The Clarendon/Virginia Square area was not that nice 10 years ago.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In my graduating class [at TC], we had dozens of students attend a college or university ranked in the top 5 nationally, including children of immigrant families attending Harvard, MIT, and a score of other excellent schools.

Really - dozens at Harvard, Yale, Princeton and two others that are in the "top 5 nationally"? Can you back this up? I wasn't aware of any local school, except perhaps TJHSST, where that might be the case. I'd expect parents to move to Alexandria City just for TC Williams if this is true. Or are you taking just a bit of literary license to make a point?

Anonymous wrote:In my graduating class [at TC], we had dozens of students attend a college or university ranked in the top 5 nationally, including children of immigrant families attending Harvard, MIT, and a score of other excellent schools.

Anonymous wrote:We live in Arlington and are very happy with our public schools. We also researched Alexandria schools but decided Arlington was better for us.

Anonymous wrote:The broad brush stroke stereotype of Alexandria is just that (as it might be for Arlington, but I don't know Arlington schools, so can't say). "Alexandria is bascially segregrated" is grossly offensive and comes from someone with a pretty big chip on his/her shoulder. The racial description of TC Williams is off base, offensive, and I doubt comes from someone who has spent much time in our school system.

I graduated from Alexandria public schools and the system is different in terms of scale because there is one high school. All children, rich or poor, those that speak English as a first or second language, etc. go through the system and then to TC. The school system has some of the brightest students in the nation, students that need considerable extra help, and everything in between. In my graduating class, we had dozens of students attend a college or university ranked in the top 5 nationally, including children of immigrant families attending Harvard, MIT, and a score of other excellent schools. And plenty of families with the means don't take to "white flight". As for me, I'm not one of the "really poor black children living in public housing" that makes up the black population of TC... I'm a product of a lower-middle class black family and worked my way through the schools and into and through a top 3 university.

Anonymous wrote:Alexandria is basically seggregated. It has 800 public housing units in north old town. It has a lot of low income apartments in the north end and some on the very west end that cater towards el salvadorean immigrants. In the middle is where the rich white families live (George Mason & MacArthur). So not surprisingly the test scores at George Mason & MaArthur are terrific while those at Houston, Kelly, Maury, etc. are terrible. When it comes time to merge elementary students into Middle schools, white flight takes hold and affluent families flee to the many private middle and high schools in the area. The high schools (they have a 9th grade H.S. and a 10-12 H.S.) is a mix of middle class students (of all races), really poor el salvadorean immigrants, and really poor black children living in public housing. The end result is those middle class students end up doing pretty good and are pretty much separated from the rest. The other 2/3's is kind of like a remedial school with lots of problems.

Arlington is similar except it does not have many public housing units and twice the number of El Salvadorean immigrants living south of Rt. 50. The schools in south Arlington have significant populations of ESL students and they devote a lot of resources trying get them up to speed. The middle class families in South Arlington aggressively try to get into magnet programs or opt for private school. The north side of Arlington is pretty affluent and those schools score through the roof. The middle portion Arlington (i.e. just south of Wilson Blvd., towards Ballston) is much more of a mix. So the test scores for Yorktown are extremely high (among the highest in the country), Washington Lee (high but nowhere near the best schools in the area), and Wakefield is very low. But each schools caters to a widely different demographic and are pretty successful with what they are dealt.

Anonymous wrote:What happens after primary/middle school? I didn't think TC Williams had an IB program at the high school level.