Reply to Watkins Parents: How pleased are you? How optimistic?

Forum Index » DC Public and Public Charter Schools

Reply to "Watkins Parents: How pleased are you? How optimistic?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Is comparing Watkins to Brent apples to apples? I thought Watkins was really big so it 'crowded out' IB kids with tons out OOB kids, whose parents also comprised the parent leadership.[/quote]

Can someone familiar with the current Watkins explain the number of classes for each grade, how Watkins is right-sizing itself to better accommodate a feed from Peabody, etc?  I'd like to know myself.[/quote]

Disclaimer: I'm not quite sure about this, as I can't find it where I read it, so hopefully someone else will either confirm or correct, but I believe that there are currently four classes in most grades and five classes in a few grades. I also think that the plan is to shrink the number of classrooms as part of the renovations, so that there would be four classes in all five grades. And yes (at least in first grade), there are two sets of two classrooms, with one teacher specializing in math/science and the other in reading/humanities; the kids switch classrooms for a few hours each day.[/quote]

[b]To all those naysayers, I also note that there are four Classes In each grade at Peabody, so, if Peabody students do indeed go to Watkins, there's no reason why Watkins' size would prevent it from becoming majority inbound.[/b]

I further note that the demographics in the neighborhood have changed a lot, even since we bought our inbound house.  There are something like 33 inbound families waitlisted for Peabody PS3 this year--those families have to send their kids somewhere.

And the renovations to Watkins will only help attract families.

Now let's hope for a good new principal.
[/quote]

[b]I think it's unclear as to whether every grade at Watkins is 4 classes.  If they start increasing to 5 in the upper grades, then I'd have to think that would let more OOB kids.[/quote][/b]

So that you're clear.  Currently Watkins has four classes at grades 1, 3, and 5.  There are 5 classes at grades 2 and 4.  Next year, Watkins will have 4 classes at each grade level.  There is no plan to increase the number of classes at the upper levels in order to accommodate OOB students.  In response to some parents' concerns about class size, the current Watkins administration, under the auspices of Principal Clemens, has been working to decrease student population by limiting the number of available seats on the lottery.  The administration has planned for student attrition at grade 5.[/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