Anonymous wrote:So if you don't get into the Charters for MS where do you go? I thought privates at MS were hard to get into at that point. Do families just move?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, the main thing that's holding Jefferson back is the lack of definite rigor. They don't seem to offer many true honors/intensified classes. Few UMC feeder parents are sold on their vague "we differentiate marvelously!" pledge. The lack of diversity doesn't help either. Where are the Asian students? There seem to be zero and only a tiny number of whites.

Jefferson has an accelerated math track with admission based on test scores and other specified metrics.

The school is 1.1% Asian (as compared with DCPS overall, which is 2% Asian).

I fully believe that Jefferson’s primary impediment to attracting more Capitol Hill kids is its location. Overall, however, it’s among the more popular middle schools in the city, with a waitlist that consistently exceeds the number of offers made.

If this were true, wouldn't Stuart Hobson have been popular with IB families for years? After all, the school is just a few blocks from Union Station and Stanton Park. Yet SH has yet to take off as a neighborhood middle school. These are tough schools. Not dangerous, but full of low SES kids leading tough lives, which turns off most UMC Ward 6 parents (though they'd be hard pressed to admit it). There's still not much in the way of definite academic tracking in DCPS middle schools, really just for math, even in 8th grade. Rigor remains insufficient and enrichment weak compared to privates, the better charters and the high-performing suburban schools in the area. Most UMC families just aren't incentivized to enroll. A few more do every year, but most still won't.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, the main thing that's holding Jefferson back is the lack of definite rigor. They don't seem to offer many true honors/intensified classes. Few UMC feeder parents are sold on their vague "we differentiate marvelously!" pledge. The lack of diversity doesn't help either. Where are the Asian students? There seem to be zero and only a tiny number of whites.

Jefferson has an accelerated math track with admission based on test scores and other specified metrics.

The school is 1.1% Asian (as compared with DCPS overall, which is 2% Asian).

I fully believe that Jefferson’s primary impediment to attracting more Capitol Hill kids is its location. Overall, however, it’s among the more popular middle schools in the city, with a waitlist that consistently exceeds the number of offers made.

If this were true, wouldn't Stuart Hobson have been popular with IB families for years? After all, the school is just a few blocks from Union Station and Stanton Park. Yet SH has yet to take off as a neighborhood middle school. These are tough schools. Not dangerous, but full of low SES kids leading tough lives, which turns off most UMC Ward 6 parents (though they'd be hard pressed to admit it). There's still not much in the way of definite academic tracking in DCPS middle schools, really just for math, even in 8th grade. Rigor remains insufficient and enrichment weak compared to privates, the better charters and the high-performing suburban schools in the area. Most UMC families just aren't incentivized to enroll. A few more do every year, but most still won't.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Community buy-in at SH is built less on location than its status as a CH Cluster School fed by Watkins-Peabody. There have been at least 40 white kids at SH in 6th-8th grades each year for the last two decades. As you may know, SH housed Watkins' 5th grade up until 2008. Jefferson Academy had to start attracting UMC CH families from scratch around 5 years ago. With Latin Cooper going strong, the upward struggle to attract neighborhood talent without designated honors classes outside math at both schools continues. If BASIS gets permission to open a K-4 school, the struggle is only going to intensify.

The "cluster" concept means nothing to most people on the Hill who still have kids in DCPS. I mean, your own post says SH houses Watkins 5th grade up until 2008. 2008!!!! That was 14 years ago my friend. A 5th grader at SH that year would be a law school grad by now.

I know there are a lot of old timers on DCUM who still remember fondly the cluster wars. You are all adorable.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The self-serving Capitol Hill Middle School Initiative of the Public School Parents Organization, CHPSPO, now W6PSPO, is largely to blame. The group has lobbied Ward 6 for the past 13 years not to support charters, to keep SWS, Brent and Maury from feeding into SH, to keep DCPS from setting up a pan-Ward 6 middle school etc. Brent actually fed into SH for a couple years under Michelle Rhee until the 2014 boundary review change that.

https://w6pspo.org/current-initiatives/middle-school-initiative/

I don’t think Brent fed to SH before 2014. There was a 2010-ish reshuffle due to the initiative above, that’s also when SWS and Capitol Hill Montessori left the cluster. Maybe before 2010? But I think before 2010 Watkins was the only SH feeder.

Anonymous wrote:Community buy-in at SH is built less on location than its status as a CH Cluster School fed by Watkins-Peabody. There have been at least 40 white kids at SH in 6th-8th grades each year for the last two decades. As you may know, SH housed Watkins' 5th grade up until 2008. Jefferson Academy had to start attracting UMC CH families from scratch around 5 years ago. With Latin Cooper going strong, the upward struggle to attract neighborhood talent without designated honors classes outside math at both schools continues. If BASIS gets permission to open a K-4 school, the struggle is only going to intensify.

Anonymous wrote:The self-serving Capitol Hill Middle School Initiative of the Public School Parents Organization, CHPSPO, now W6PSPO, is largely to blame. The group has lobbied Ward 6 for the past 13 years not to support charters, to keep SWS, Brent and Maury from feeding into SH, to keep DCPS from setting up a pan-Ward 6 middle school etc. Brent actually fed into SH for a couple years under Michelle Rhee until the 2014 boundary review change that.

https://w6pspo.org/current-initiatives/middle-school-initiative/

Anonymous wrote:Community buy-in at SH is built less on location than its status as a CH Cluster School fed by Watkins-Peabody. There have been at least 40 white kids at SH in 6th-8th grades each year for the last two decades. As you may know, SH housed Watkins' 5th grade up until 2008. Jefferson Academy had to start attracting UMC CH families from scratch around 5 years ago. With Latin Cooper going strong, the upward struggle to attract neighborhood talent without designated honors classes outside math at both schools continues. If BASIS gets permission to open a K-4 school, the struggle is only going to intensify.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, the main thing that's holding Jefferson back is the lack of definite rigor. They don't seem to offer many true honors/intensified classes. Few UMC feeder parents are sold on their vague "we differentiate marvelously!" pledge. The lack of diversity doesn't help either. Where are the Asian students? There seem to be zero and only a tiny number of whites.

Jefferson has an accelerated math track with admission based on test scores and other specified metrics.

The school is 1.1% Asian (as compared with DCPS overall, which is 2% Asian).

I fully believe that Jefferson’s primary impediment to attracting more Capitol Hill kids is its location. Overall, however, it’s among the more popular middle schools in the city, with a waitlist that consistently exceeds the number of offers made.

If this were true, wouldn't Stuart Hobson have been popular with IB families for years? After all, the school is just a few blocks from Union Station and Stanton Park. Yet SH has yet to take off as a neighborhood middle school. These are tough schools. Not dangerous, but full of low SES kids leading tough lives, which turns off most UMC Ward 6 parents (though they'd be hard pressed to admit it). There's still not much in the way of definite academic tracking in DCPS middle schools, really just for math, even in 8th grade. Rigor remains insufficient and enrichment weak compared to privates, the better charters and the high-performing suburban schools in the area. Most UMC families just aren't incentivized to enroll. A few more do every year, but most still won't.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, the main thing that's holding Jefferson back is the lack of definite rigor. They don't seem to offer many true honors/intensified classes. Few UMC feeder parents are sold on their vague "we differentiate marvelously!" pledge. The lack of diversity doesn't help either. Where are the Asian students? There seem to be zero and only a tiny number of whites.

Jefferson has an accelerated math track with admission based on test scores and other specified metrics.

The school is 1.1% Asian (as compared with DCPS overall, which is 2% Asian).

I fully believe that Jefferson’s primary impediment to attracting more Capitol Hill kids is its location. Overall, however, it’s among the more popular middle schools in the city, with a waitlist that consistently exceeds the number of offers made.