Reply to DC's School Report Cards are up. Any surprises?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Again for those who missed it: Stuart-Hobson has nearly identical CAPE scores and other quantitative metrics to DCI.

DCI has slightly more kids meeting or exceeding expectations in math (60.9% to 57.2%). S-H has slightly more kids meeting or exceeding expectations in ELA (59.9% to 56.8%).

They have near identical chronic absentee rates (just under 20% for both). S-H has a better teacher retention rate (84% to 73%).

S-H is easier to get into OOB than DCI is to get into without coming from a feeder. However, it's not that hard to access a feeder for either school -- if you are willing to change schools in 3rd/4th/5th, both have feeders where you are very likely or guaranteed a spot via lottery.

The biggest advantage of DCI is the HS. For MS, there is no advantage unless the language component is very important to you. If your preferred HS is a private or application school anyway, there's no real difference.[/quote]

[b]There is a huge advantage to DCI over SH because DCI is able to meet the top students where they are and challenge them.  Kids are not in classes with other kids who are 3 or 4 grade levels apart.  They actually work to place kids by ability with most subjects, and the only middle school in this city that I know that uses standardized test scores as part of this placement in addition to grades and teachers recs.  
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So the lower performing kids are not in the same classes as the top performing kids.  The top kids get more depth and challenge to meet them where they are.  In addition, based on standardized test scores, the lower kids automatically get more classes in ELA, math etc.. instead of an elective so more support.  It is not optional, they are placed in it.

This is how DCI is able to meet the needs of both the high and low performing students. In addition, they have high standards to be placed in the higher ability classes.  For instance the highest track math class, the requirement is 90% or higher in math on standardized tests.  So there are no kids in the class who should not be in it and the class can go deeper and be much more challenging. Not so with DCPS middle schools where OSSE doesn’t believe in tracking because of equity.  BTW, DCI has multiple levels of math classes.

Also you should look at test scores more.  I suspect lots of kids at SH are getting tutors to try to get the kids up to speed.  It sounds like the tutor in this post has lots of these kids from DCPS middle schools in CH.

Lastly, the high school is even better because there are multiple official tracks for kids to actually pick where their interests lies.  The school also realizes that not all kids are destined for college and has some vocational tracks that will give kids the skills they need to get jobs after high school.[/quote]

This part is ironic, because SH uses standardized test scores to track students (as do EH and Jefferson per their open houses).[/quote]

So does Deal. In fact, my impression is that standardized tests are how DCPS tracks students as a general matter?[/quote]

That's right. I think the DCI conversations get a little weird because virtually no family at DCI has experience with DCPS (since they all went into charter immersions feeders in ECE). [/quote]

Yes, it's really odd. At least do a little research before you opine! DCPS definitely does track math in middle school, at least at some schools.

At ITDS, all 8th graders are in algebra (absent a compelling reason not to be) but Geometry placement is based on all available data. That means coursework, class tests, MAP, CAPE, summer school, everything. This probably wouldn't be doable for bigger schools but for a small student body it's manageable. DCI is definitely, definitely not the only middle school that uses testing in math placement. [/quote]

Can you take algebra 2 as an 8th grader?  DCI has that option as well. Curious to see if dcps has that. And what metric do they use to get placement? CAPE?[/quote]

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