Anonymous
Post 01/25/2013 11:42     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
9:53 poster here. To 11:23: I guess this just goes to my point -- LT in-bounds families are not willing to stay, we all know that, but more important that that, what could we voice to DCPS? That the current principal "doesn't support us"? Sounds too vague. Maybe the better approach is for all in-bounds LT families to continue to avoid the school and hope that it lands on the closure list.

All I know is that I can see Prospect LC from my window, and I won't like having to pass it by each day on my way to LT...
Anonymous
Post 01/25/2013 11:23     Subject: Re:SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Our child started at LT this fall...we are inbounds and and we felt that it would be a nice place for 2 years, especially given the number of neighborhood friends of our child's who would be there too. We fortunately ended up getting a call from another school a few weeks in and made the switch.

My experience at LT is limited, but the comparison of the parent and administrative involvement of LT and where we are now is huge. At LT I felt like, ok, we can have a good teacher and a nice experience, but where we are now functions as a whole. The administration knows the kids by name, its friendly, lots of organized school events and its just a different feel. That I think is a huge part of the lack of mobilization at LT...there is so much to be done there that needs to start with the administration and we need one there who supports change.

I would and should do my part to help this along and really think it has to begin with the principal there. I have talked with many former parents there who said they had put in huge efforts only to be shut down by the longer standing PTA members and the principal and ultimately decided it wasn't worth their time. This is hearsay, but I don't doubt it for a minute.
Anonymous
Post 01/25/2013 09:53     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Prospective LT parent here. I visited and I wasn't impressed. A little down about it actually. But the question for all those people who are telling the LT community to mobilize: what's our gripe exactly? That the school is 80% out-of-boundary and not representative of the community? Well the school is there for the taking, it just seems like none of the in-boundary families are taking it.
Anonymous
Post 01/25/2013 06:51     Subject: Re:SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
^Yes, they get left out in the cold because they're not a cohesive group wit a reform vision & drive, like the Maury, SWS & Brent PTA parents. We switched from LT to Maury 2 years ago. But like a lot of Maury middle class families, not sure if we'll stay past 2nd grade. May go private. SWS would have been just our thing if there'd been space.

If people really don't like two elem schools with a citywide draw in the same little area of Captl Hill, talk to the WasPos!!
Anonymous
Post 01/25/2013 04:03     Subject: Re:SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:I also think it is downright absurd that the only two citywide elementary schools are both on Capitol Hill, when the Capitol Hill community has enough young families to support more high quality neighborhood schools. Ward 3 would never stand for it.

Tommy Wells, where are ya?


No, Ward 3 wouldn't because parents there are much more of a political force than here. Not only are the 2 schools on the Hill, they're both on the fringes of the LT District. Wells listens to the ossified Cluster leadership--you have a point 10:42--and hardly anybody else on education. In the decade that I've been on the Hill education scene, I have yet to see IB LT parents get organized to lobby his office. They'd be rid of Principal Cobbs by now if they had,



Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 18:32     Subject: Re:SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
When I purchased my home it was inbounds for the cluster. The next year the rules changed and my home (and block) were no longer inbounds for the cluster and the only option was LT. Fortunately we at least had a proximity preference for Peabody - I can literally see it from my window!-and it enabled inbound enrollment in the cluster. But I was certainly frustrated by that shift. So I get why some of the cluster families are unhappy with the SWS boundary changes. I hope that frustration does not lead them to try to undermine the growth of the school - if you have an excellent program, why not expand it?

And I think given that DCPS was changing the boundaries in a year that it would have made sense to keep the boundaries the same and visit the SWS boundaries when all of the boundaries were considered. DCPS apparently disagreed.

I also think it is downright absurd that the only two citywide elementary schools are both on Capitol Hill, when the Capitol Hill community has enough young families to support more high quality neighborhood schools. Ward 3 would never stand for it.

Tommy Wells, where are ya?
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 15:42     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?


What do you mean by the bolded? The Two Rivers suit? Or the long ago formation of the Cluster, including Stuart Hobson as the MS of right? If the latter, you probably also know that the Brent non-inclusion as a SH feeder (to Jefferson instead, I believe) was as much being pushed by Brent parent(s) leaders as any effort from Cluster side at the time.


