Reply to Surplussing the old Hardy School, again

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]For what it's worth, I see the stats show that the IB % for Hardy MS is growing.   It used to be 12% a year or two ago IIRC; now it's 15% according to the DCPS website.    Much more of a concern though is the Hardy MS math and reading proficiency.  They are 15-20 percentage points below that of Deale.

I hear the old Hardy/Lab building is too small for a modern DCPS school, whether elementary or middle school, so perhaps it works well as an overflow building for Lab.  I agree with a prior poster who wondered about the to-be-sold GDS school on MacArthur -- I'd love to see DCPS buy that space and renovate it into a new school.  While I'd like to see a new middle school as an option other than Hardy MS, perhaps what NW DC needs is another high school other than Wilson (Ellington doesn't "count" as a regular NW DCPS high school due to its arts focus).  If NW DC had a high school option there, I think NWDC would be more accepting of Hardy MS out of a desire for continuity -- DCPS from K-12 -- and all at DCPS schools in NW DC.  Some have said DCPS wouldn't buy a school (like GDS) because they already have too much excess real estate; however, that's not the case I don't think for NW DC.  And, GDS would probably be a bargain compared to the recent renovation costs the city has recently been enduring, such as for Ellington and Dunbar (not to mention Wilson and others).  [/quote]
I too have heard that the cost to renovate the Old Hardy School is prohibitive, and that the reason for the jaw-dropping fifty-year term of the proposed lease is primarily so that Lab can see some return on its investment after making these expensive repairs. That sounds reasonable, until you look at the equally jaw-dropping sums that DCPS is plowing into underutilized facilities elsewhere in the District simply to make political hay.

I also live near GDS and would love to see a DCPS school go in there -- it's right on the stretch of MacArthur that was almost re-zoned from Key to Hyde -- but it wouldn't likely be a high school. The GDS campus is currently a lower-middle school and would also require capital improvements before a high school would work well there. And I don't see DCPS investing in a fixer-upper in order to establish a new NW high school, particularly at a location so poorly-served by public transit and difficult to reach even by car.  Perhaps we can dream about a charter middle school...[/quote]

The GDS Macarthur site is very tight from a parking and drop-off perspective.  Even members of the community acknowledge this.  Some even claim that the Obamas were all set to enroll at GDS instead of Sidwell back in 2008, but that the Secret Service vetoed GDS because the access and egress points were so jammed up.  Take the story with a big grain of salt, but there it is.

My guess is that GDS will sell to a developer who pay top dollar and then raze the school and plunk down McMansions on the site, of the type that already exist next to GDS.[/quote]

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