Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SH and a lot of the other DCPS middle schools offer a lot of sports and extracurriculars. The really high-achieving kids are likely to be very busy with some combination of activities like the musical, debate, mock trial, and sports teams, etc. That does not always leave a ton of time for tutoring unless you absolutely need it.

SH offerings are mediocre.

The SH extracurricular offerings are mediocre? That is just a lie. For offerings to student ratio, I'd say SH's are obviously the best of DC public schools. (Deal is the only school that comes close and it is orders of magnitude bigger, so the activities are nowhere near as accessible.)

I understand the instinct to try and feel assured that the school you chose for your kids is fine and that it will all work out.

It's ALSO true that there is a portion of people who feel that SH is simply not offering a good enough education and would not consider it for their kids. and these people are not wrong, either.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SH and a lot of the other DCPS middle schools offer a lot of sports and extracurriculars. The really high-achieving kids are likely to be very busy with some combination of activities like the musical, debate, mock trial, and sports teams, etc. That does not always leave a ton of time for tutoring unless you absolutely need it.

SH offerings are mediocre.

The SH extracurricular offerings are mediocre? That is just a lie. For offerings to student ratio, I'd say SH's are obviously the best of DC public schools. (Deal is the only school that comes close and it is orders of magnitude bigger, so the activities are nowhere near as accessible.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a solution to the problem with schools in this city. But as an educated UMC family EOTP, charters are what kept us in the city to make it work.

We were at an immersion charter and now at DCI as a new family this year. We were at an event this weekend and met a number of other DCI families and wow the backgrounds of these families were impressive - lawyers, CIO, educational executives, etc…. It was also a very diverse group with blacks, white, asians.

It is quite obvious to me now that educated UMC families of all backgrounds and ethnicities are congregating and coalescing among the few acceptable charters for middle school EOTP. It is not by chance that there were so many accomplished families in one event.

If I could send my kid to Stuart-Hobson I totally would. DC is at a supposedly desirable EOTP charter but meh.

I think this is the same Stuart Hobson booster but if it’s a real post I invite you do so some research on the school. It’s objectively a poor performing school.

It’s really not. It has a good OSSE report card with solid performance and growth scores. Its top kids do well on tests and in HS admissions, while having a very robust MS experience with great ECs and truly excellent performance arts. It’s not an accident that SH got over 20 kids into Duke last year. I’m not sure why anyone thinks there’s on SH booster.

Duke Ellington is a performing arts school. It’s not an academic powerhouse. I mean I am thrilled if kids who are good at performance do well here, but the reality is that SH has very little to do with it. Furthermore, the “honors” classes are not even grade level. Kids do really poorly on standardized tests. “Truly excellent” performing arts is 100% in the eye of the booster. I’m glad you’re happy but I’m really glad my kids don’t attend Stuart Hobson.

SH doesn't have "honors" classes; it does track kids, but not like that. So it's interesting that you have opinions on classes that literally don't exist. Why do people come on DCUM to post nonsense about schools they have no connection to? Look, obviously demographics (and, particularly, at risk %age) play into overall test scores and SH is 29% at risk, but if you look at just white kids (since they are virtually certainly to be close to 0% at risk at any DC school), SH actually outperforms BASIS and Hardy and DCI and Latin on ELA CAPE (looking at 4s + 5s); in Math, it's still ahead of all of those schools except for BASIS, which is only at 2% more. Tell me again about the non-grade level classes and kids doing "really poorly"...

I want to be clear that I am not trashing any of those schools. I would have sent me DD to Latin if she lotteried in, because I would love to have a HS plan. She has friends who are very happy at BASIS and if we lived IB for Hardy, I assume she'd go there happily. Also, there are other unnamed schools doing equally well or even better by the metric I just looked at, like Jefferson and Elliot Hine and ITS and Truth. The point is that there are actually a bunch of MS out there working for kids all of which have various pluses and minuses and this weird DCUM line that UMC Hill kids at a school like SH are looking for "easy classes" and or somehow not getting fundamentals is crazy. People hire tutors in MS because their kids aren't doing well... so it's not shocking to hear that the tutor works with kids who aren't doing well at Hill MSes. I'm sure there are plenty of those too! (And it's fair to say that I don't know any parents at SH who hire an individual tutor for "enrichment" given all of the free enrichment offered by the school, so that doesn't really surprise me either. Maybe there are MSes with less on offer where that's more attractive?)

