Reply to Best Cap Hill elementary to middle?

Forum Index » DC Public and Public Charter Schools

Reply to "Best Cap Hill elementary to middle?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Brent actually scores lower than schools with similar demographics. For middle path, I’d choose Watkins.[/quote]

Come on.  Brent is head and shoulders above Watkins in terms of the kid's experience. The entire 1st grade at Brent is in-boundary and OOB with older sibs.  Brent parents care little about PARCC scores and the kids are not prepped for the test like at almost every other Hill DCPS.  Brent has a seriously good fine arts program, paid for by the $400,000 a year PTA. Brent is also the only elementary school on the Hill with a designated science teacher.  The Brent principal is terrific, while the Watkins principal seems to care only about "closing the achievement gap."  Brent's middle school feeder situation isn't good, and neither is Maury's so if you want a path to Stuart Hobson, go for Watkins.  Don't go for Watkins for Watkins.[/quote]

[b]It's cute how at schools with lots of rich and/or white kids the parents are like "the experience is so great! there's no test prep so our kids don't score as well as white kids at other schools but it's cool because we have art!" and then they look at other schools where kids like theirs do better and the at-risk/AA/Latino kids do better that also have nice art and science classes and say "it's not an option--my kid needs a cohort of high performers and separate honors classes." 
[/b]
OP, Stuart-Hobson and Jefferson are more alike than different (SH has a principal people like and JA currently has an interim principal; [b]each school will likely change leadership several times before your kid gets there[/b]). SH has about 10% white kids and seems to do a better job explaining its differentiated classes, but both schools differentiate and both schools will be in good physical shape when your kid arrives (JA is being renovated now). JA is further away but it's not hard to get to (3 blocks from L'Enfant Plaza metro and several buses) so if you like Brent, don't be scared off by JA. And if you like the Cluster or LT or JOW (which is going through a mess right now because their principal resigned and some older-grade teachers seem awful--but this will likely be well in the rearview mirror before your kid is out of the ECE wing) go for it. Teachers and principals change so much from year to year that you can't really pin your hopes on one school being way better than another. Even the best school has a range of good and bad teachers (or teachers that click better with some students than others). Class sizes and extracurriculars and playgrounds and all that other stuff can change from year to year. Find a house you like that you can afford and read a lot to your kid and take him or her to museums and volunteer in the classroom and do stuff like DC Youth Orchestra and Sports on the Hill and scouting and your kid will be just fine.[/quote]

Nail, head, thank you.  [/quote]

^^ sort of.  more yes and no.  In no particular order

Stuart hasn't had much leadership turnover but  ¯\_(?)_/¯ that could happen anywhere I suppose.

Jefferson is underrated and improving but it also serves more at risk students than SH.

SH is stronger in performing arts than other MS options in DC.

A small cohort of Brent families recently made jump to Jefferson but most Brent families do not. Many Brent families bail for charters in 5th or private earlier (it's upper grades take OOB students to fill gap).

LT cohort at SH is somewhat small but likely growing in next 3-4 years.   Watkins accounts for 2/3 of the rising 6th grade class.

SH Class sizes are large for both honors and regular track.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics