Brent parents: Give me the lowdown on the school

[Anonymous]

Rock throwing -- I am the 1st one to say that the kids are pretty crazy on the playground, before/after school and during recess. But by crazy I mean flying balls going stray from the kickball area, kids running around not necessarily paying a huge amount of attention to other people. The occasional friendly wrestling. Doesn't work well for MY kid, but DC is a shy type. That doesn't mean it's really an actual problem. As to ROCK THROWING?! What?! How could a kid under the age of 10/11 hurl a rock over a 16? 20?-foot fence? Balls get KICKED over all the time, but a rock? I've never seen it and if it did happen it's an incredibly rare occurrence.

Drop off -- very smooth for the most part as long as people follow the rules (no parking, no double parking). It is tough, especially when your kid is still too young to head onto the playground unescorted. There's U-turns, though they are against school rules. I would say 98% of the time I follow all rules and 2% I have to break one to get my kid there on time. I'm sure most other people are the same (we are OOB). Not ideal, but I've seen the same at many many other schools around town.

DC is in upper grade, receives great kudos for strengths and support for weaknesses. Teachers go above and beyond and always have with a few exceptions for both my kids (other DC is in MS). We are very pleased there for a multitude of reasons.

I am baffled why there can't be properly stocked bathrooms at such a rich school.

I'm not worried about MS, feel like I have several options.

Special ed seems to be better than many schools, not as good as many others.

A private school with smaller class sizes and fewer kids on the playground at the same time would be my ideal, but otherwise, I think Brent is a great fit for our child/family.

Rock throwing?!

[Anonymous]

Lafayette, Janney, Murch, Stoddert, Mann and Key, are all way above capacity, close to double capacity in several cases. No thanks, even if they're "better." Most use classroom trailers, with kids forced to venture outside to access bathrooms in other buildings. Lafayette, with the city's highest test scores, doesn't even have many walls inside (it's being renovated, noisily).

JKLM and private schools have their own problems, too, a strong undercurrent of snobbery and droves of hopelessly pampered kids among them. You won't find a nicer or more grounded group of with-it urban parents than those associated with Brent.

Lower grades parents generally haven't been on the Hill very long. They don't remember the days when Brent was a stinky dark cave with broken glass on the tarmac and no in-boundary kids.

The principal seems pushed around more by his teachers than parents, especially the Early Childhood group. I have confidence that the LSAT will make needed changes this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Rock throwing -- I am the 1st one to say that the kids are pretty crazy on the playground, before/after school and during recess. But by crazy I mean flying balls going stray from the kickball area, kids running around not necessarily paying a huge amount of attention to other people. The occasional friendly wrestling. Doesn't work well for MY kid, but DC is a shy type. That doesn't mean it's really an actual problem. As to ROCK THROWING?! What?! How could a kid under the age of 10/11 hurl a rock over a 16? 20?-foot fence? Balls get KICKED over all the time, but a rock? I've never seen it and if it did happen it's an incredibly rare occurrence.

Drop off -- very smooth for the most part as long as people follow the rules (no parking, no double parking). It is tough, especially when your kid is still too young to head onto the playground unescorted. There's U-turns, though they are against school rules. I would say 98% of the time I follow all rules and 2% I have to break one to get my kid there on time. I'm sure most other people are the same (we are OOB). Not ideal, but I've seen the same at many many other schools around town.

DC is in upper grade, receives great kudos for strengths and support for weaknesses. Teachers go above and beyond and always have with a few exceptions for both my kids (other DC is in MS). We are very pleased there for a multitude of reasons.

I am baffled why there can't be properly stocked bathrooms at such a rich school.

I'm not worried about MS, feel like I have several options.

Special ed seems to be better than many schools, not as good as many others.

A private school with smaller class sizes and fewer kids on the playground at the same time would be my ideal, but otherwise, I think Brent is a great fit for our child/family.

Rock throwing?!

Last time I checked, a U-turn across double yellow lines is not just a violation of school rules, it's a violation of DC law. The crossing guard does her best in terms of containing the chaos resulting from incredibly poor judgment on the part of parents, many of whom find a 10 minute walk to school too difficult to manage. I cannot fathom this selfish, suburban mentality which puts our children at risk. OTOH, if you live OOB, try leaving home 10 minutes earlier so that you don't have to break the rules and endanger others in making sure your child is in his or her seat at 8:45. The PTA subsidizes childcare from 8:00 to 8:30 and there are a number of teacher-led activities which enhance the school community.

For some reason, stocking the bathrooms and related issues like clogged sinks continues to be a struggle. It's not an issue of Brent being a "rich school" -- who says something like that? -- but a reflection that custodial staff are not as on top of things as they should be. A couple of parents bringing this to the attention of the front office should remedy things for least a few weeks. But that would require that you pick up the phome or actually park and get out of your car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lafayette, Janney, Murch, Stoddert, Mann and Key, are all way above capacity, close to double capacity in several cases. No thanks, even if they're "better." Most use classroom trailers, with kids forced to venture outside to access bathrooms in other buildings. Lafayette, with the city's highest test scores, doesn't even have many walls inside (it's being renovated, noisily).

JKLM and private schools have their own problems, too, a strong undercurrent of snobbery and droves of hopelessly pampered kids among them. You won't find a nicer or more grounded group of with-it urban parents than those associated with Brent.