I am thrilled you are so optimistic about Stuart Hobson. However for those who have actual children and are thinking about it you should be aware that the offerings are poor, grade level at Stuart Hobson is considered doing really well, and kids are not being taught well there. Sorry not sorry. Same applies for Truth (actually Stuart would probably be better than truth). Hine has an IB program which is a good curriculum. Finally the reason you don’t know any kids who get a tutor for further enrichment is my biggest issue with SH- kids are just not ambitious. I’m seeing kids who are struggling and not motivated. But if that’s okay with you, fantastic. But lie to less privileged kids who don’t know they’ll be okay. It’s not a good school. It won’t meet your kids needs. If you know your privileged kids will be totally fine whatever happens- go for it. Enjoy the easy commute. But for those less sure, do everything you can to get into another school including moving.

Bumping this thread where the obnoxious tutor talks about enrichment… and says parents who don’t hired tutors for enrichment are “just not ambitious” or maybe that’s their kids, unclear. Just like I said. You’re welcome.

I don’t understand parents who don’t want the best for their kids. I truly don’t.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SH and a lot of the other DCPS middle schools offer a lot of sports and extracurriculars. The really high-achieving kids are likely to be very busy with some combination of activities like the musical, debate, mock trial, and sports teams, etc. That does not always leave a ton of time for tutoring unless you absolutely need it.

SH offerings are mediocre.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SH and a lot of the other DCPS middle schools offer a lot of sports and extracurriculars. The really high-achieving kids are likely to be very busy with some combination of activities like the musical, debate, mock trial, and sports teams, etc. That does not always leave a ton of time for tutoring unless you absolutely need it.

SH offerings are mediocre.

Anonymous wrote:SH and a lot of the other DCPS middle schools offer a lot of sports and extracurriculars. The really high-achieving kids are likely to be very busy with some combination of activities like the musical, debate, mock trial, and sports teams, etc. That does not always leave a ton of time for tutoring unless you absolutely need it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a solution to the problem with schools in this city. But as an educated UMC family EOTP, charters are what kept us in the city to make it work.

We were at an immersion charter and now at DCI as a new family this year. We were at an event this weekend and met a number of other DCI families and wow the backgrounds of these families were impressive - lawyers, CIO, educational executives, etc…. It was also a very diverse group with blacks, white, asians.

It is quite obvious to me now that educated UMC families of all backgrounds and ethnicities are congregating and coalescing among the few acceptable charters for middle school EOTP. It is not by chance that there were so many accomplished families in one event.

If I could send my kid to Stuart-Hobson I totally would. DC is at a supposedly desirable EOTP charter but meh.

I think this is the same Stuart Hobson booster but if it’s a real post I invite you do so some research on the school. It’s objectively a poor performing school.

It’s really not. It has a good OSSE report card with solid performance and growth scores. Its top kids do well on tests and in HS admissions, while having a very robust MS experience with great ECs and truly excellent performance arts. It’s not an accident that SH got over 20 kids into Duke last year. I’m not sure why anyone thinks there’s on SH booster.

Duke Ellington is a performing arts school. It’s not an academic powerhouse. I mean I am thrilled if kids who are good at performance do well here, but the reality is that SH has very little to do with it. Furthermore, the “honors” classes are not even grade level. Kids do really poorly on standardized tests. “Truly excellent” performing arts is 100% in the eye of the booster. I’m glad you’re happy but I’m really glad my kids don’t attend Stuart Hobson.

SH doesn't have "honors" classes; it does track kids, but not like that. So it's interesting that you have opinions on classes that literally don't exist. Why do people come on DCUM to post nonsense about schools they have no connection to? Look, obviously demographics (and, particularly, at risk %age) play into overall test scores and SH is 29% at risk, but if you look at just white kids (since they are virtually certainly to be close to 0% at risk at any DC school), SH actually outperforms BASIS and Hardy and DCI and Latin on ELA CAPE (looking at 4s + 5s); in Math, it's still ahead of all of those schools except for BASIS, which is only at 2% more. Tell me again about the non-grade level classes and kids doing "really poorly"...

