Reply to Can anyone tell me the story of Stuart-Hobson?

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[quote=Anonymous]Yes, what is it that you're trying to understand? Capitol Hill Montessori wasn't a middle school when it was moved out. It was a preschool program, housed in the Watkins building. Same goes for SWS, which was housed at Peabody. There was a WaPo article a few years back that tells the story of the "Cluster School" founded in the 1980s. That sounds like what you are are looking for, not Stuart-Hobson specifically it seems to me, to tell from those added details. It is to this day the basis for the feeder pattern within that "cluster", from Peabody, to Watkins, to Stuart-Hobson.
What you are totally missing is the fact that that history, which interesting, is pretty much irrelevant because the institutional landscape of schools is completely different nowadays. There weren't out-of-boundary application options and there certainly weren't any charter schools. Can't tell you the story of SH as a "museum magnet school" exactly but at one point way back DC has something like "magnet schools". (Maury ES was a science magnet for example.)
At any rate, that history doesn't have much to do with today's middle schools. If you ask me, middle schools have a difficult role simply by the fact that they are middle schools, in the "middle" from here to there. Just how it is. That charter schools started draining away some of the kids in 5th grade, unsettling the feeder patterns really didn't help. But I am also loathe to blame them because they aren't exactly having a smooth ride in their middle schools either, just an easier selection. Sure, you can blame "choice" more broadly, but having exercised my right to choose twice with middle schools, in different directions, I must say that's here to stay. We better live with it. Whether they start at 5th or at 6th, the first year of middle school is rough (look for a recent WaPo article on the subject of the "freshmen year" effect). And then there are only two more. Meanwhile, K-8 schools have their downsides and so do 6-12. Caught in the middle they are, those middle schools.

OP, I think it's a nice thing that you are interested in that history but it appears to me that you have made up your mind about things you really are just discovering. At the risk of sounding a little know-it-all, you really have to have kids that age (or at least have had them fairly recently) to know what it's like. While there are undeniable parallels between 2 and 12 year-old, it really isn't the same. What you think you may know your child needs during those years, may turn out to be very different. Keep an open mind and enjoy those elementary school years without constantly worrying about a landscape that's like quick sand, changing under your eyes.[/quote]

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