Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 20:45     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:Honestly Lee's stats are so bad and you live just as close to Breakthrough, why even have Lee on the list?


I can't imagine traveling 20+ minutes to go to Breakthrough
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 19:14     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
I'd do Francis and ITDS above the rest because of the middle school options. Euclid middle is a big question mark. Plus ITDS has no boundary so you won't be OOB, you're just like everyone else.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 19:04     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
We've been at ITDS for a long time and love it. The education is great (and has gotten better over the years we've been there!), the community is wonderful, and my kids have loved it. The Middle School is quite good, and even if you want to try to lottery to Latin, Basis, or DCI for MS, you know you have a great back up that also does a great job of getting kids placed well for high school.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 17:25     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:How about Marie Reed and Ross then? We are at MR and playing the MS lottery for next year and will be skipping John Francis due to lack of higher math classes compared to some other middle schools - if that's something that matters to you.


With younger kids I wouldn't pass up Francis for that reason. I know a lot of parents want the math to change and it is in general DCPS policy to offer geometry in 8th. So I expect it will happen in the next few years.


People have been saying that for years... it didn't happen in time for it to work for my now-middle-schooler so not sure what would prompt the change.


What would prompt it is the change in policy coming from downtown. When it was just some people trying to get their school to have it, that was one thing. When the central office wants the bigger schools to all have it, that's different.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 17:21     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:How about Marie Reed and Ross then? We are at MR and playing the MS lottery for next year and will be skipping John Francis due to lack of higher math classes compared to some other middle schools - if that's something that matters to you.


With younger kids I wouldn't pass up Francis for that reason. I know a lot of parents want the math to change and it is in general DCPS policy to offer geometry in 8th. So I expect it will happen in the next few years.


People have been saying that for years... it didn't happen in time for it to work for my now-middle-schooler so not sure what would prompt the change.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 17:13     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:How about Marie Reed and Ross then? We are at MR and playing the MS lottery for next year and will be skipping John Francis due to lack of higher math classes compared to some other middle schools - if that's something that matters to you.


With younger kids I wouldn't pass up Francis for that reason. I know a lot of parents want the math to change and it is in general DCPS policy to offer geometry in 8th. So I expect it will happen in the next few years.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 17:02     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
How about Marie Reed and Ross then? We are at MR and playing the MS lottery for next year and will be skipping John Francis due to lack of higher math classes compared to some other middle schools - if that's something that matters to you.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 16:31     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Honestly Lee's stats are so bad and you live just as close to Breakthrough, why even have Lee on the list?
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 16:14     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Your list is geographically all over the place. What's that about?


OP here. We're in Columbia Heights - all these schools are a reasonable commute to us (except possibly John Francis).


OP again just to note that this isn't our whole lis, just the ones we wish we had a bit more info on.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 16:10     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:Your list is geographically all over the place. What's that about?


OP here. We're in Columbia Heights - all these schools are a reasonable commute to us (except possibly John Francis).
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 14:53     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Your list is geographically all over the place. What's that about?
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 14:45     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Would love to get some recent first hand experiences with any of the following schools:

Garrison
Inspired Teaching
John Francis
Lee
John Lewis
EL Haynes
Seaton

We're currently finalizing our lottery lists for our rising K and first grader. We're looking for a school that will take us all the way to 4th or 5th grade.

Particularly - do you feel good about staying through late elementary? How is differentiation in the upper grades (particularly for above grade level students)? How much time would you guess your kid is spending on screens? Does it feel valuable or like it's too much? How's the community?

Would love any and all insight. Thanks so much.


This is how I would rank these:

John Francis
Garrison
John Lewis
Inspired Teaching
Seaton
EL Haynes
Lee


You gotta love DCUM, man. Someone comes on asking for personal experiences at some schools and some yahoo says "just order your list this way." Do you expect her to just be like "oh, okay" and copy and paste your list?
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 14:36     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Anonymous wrote:Would love to get some recent first hand experiences with any of the following schools:

Garrison
Inspired Teaching
John Francis
Lee
John Lewis
EL Haynes
Seaton

We're currently finalizing our lottery lists for our rising K and first grader. We're looking for a school that will take us all the way to 4th or 5th grade.

Particularly - do you feel good about staying through late elementary? How is differentiation in the upper grades (particularly for above grade level students)? How much time would you guess your kid is spending on screens? Does it feel valuable or like it's too much? How's the community?

Would love any and all insight. Thanks so much.


This is how I would rank these:

John Francis
Garrison
John Lewis
Inspired Teaching
Seaton
EL Haynes
Lee
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 12:56     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
ITDS is pretty good on differentiation upwards, and you would have the option of staying for middle which is pretty good. I feel fine about the amount of screens, which I guess is a medium amount. People tend to care less about this as their kid gets older. I appreciate ITDS' emphasis on math fluency and am fine with it being delivered by screen games.

Lee's test scores are so low relative to demographics, I can't see how you would be happy there if that's your main concern.
Anonymous
Post 01/15/2026 12:52     Subject: Recent Experiences (K-5): Garrison, ITS, John Francis, Lee, John Lewis, Haynes, Seaton
Would love to get some recent first hand experiences with any of the following schools:

Garrison
Inspired Teaching
John Francis
Lee
John Lewis
EL Haynes
Seaton

We're currently finalizing our lottery lists for our rising K and first grader. We're looking for a school that will take us all the way to 4th or 5th grade.

Particularly - do you feel good about staying through late elementary? How is differentiation in the upper grades (particularly for above grade level students)? How much time would you guess your kid is spending on screens? Does it feel valuable or like it's too much? How's the community?

Would love any and all insight. Thanks so much.