I want to be clear that I am not trashing any of those schools. I would have sent me DD to Latin if she lotteried in, because I would love to have a HS plan. She has friends who are very happy at BASIS and if we lived IB for Hardy, I assume she'd go there happily. Also, there are other unnamed schools doing equally well or even better by the metric I just looked at, like Jefferson and Elliot Hine and ITS and Truth. The point is that there are actually a bunch of MS out there working for kids all of which have various pluses and minuses and this weird DCUM line that UMC Hill kids at a school like SH are looking for "easy classes" and or somehow not getting fundamentals is crazy. People hire tutors in MS because their kids aren't doing well... so it's not shocking to hear that the tutor works with kids who aren't doing well at Hill MSes. I'm sure there are plenty of those too! (And it's fair to say that I don't know any parents at SH who hire an individual tutor for "enrichment" given all of the free enrichment offered by the school, so that doesn't really surprise me either. Maybe there are MSes with less on offer where that's more attractive?)

I am thrilled you are so optimistic about Stuart Hobson. However for those who have actual children and are thinking about it you should be aware that the offerings are poor, grade level at Stuart Hobson is considered doing really well, and kids are not being taught well there. Sorry not sorry. Same applies for Truth (actually Stuart would probably be better than truth). Hine has an IB program which is a good curriculum. Finally the reason you don’t know any kids who get a tutor for further enrichment is my biggest issue with SH- kids are just not ambitious. I’m seeing kids who are struggling and not motivated. But if that’s okay with you, fantastic. But lie to less privileged kids who don’t know they’ll be okay. It’s not a good school. It won’t meet your kids needs. If you know your privileged kids will be totally fine whatever happens- go for it. Enjoy the easy commute. But for those less sure, do everything you can to get into another school including moving.

Bumping this thread where the obnoxious tutor talks about enrichment… and says parents who don’t hired tutors for enrichment are “just not ambitious” or maybe that’s their kids, unclear. Just like I said. You’re welcome.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a solution to the problem with schools in this city. But as an educated UMC family EOTP, charters are what kept us in the city to make it work.

We were at an immersion charter and now at DCI as a new family this year. We were at an event this weekend and met a number of other DCI families and wow the backgrounds of these families were impressive - lawyers, CIO, educational executives, etc…. It was also a very diverse group with blacks, white, asians.

It is quite obvious to me now that educated UMC families of all backgrounds and ethnicities are congregating and coalescing among the few acceptable charters for middle school EOTP. It is not by chance that there were so many accomplished families in one event.

If I could send my kid to Stuart-Hobson I totally would. DC is at a supposedly desirable EOTP charter but meh.

I think this is the same Stuart Hobson booster but if it’s a real post I invite you do so some research on the school. It’s objectively a poor performing school.

It’s really not. It has a good OSSE report card with solid performance and growth scores. Its top kids do well on tests and in HS admissions, while having a very robust MS experience with great ECs and truly excellent performance arts. It’s not an accident that SH got over 20 kids into Duke last year. I’m not sure why anyone thinks there’s on SH booster.

Duke Ellington is a performing arts school. It’s not an academic powerhouse. I mean I am thrilled if kids who are good at performance do well here, but the reality is that SH has very little to do with it. Furthermore, the “honors” classes are not even grade level. Kids do really poorly on standardized tests. “Truly excellent” performing arts is 100% in the eye of the booster. I’m glad you’re happy but I’m really glad my kids don’t attend Stuart Hobson.

SH doesn't have "honors" classes; it does track kids, but not like that. So it's interesting that you have opinions on classes that literally don't exist. Why do people come on DCUM to post nonsense about schools they have no connection to? Look, obviously demographics (and, particularly, at risk %age) play into overall test scores and SH is 29% at risk, but if you look at just white kids (since they are virtually certainly to be close to 0% at risk at any DC school), SH actually outperforms BASIS and Hardy and DCI and Latin on ELA CAPE (looking at 4s + 5s); in Math, it's still ahead of all of those schools except for BASIS, which is only at 2% more. Tell me again about the non-grade level classes and kids doing "really poorly"...

