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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]They fare as well in SOL scores (basic curriculum--which is a very low learning standard for an average to bright elementary student) but not in learning much beyond that because all schools teach to the middle and at those schools the middle is quite different. Your child of parents with advance degrees will do fine at both schools--if "fine" is what you aspire to. You have fewer families at Barcroft and Randolph who have advance degrees, etc. because those parents usually aspire to more than "fine" for their kids. [/quote]

You do understand that the sfh neighborhood's in south Arlington are filled with well educated successful people right? Do you think those homes are full of blue collar workers now? 30 years ago maybe, but not now. This is such a strange train of thought to me. Low level clerks and office workers can't afford homes in south Arlington. [/quote]

Many of the SFH neighborhoods in south Arlington are rental neighborhoods, though, and are "affordable" rentals (since they are small, old, and haven't been rehabbed) so people move around a lot. We live (own) in a SFH neighborhood in 22204 but  in the 9 years I've had kids in the schools there have never been the same kids at our bus stop for more than 2 years.

When the tear-down activity makes more of a difference you may see that in the schools -- ArlNow featured a new build in south Arlington for $1.3M today (good luck) -- but despite the prevalence of SFHs, the rate of home [i]ownership[/i] in 22204 is about half that of 22207.  [/quote]

This is simply not true. "Many" of the neighborhoods in 22204 are not "full" of affordable rentals. Too broad a brush. Some neighborhoods have more rentals than others, and if they aren't rehabbed they tend to be more affordable. But many neighborhoods have few rentals, and those that are rentals are not "affordable." The families who can afford to rent in my neighborhood are state department or military officers who are going to be in the area temporarily and are not looking to buy for that reason alone. Not someone who's getting a subsidy. Even the not-so-nice rentals are too pricey to be considered "affordable," and have groups of single professionals (who are priced out of Clarendon and the R-B corridor) living together instead of poor families.

But back to the schools, families with choices are not choosing to send their kids to the neighborhood schools where more than 50% of the kids are FARMS. That seems to be the point at which parents who have choices make different choices. I think most parents just want to feel that their kids will have a peer group and have access to the same activities they would have if they lived 2 miles to the north, and I think we should be doing more to ensure that parents who have choices WANT the neighborhood school because they are reassured that this will be the case. And if we can achieve this, chances are it won't really make a huge difference in the outcomes of the kids who come from families of means, because most likely these kids will be fine regardless of whether their ES is a 9 or a 4. But integrated schools just might make a world of difference for the child who isn't privileged. More programming classes and chess clubs and math dice and robotics and odyssey of the mind and whatever else and scholarships for those classes/clubs for EVERYONE certainly can't hurt. Sure, some families may still decamp for other locations, always chasing something "better," like the ES with a slide or the HS with the highest avg. SAT scores. But many more middle and UMC families would stay and enroll in their geographically close school if they knew their children would have similar academic experiences regardless of their zip code.

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