Please, the fact that nobody outside the Cluster much likes their leadership is hardly breaking news. The outmoded brand of inclusiveness the Cluster preaches is causing the several schools to lose ground, and giving us all headaches. Look at the percentage of white kids dropping at Watkins and SH in recent years and ask why. Could it be that distant charters, especially Inspired Teaching, BASIS and Washington Latin are a whole lot more upper-middle-class friendly? Shock.

Nonsense that Brent didn't, and doesn't, want a SH feeder in this decade if that's what you mean; they didn't want the feeder on the terms of myopic and territorial Cluster parents fighting honors courses/a gifted program and logical feeds enabling the middle-class Hill cohort to group at the school. A lone antagonist from Brent wanted Jefferson as a feed in 2008, and he's landed at BASIS. Look at how Cluster parents are coopting SWS, in the short-term anyway, in the hopes of avoiding lack of challenge and a good situation socially for their own children in Watkins' upper grades. Meanwhile, the Brent PTA pays for pullout instruction for advanced learners, causing yet more Watkins attrition. We'd have one Deal quality middle school on the Hill if it weren't for Cluster parents playing their many political cards in a self-serving, and ultimately self-defeating way. Any chance that all of you will take an interest in space tourism? Growth field.







Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 15:19     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:What if DCPS allowed SWS to flourish for a few years, and then BOOM - closed LT down and allowed SWS to inherit its catchment area . . . ? Then you'd have something.


Not necessarily - many struggling LT students are bona fide IB kids. Take four crazy little ones being raised by a great-grandmother, a homeowner on my F St. block. The mom, a drug addict who's in and out of jail and the Capitol Hill Towers with various men, says she isn't going anywhere. Where would such kids be dispatched if LT shut - Watkins? SWS? Maury? You'd have them disrupting class as the focus of a teacher's attention anywhere you dropped them but a super regimented KIPP school.

I marvel at how poorly some of the Hill yuppies plan and research options where ES choice is concerned. We've spent years saving to buy the right Brent District fixer to escape both LT and charter lottery stress. Now we get to spend every weekend in the forseeable future renovating said property to be at Brent. Why do so many parents let LT happen to them? They buy into the ANC 6C view that the school is on the up and up (a waiting list every year!), try preschool, realize that LT is going nowhere and pitch fits on DCUM. Why should other high-SES Hill parents be sympathetic to LT refugees, after all the heavy lifting and political capital building they've done (including the under-handed Cluster variant) to build the schools they have, both DCPS and charter?






What do you mean by the bolded? The Two Rivers suit? Or the long ago formation of the Cluster, including Stuart Hobson as the MS of right? If the latter, you probably also know that the Brent non-inclusion as a SH feeder (to Jefferson instead, I believe) was as much being pushed by Brent parent(s) leaders as any effort from Cluster side at the time.
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 15:08     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:What if DCPS allowed SWS to flourish for a few years, and then BOOM - closed LT down and allowed SWS to inherit its catchment area . . . ? Then you'd have something.


Not necessarily - many struggling LT students are bona fide IB kids. Take four crazy little ones being raised by a great-grandmother, a homeowner on my F St. block. The mom, a drug addict who's in and out of jail and the Capitol Hill Towers with various men, says she isn't going anywhere. Where would such kids be dispatched if LT shut - Watkins? SWS? Maury? You'd have them disrupting class as the focus of a teacher's attention anywhere you dropped them but a super regimented KIPP school.

I marvel at how poorly some of the Hill yuppies plan and research options where ES choice is concerned. We've spent years saving to buy the right Brent District fixer to escape both LT and charter lottery stress. Now we get to spend every weekend in the forseeable future renovating said property to be at Brent. Why do so many parents let LT happen to them? They buy into the ANC 6C view that the school is on the up and up (a waiting list every year!), try preschool, realize that LT is going nowhere and pitch fits on DCUM. Why should other high-SES Hill parents be sympathetic to LT refugees, after all the heavy lifting and political capital building they've done (including the under-handed Cluster variant) to build the schools they have, both DCPS and charter?




Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 14:57     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:So this thread is basically three things. 1., Would-be/soon-to-be Cluster parents angry that they've lost out on SWS; 2., IB LT parents just angry because, well, go visit LT; and 3., hopelessly optimistic OOB parents thinking this gives them a chance at SWS (it doesn't). Sad for everyone.


I'd say that's a solid summary.
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 14:05     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
What if DCPS allowed SWS to flourish for a few years, and then BOOM - closed LT down and allowed SWS to inherit its catchment area . . . ? Then you'd have something.
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 13:59     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:So this thread is basically three things. 1., Would-be/soon-to-be Cluster parents angry that they've lost out on SWS; 2., IB LT parents just angry because, well, go visit LT; and 3., hopelessly optimistic OOB parents thinking this gives them a chance at SWS (it doesn't). Sad for everyone.


Everyone's "OOB" now. Are you saying that SWS isn't going to admit anyone next year? Or that all the PS and PK slots will be filled with siblings?
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 13:51     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
So this thread is basically three things. 1., Would-be/soon-to-be Cluster parents angry that they've lost out on SWS; 2., IB LT parents just angry because, well, go visit LT; and 3., hopelessly optimistic OOB parents thinking this gives them a chance at SWS (it doesn't). Sad for everyone.
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 13:08     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:

Let's not forget that Cap Hill Day School recently spent a full school year in a temporary space -- pods, trailers, whatever -- at the SE Waterfront. It's not like they discounted tuition or bled enrollment.


It was actually 1/2 a year, and they knew where and when they would be moving back. It was a different situation at SWS-- no one knew where the permanent site was going to be.



I'm actually going to miss the Annex. It's a lot nicer than some permanent schools I've seen, albeit cramped. There's some degree of calculated risk and reward too. What was the worst case scenario for an IB SWS family making the call last year? An unsatisfactory year and switching to Watkins or testing lottery/charters? The upside is 6-8 years of access to a program which is a good fit for DC. The next risk is MS, but that's one shared pretty equally by Hill ES communities. As the Chancellor stated yesterdary, there will be new boundaries in place by 2014-2015, as well as plans for a new Ward 6 neighborhood school for the SE Waterfront area in the Van Ness building.

Of course that doesn't help anyone denied the future opportunity for boundary preference for their toddler or infant at SWS PK, but last year some IB families did enter, stay in or switch to the Cluster -- for reasons of their own, which may have been sibling colocation, program preference, risk aversion . . . ? I certainly couldn't speak to everyone's considerations.
Anonymous
Post 01/24/2013 12:18     Subject: SWS moving to Prospect LC building?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Pre expansion SWS offered a whopping 2 years of EC, after which it fed to ... Watkins. The SWS community wanted to extend SWS more than avoid Watkins. Plenty of SWS kids have older siblings at Watkins, so there are families vested in both schools.

And I'm sorry, but if you don't believe SWS was on the chopping block after having its budget slashed you seriously don't know what you're talking about.


Plenty of SWS kids also leave for K at St. Peters and CHDS. This is going to be interesting for all those private/parochial school- intending parents who have used SWS as a free way to get EC. I will enjoy the show, but think this is bad for SWS and for the Hill in general.


Even with a move to temporary space, there was not a whole lot of attrition (roughly 3/4 rose from SWS at Peabody to SWS at Logan). And as a previous commenter noted, much of that attrition was SWS to PEABODY.

... you enjoy!


I'm sure not all parents were interested in the trailers without an end game in sight at that point. . .


people who knew the program well were confident they'd make the pods work. some of us were pleasantly surprised it was only one year and not two at Logan as initially proposed.

Let's not forget that Cap Hill Day School recently spent a full school year in a temporary space -- pods, trailers, whatever -- at the SE Waterfront. It's not like they discounted tuition or bled enrollment.


It was actually 1/2 a year, and they knew where and when they would be moving back. It was a different situation at SWS-- no one knew where the permanent site was going to be.