pulling 98. Altogether, DCPS high schools pull nearly 1,000 kids from Dunbar. Turner and Stanton are pulling 100 kids from Garfield Elementary. Cooke, Tubman and other DCPS schools are pulling 80 kids from Bancroft.

The intra-DCPS competition over students seems worst at high schools. Cardozo is losing about 900 students to other DCPS high schools. Eastern is losing over 700 to other DCPS schools.

I think Tubman is the assigned non-dual-language alternative to Bancroft, so that might explain that particular dynamic.

Makes sense. I wonder what happens to the budget for the others -- does DCPS do some sort of revenue share between its campuses? When I've heard Councilmembers say there are too many schools and too many facilities, I assumed that they were just talking about charters. But looking at this data, makes me nervous that they are aiming to curtail both charters and out of boundary seats to force enrollment in "by-right" neighborhood schools.

The funding comes by the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. It's not a transfer of revenue from the IB school to the attended school, it all comes straight from the main pot of money.

DCPS has closed so many of its schools that it really can't close or consolidate much more without giving people longer commutes than is desirable, and given the enrollment increases over the past decade it's unlikely they will want to close any more-- DCPS has to plan for the long term as the school of right for all residents, they can't just take as many as they want and ignore the rest, so they sometimes maintain capacity for future use. They are able to adjust boundaries and feeders, as well as add physical capacity through renovation, and they are doing both of those things now and in the near future.

The Deputy Mayor for Education did a memo in 2019 that you might find interesting. It's about the capacity of the whole system
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/School%20system%20capacity%20assessment%20new%20public%20charter%20applications%20FINAL%20051519.pdf

There is also this similar analysis from 2020. Lots of discussion of "unintentionally small" schools-- those that are attracting enough students to continue to exist, but not enough to meet their own enrollment goals. https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DME%20Charter%20Application%20Needs%20Analysis%202020.pdf

The PCSB recently took a year off from approving new schools, and is overhauling its approval criteria. They do seem to be paying a lot of attention to whether schools can realistically hope to meet their enrollment targets. The PCSB, obviously, is not trying to force enrollment towards DCPS, but it does want to ensure that schools only open if they have a reasonable likelihood of attracting students. DCPS might like to curtail charters, but has little influence, although TBH some charters are doing that all on their own . I do think the improvement of DCPS elementaries EOTP in general has helped the sparkle come off certain charters (Mundo, CMI, SSMA, Lee), but those charters still exist and there's nothing stopping them from filling their seats if they have enough applicants.

Great post. Especially the links. A Councilmember said very specifically recently that we have to confront that there are too many schools right now. There are people looking to close schools and they are not only talking about charters.

Well, I'm curious which schools they want to close. If you look at DCPS' long-term enrollment projections, and remember that every student still has to be assigned to a DCPS by-right school within a reasonable commute, then it's really hard to close schools. You'd have to figure out how to re-assign every single kid to a school that has enough room to take them, and still maintain enough capacity for long-term growth. It's not like they never close schools (Washington Metropolitan comes to mind for example), but closing neighborhood schools is logistically a struggle.

I don't believe the DME has updated their projections since 2019, and obviously the pandemic changed everything. But in 2019 they were projecting that by 2027 DCPS would have 61,925 seats and 61,697 students.

See https://ggwash.org/view/71802/can-dcps-survive-the-coming-enrollment-surge for a complete discussion.

What a dumb article. Can DCPS "survive" FFS. Of course it will survive, it's not going to drop dead of a heart attack. If they need to open new buildings, they do have some they can use. If they need to add additions, that's doable in some places. If they need to reboundary, fine, they did it in 2014 and they can do it again. It's nothing to be so apocalyptic about.

This article seems especially stupid now that Foxhall and MacArthur are happening, and the 2023 boundary review is commencing. Yes it's all so expensive and politically hard, oh noes, somehow they're doing it anyway.

Or maybe some people in positions of responsibility read the article four years ago when it came out and took some steps in response.

No, I read it back then and thought it was stupid then too. DCPS was fresh off the 2014 reboundarying, it makes no sense to assert that it's just toooooo hard to reboundary. Will DCPS "survive", LOL, no it will just disappear in a puff of smoke.