Anonymous wrote:Powell was Kaya first stop today. The article also points out the changes in the neighborhood.


http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/housingcomplex/2013/08/26/back-to-school-with-mayor-gray-and-chancellor-henderson/

Anonymous wrote:Has Powell mailed out their packets which includes which teacher your child has, school supply list etc?

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to be negative about Powell--I've heard good things about it. But I think the biggest difference is that from what I know/read, middle class families are not staying at Powell past K. At Bancroft, a handful of middle class families have been staying through 5th for the last few years. Believe me, this makes a huge difference to your social interactions and your child's experience at the school. Your child's best friend, like or not, is probably going to be from an English speaking, educated family.

As for test scores, read what you will into them, but one difference between Powell and Bancroft is that (as far as I know) Bancroft has had bilingual instruction for all kids through 5th for many years, while at Powell and most of the other dual language DCPS schools (except Oyster), the program either stops after the lower grades or only some classes are bilingual. I think some schools are moving to all-bilingual all the way through, but they're not there yet. I've been told that this will affect test scores. Kids spending only half their class time on English instruction won't score as well on a test in English. However, I've also been told that the kids eventually catch up, and that you can see this in Bancroft's grade by grade test scores--the scores rise from 3rd grade to 5th.

The new principal at Bancroft isn't Hispanic, but she's bilingual, which our previous principal was not. Many Bancroft parents think having a bilingual principal at our bilingual school is important.

OP, you may get off the Bancroft waitlist (it can move into early October). If you don't get it, take the spot at Powell and see how it goes, then you can always move to Bancroft for K--seems like it should be pretty seamless for your child since the schools are similar.

Anonymous wrote:We are inbounds for Powell and visited both before getting a Powell lottery spot. Our preschooler starts at Powell this month. Our Powell visit showed kids really engaged in learning. They just seemed so absorbed. The principal spoke with us about plans and the staff we spoke with all seemed on board. They are on their way to new facilities, growing and the neighborhood seems to be cluing in that they've got something good going on.

At Bancroft the visit seemed different. A sprawling campus, and the principal seemed to make it seem like some things were in flux, like language. The classrooms seemed OK, but looser, with less Spanish in use as well. Teachers didn't seem as uniformly committed to the method there.

We felt pretty good about Powell on the test scores too, especially compared to Bancroft. If a school that has higher FARM and ELL numbers does as well as the school with the supersized waitlist, they must really do something good. It seemed a lot like Bancroft but without the hype.

Anonymous wrote:We are inbounds for Powell and visited both before getting a Powell lottery spot. Our preschooler starts at Powell this month. Our Powell visit showed kids really engaged in learning. They just seemed so absorbed. The principal spoke with us about plans and the staff we spoke with all seemed on board. They are on their way to new facilities, growing and the neighborhood seems to be cluing in that they've got something good going on.

At Bancroft the visit seemed different. A sprawling campus, and the principal seemed to make it seem like some things were in flux, like language. The classrooms seemed OK, but looser, with less Spanish in use as well. Teachers didn't seem as uniformly committed to the method there.

We felt pretty good about Powell on the test scores too, especially compared to Bancroft. If a school that has higher FARM and ELL numbers does as well as the school with the supersized waitlist, they must really do something good. It seemed a lot like Bancroft but without the hype.