I want to be clear that I am not trashing any of those schools. I would have sent me DD to Latin if she lotteried in, because I would love to have a HS plan. She has friends who are very happy at BASIS and if we lived IB for Hardy, I assume she'd go there happily. Also, there are other unnamed schools doing equally well or even better by the metric I just looked at, like Jefferson and Elliot Hine and ITS and Truth. The point is that there are actually a bunch of MS out there working for kids all of which have various pluses and minuses and this weird DCUM line that UMC Hill kids at a school like SH are looking for "easy classes" and or somehow not getting fundamentals is crazy. People hire tutors in MS because their kids aren't doing well... so it's not shocking to hear that the tutor works with kids who aren't doing well at Hill MSes. I'm sure there are plenty of those too! (And it's fair to say that I don't know any parents at SH who hire an individual tutor for "enrichment" given all of the free enrichment offered by the school, so that doesn't really surprise me either. Maybe there are MSes with less on offer where that's more attractive?)

I am thrilled you are so optimistic about Stuart Hobson. However for those who have actual children and are thinking about it you should be aware that the offerings are poor, grade level at Stuart Hobson is considered doing really well, and kids are not being taught well there. Sorry not sorry. Same applies for Truth (actually Stuart would probably be better than truth). Hine has an IB program which is a good curriculum. Finally the reason you don’t know any kids who get a tutor for further enrichment is my biggest issue with SH- kids are just not ambitious. I’m seeing kids who are struggling and not motivated. But if that’s okay with you, fantastic. But lie to less privileged kids who don’t know they’ll be okay. It’s not a good school. It won’t meet your kids needs. If you know your privileged kids will be totally fine whatever happens- go for it. Enjoy the easy commute. But for those less sure, do everything you can to get into another school including moving.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Ballou stays open because DCPS provides a by right high school within a certain distance of every address in the city. Merging with Anacostia would not achieve that.

I would love to know what you think this “certain distance” is because… have you seen the Dunbar catchment?

The distance thing is a planning goal. It's not an entitlement to individuals. They aren't going to open a new school to meet the goal, especially when there are other high schools in the area that are not overcrowded. HD Woodson, Eastern, and McKinley Tech conveniently serve a portion of students zoned for Dunbar, as do charters such as Latin and WLA, and Dunbar is not overcrowded, so DCPS doesn't view this as a problem even those things Dunbar's zone is bigger than technically desirable. But that doesn't mean other schools should also have a massive zone.

DCPS closed a lot of schools in past decades and came to regret it. And DCPS needs to maintain some extra capacity just in case it's needed, and to absorb kids from charters that fail. If, say, Thurgood Marshall Academy were to close, putting nearly 400 kids out, Ballou and Anacostia would have to absorb many of them. Even on zero notice.

This person DCPSes. Spot on.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Ballou stays open because DCPS provides a by right high school within a certain distance of every address in the city. Merging with Anacostia would not achieve that.

I would love to know what you think this “certain distance” is because… have you seen the Dunbar catchment?

The distance thing is a planning goal. It's not an entitlement to individuals. They aren't going to open a new school to meet the goal, especially when there are other high schools in the area that are not overcrowded. HD Woodson, Eastern, and McKinley Tech conveniently serve a portion of students zoned for Dunbar, as do charters such as Latin and WLA, and Dunbar is not overcrowded, so DCPS doesn't view this as a problem even those things Dunbar's zone is bigger than technically desirable. But that doesn't mean other schools should also have a massive zone.

DCPS closed a lot of schools in past decades and came to regret it. And DCPS needs to maintain some extra capacity just in case it's needed, and to absorb kids from charters that fail. If, say, Thurgood Marshall Academy were to close, putting nearly 400 kids out, Ballou and Anacostia would have to absorb many of them. Even on zero notice.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Ballou stays open because DCPS provides a by right high school within a certain distance of every address in the city. Merging with Anacostia would not achieve that.

I would love to know what you think this “certain distance” is because… have you seen the Dunbar catchment?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Ballou stays open because DCPS provides a by right high school within a certain distance of every address in the city. Merging with Anacostia would not achieve that.

I would love to know what you think this “certain distance” is because… have you seen the Dunbar catchment?

Anonymous wrote:
Ballou stays open because DCPS provides a by right high school within a certain distance of every address in the city. Merging with Anacostia would not achieve that.