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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The problem OP is this board skews wealthy and white so they only talk about Ward 3 or Capitol Hill area, which is not zoned for the Ward 3 high school. They have a deep fear of minorities and judge everything solely on test scores. You don’t get a very good picture of DC schools here. [/quote]

Not even worth discussing other schools bc they’ll just get shouted down. This is the last place I’d go for advice[/quote]

Are there non-application DCPS high schools other than JR that have more than 20% of kids on grade level (based on test scores)?   Honest question. [/quote]

I don't know. But test scores don't equal good schools.

And the circle of nonsense begins anew[/quote]

What exactly does this mean?   Test scores reflect how academically prepared students are, and most parents with options don’t want their kids to be or to go to school with mostly kids who are multiple grade levels behind.

Please explain your thinking here. [/quote]

Not my post, but I'll explain as I feel similarly. Likely in the minority here as I am a Black mom to a Black boy, middle class. My son started out a diverse charter school. Pretty good scores, highly rated on charter rating scales at the time. Pulled him from this school because class sizes got larger and he wasn't getting the support/instruction he needed. (Very kind, respectful kid at school though). Used to lottery to get him into an elementary school on CH. This school was not diverse, but students and teachers were welcoming. However, teachers pushed and pushed for him to be tested for SPED. Which he ended up not qualifying for in spite of their insistence. This school had AMAZING test scores though. Guess my kid messed this up.  :roll:

Now, my son is an 8th grader at a school that is not highly sought after here. Overall school scores were not amazing last year, but his were good and the highest he's ever had. He's in the accelerated math cohort and thriving and now headed to high school. What I believe what he truly needed was teachers who are ACTUALLY TEACHING. He had some of those at the second ES, but in general most kids there were already above grade level I guess. He still has work to do, I still support him at home. However, if I picked school based on test scores alone, he might still not be getting the support he needs when he is at school every day. [/quote]

There are kids who live in abject poverty, with violence, are malnourished and live on the streets who grow up to be world renowned mathematicians, doctors and the like. By your way of thinking those factors are immaterial to success because a kid escaped. You would be wrong.

It is great that your kid has a positive outcome. But there is no world in which the quality of education for a classroom filled with kids below grade level is better or the same as a classroom filled with kids who are at or above grade level.

People like you who say "test scores don't matter" really mean to say "test scores don't mean everything or guarantee success". The latter is right, but those two things are not the same. Kids at grade level or not is not about the color of your black son. The fact that you interject that little fact is at once nonsense and offensive. DC's tests are not culturally biased. If 5% of a school is at grade level it is because 5% know the minimum to achieve that score, and the scoring sheets don't know what color you are.

If your argument is that caring about high test scores and objective measures of academic success is racist then you aren't hurting people who are succeeding. You are perpetuating a culture of lowered expectations and hurting your kids and others like them. [/quote]

Are you Asian?[/quote]

Nope. Sorry to disappoint your stereotype.[/quote]

I like your strong opinions. Can I ask where you would recommend sending kids to school in DC or MD?[/quote]

I know nothing about schools in MD. I don't live IB for JKLM (or Deal, Hyde or JR). For those reasons I don't consider myself qualified to speak about those schools (although JR is much larger than I think would be a good fit for my kid). We didn't love our IB ES but got lucky in the lottery for PK3. It was great in ECE and failed us in upper elementary. Latin and BASIS were the only two viable MS options. SH would have swallowed up my kid. TR, ITDS and that ilk have middling rigor that does not meet our needs. We have experience there; those schools benefit from UMC families whose performance on tests is mostly about their advantages by birth. I can assure you they are light years behind what our kid was exposed to when we escaped. Fortunately we got very lucking in the lottery again. I think we would have considered a move had we not gotten lucky. There are no non-charter non-application HS in DC we would for even a second consider. For now we think our charter will work through 12th, but who knows. We have a couple of years before it is decision time. If we need to make a change in 9h and application HS are not an option, we might move or pay for private. We are fortunate to have the means to pony up for private tuition if necessary, although we'd rather not. I don't think we'd move outside of DC just for HS.

Our experience matches that of a lot of Capitol Hill families. We love DC and want to stay. But our liberal views didn't extend to subjecting our kid to underperforming schools if the classes are filled mostly with kids below grade level to prove some sort of liberal street cred. It makes me upset to watch DC institutionalize underperformance as a sign of equity or to just accept that kids from less privileged backgrounds can't excel if excellence is demanded. I get angry that we allow kids to just get advanced up and through HS graduation because some well meaning person decided that holding kids back made them feel bad. DCUM is filled with people who like to present a false choice between having 17 year old's in 6th grade or allowing kids with no education to graduate. As if it is binary. DCUM is filled with people who want to justify or explain why a school with only a small % at or above grade level is OK or won't impact classroom management or rigor. That's nonsense.

My advice is get lucky in the lottery. It makes my stomach turn to type those words. [/quote]

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