Lower grades parents generally haven't been on the Hill very long. They don't remember the days when Brent was a stinky dark cave with broken glass on the tarmac and no in-boundary kids.

The principal seems pushed around more by his teachers than parents, especially the Early Childhood group. I have confidence that the LSAT will make needed changes this year.

Would you care to identify the changes that you believe need to be made? The LSAT is not responsible for establishing school policies or curricula. That is the principal's job.

[Anonymous]

Concerned community members are always welcome to attend LSAT meetings to hear what's discussed. Suffice it to say that if numbers creep up, the LSAT will have to make more tough decisions about capacity management. As things stand, 30 in-boundary families eligible for K in 2015 have been shut out of both preschool and prek, which has generated community tensions. Space related issues aren't going away.

[Anonymous]

The LSAT makes recommendations, not decisions. Ferguson has community tensions. While it's unfortunate that fewer than all IB families were able to secure a spot for PK4 the last two years, Principal Young has committed to moving forward with mixed-age classrooms for the ECE program in lieu of eliminating PS3. Characterizing this situation as resulting in community tensions is hyperbolic and silly.

[Anonymous]

"Community tensions" because some in boundary families got shut out of preschool? It's hard to be sympathetic about that considering it's a lottery. That neighborhood's three-year-olds don't need it, either.

[Anonymous]

You want community tension? Try discussing the attempt to implement an ambiguous birthday/holiday celebration policy with parents who think this is will lead to the end of freedom as we know it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"Community tensions" because some in boundary families got shut out of preschool? It's hard to be sympathetic about that considering it's a lottery. That neighborhood's three-year-olds don't need it, either.

Special circumstances intervened, in case you missed it. Not only were 30 in-boundary families shut out of preschool by the 2013 lottery, they were shut out automatically a second time when Brent didn't open any PreK spots for them. The LSAT helped make these decisions. If you think that excluding 40% of families in one cohort before K bodes well for school community cohesiveness, and fund-raising for that matter, tell us what logic you're following.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Community tensions" because some in boundary families got shut out of preschool? It's hard to be sympathetic about that considering it's a lottery. That neighborhood's three-year-olds don't need it, either.

Special circumstances intervened, in case you missed it. Not only were 30 in-boundary families shut out of preschool by the 2013 lottery, they were shut out automatically a second time when Brent didn't open any PreK spots for them. The LSAT helped make these decisions. If you think that excluding 40% of families in one cohort before K bodes well for school community cohesiveness, and fund-raising for that matter, tell us what logic you're following.

My logic: the parents of this 40% just dropped a crapload of money to buy IB, so they aren't going anywhere fast. They also paid an arm and leg for the ability to talk about "community cohesiveness" and to brag about their PTA's abilities, especially with regards to every other school on the Hill, and probably in all of DC. Excluding them in a lottery is not really a big deal.

[Anonymous]

I just wanted to say that the kids from Brent are some of the best prepared kids at BASIS DC this year. With a little parent home schooling over the summer, quite a few of them are in the top math class - Algebra I in 5th grade. That to me says quite a bit about the school. Our HRES gets much weaker starting in 3rd grade, when they start trying to do real academic work............

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

My logic: the parents of this 40% just dropped a crapload of money to buy IB, so they aren't going anywhere fast. They also paid an arm and leg for the ability to talk about "community cohesiveness" and to brag about their PTA's abilities, especially with regards to every other school on the Hill, and probably in all of DC. Excluding them in a lottery is not really a big deal.

Easy for you to say when you pretty clearly weren't among the excluded. Some rising parents have in fact already peeled off to other schools. No big deal to be sure, but not a pretty picture either. Brent pretended to solicit community input on reconfiguring the early childhood classes after the decision had already been made. Parents remember these things.

[Anonymous]

I don't think that parents have minded bad lottery luck as much as tone-deaf leadership. The problem has created two classes of in-boundary parents of 3-5s, those Brent wants to serve and those the school can't avoid serving eventually.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Community tensions" because some in boundary families got shut out of preschool? It's hard to be sympathetic about that considering it's a lottery. That neighborhood's three-year-olds don't need it, either.

Special circumstances intervened, in case you missed it. Not only were 30 in-boundary families shut out of preschool by the 2013 lottery, they were shut out automatically a second time when Brent didn't open any PreK spots for them. The LSAT helped make these decisions. If you think that excluding 40% of families in one cohort before K bodes well for school community cohesiveness, and fund-raising for that matter, tell us what logic you're following.

My logic is this: PS and pre-K are a lottery. Reasonable people shouldn't be pissed off that they did not win free child care for two years. Talk about entitlement!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

My logic: the parents of this 40% just dropped a crapload of money to buy IB, so they aren't going anywhere fast. They also paid an arm and leg for the ability to talk about "community cohesiveness" and to brag about their PTA's abilities, especially with regards to every other school on the Hill, and probably in all of DC. Excluding them in a lottery is not really a big deal.

Easy for you to say when you pretty clearly weren't among the excluded. Some rising parents have in fact already peeled off to other schools. No big deal to be sure, but not a pretty picture either. Brent pretended to solicit community input on reconfiguring the early childhood classes after the decision had already been made. Parents remember these things.





Please, go elsewhere. Brent doesn't owe you or your 4 yr old anything.