Anonymous wrote:So imagine that DCPS eliminates the OOB feeder rights from the elementary schools. Is it likely that inboundary families would fill up those slots or would SH be under enrolled? It is a tiny boundary.

If the boundary stays the same, not a ton of inboundary kids attend and open seats are then awarded through lottery is that actually worse for the school than getting intact OOB cohorts from the feeder elementary schools? Or is it better?

I feel like maybe the answer is to make SH a college-prep test-in program that feeds to Eastern ( with an international Baccalureate diploma option ) and have Eliot Hine be the large middle school by rights for all of the Capitol Hill elementary schools. Thoughts?

There are plenty of under-performing, under-enrolled schools in DC that can be converted to a test-in or magnet program should DCPS go this route. Capitol Hill families have just as much right as those IB for Deal or Brookland for a quality MS program that serves the neighborhood. While I can appreciate that DCPS would like to populate EH with kids from Brent, Maury and Tyler, that just isn't going to happen for the foreseeable future. The reasons are manifold and complex, but charters like BASIS and Latin give Capitol Hill families as escape valve at Fifth Grade and thus the option to remain in the city. Kaya surely has to realize that keeping more UMC students in the DCPS system from Fifth to Eighth Grades will only strengthen the system. In the unique case of Brent, SH is the middle school in closest proximity, and high-performing IB students simply are not going to stay through Fifth and then enroll in either Jefferson of EH. ble future and SH is the closest middle school and is walkable for many as it is only five blocks from the northern Brent boundary.

More inboundary kids would attend SH (i.e. Brent and Maury students) if there was room and the opportunity. Those parents would love to have their children in a nearby quality middle school.

Anonymous wrote:So imagine that DCPS eliminates the OOB feeder rights from the elementary schools. Is it likely that inboundary families would fill up those slots or would SH be under enrolled? It is a tiny boundary.

If the boundary stays the same, not a ton of inboundary kids attend and open seats are then awarded through lottery is that actually worse for the school than getting intact OOB cohorts from the feeder elementary schools? Or is it better?

I feel like maybe the answer is to make SH a college-prep test-in program that feeds to Eastern ( with an international Baccalureate diploma option ) and have Eliot Hine be the large middle school by rights for all of the Capitol Hill elementary schools. Thoughts?

Yes X 100

So imagine that DCPS eliminates the OOB feeder rights from the elementary schools. Is it likely that inboundary families would fill up those slots or would SH be under enrolled? It is a tiny boundary.

If the boundary stays the same, not a ton of inboundary kids attend and open seats are then awarded through lottery is that actually worse for the school than getting intact OOB cohorts from the feeder elementary schools? Or is it better?

I feel like maybe the answer is to make SH a college-prep test-in program that feeds to Eastern ( with an international Baccalureate diploma option ) and have Eliot Hine be the large middle school by rights for all of the Capitol Hill elementary schools. Thoughts?

According to DCPS census date, Watkins is 79 percent OOB, LT is 77 percent OOB and JO Wilson is 72 percent OOB. Undoing Rhee's feeder preference for OOB students would be a quick fix necessary to attract students from Maury, Tyler and Brent. The question is whether DCPS has the gumption to commit to making SH a high-achieving neighborhood school. Unfortunately, I think we all know the answer.

Anonymous wrote:Pp with the 6th grader at SH. What is your assessment of the ward 6 middle school feeder pattern situation. How are things for your DC at SH? Would you be open to ways to feed Other cap hill schools into SH or do you like how it is now?

Disclosure: our family is OOB for Watkins/S-H.

SH is a good school for my 6th grader, and works for a couple reasons -- most of the peer group from Watkins is intact and enrolled at S-H, so arrived with friends. One section of each academic class is "honors" and with that tracking, there are strong attentive students in the core classes. It's a small school, so allows trying extra curriculars that are beyond what I expected would be the comfort zone. At a large school, like Deal, I think sports etc. would be more competitive, and less accessible for newscomers.

Personally, I think Brent should feed to SH, and that would strengthen the school. Personally, I've never really understood the Peabody/Watkins/S-H boundary, and it seems to me it should be rationalized somehow.

As a policy matter, I think that having OOB elementary students have a "right' to feed to the middle school is a problematic policy (which started with the 2009-10 school year). I would eliminate it. Politically, I don't think it will be eliminated.

From what I understand, SH was significantly under enrolled at the beginning of the school year causing a budget crisis.

What was that about and how does it square with the numbers cited above? Are those numbers potential students feeding from Watkins,JO Wilson and Ludlow Tayler but they don't actually arrive in those numbers?

How long are the wait lists for SH?

Anonymous wrote:Pp with the 6th grader at SH. What is your assessment of the ward 6 middle school feeder pattern situation. How are things for your DC at SH? Would you be open to ways to feed Other cap hill schools into SH or do you like how it is now?

SH has a capacity of 410, thus the per grade capacity is ~137.
(http://dc.gov/DC/DME/Media%20Releases/newsroom_archive/Press%20Releases/Final%202013%20DC%20Public%20Education%20Plan.pdf)

Sixth grade at SH has enroll capacity of ~137 students. If Watkins sends 4 fifth grade classes (~100 kids), Ludlow sends 1 fifth grade class (~25 kids) and JO Wilson sends 1 fifth grade class (~25 kids) to SH, then SH appears to be full with approximately 150 kids in the pipeline. How can more schools (Brent, Tyler, Maury) be added to the SH feeder pattern without removing another school (Ludlow, JP Wilson) from the SH feeder pattern?

Pp with the 6th grader at SH. What is your assessment of the ward 6 middle school feeder pattern situation. How are things for your DC at SH? Would you be open to ways to feed Other cap hill schools into SH or do you like how it is now?

Anonymous wrote:What percentage of Watkins kids actually go to Stuart Hobson - are there really 100 kids that went to Watkins that end up on SH?

My DC is a current 6th grader at SH.

The 5th grade Watkins class had ~95 kids, I think that at least 80 ended up a SH for 6th, maybe more. SH has ~130 6th graders.

In 4th grade, Watkins had ~120 4th graders (school year 2011-12). The way Watkins deals with the Basis/Washington Latin departures for 5th grade is to go from 5 sections of 4th grade to 4 sections of 5th grade. So, there may have been some new OOB 5th graders, but not as many as you might thingk. .

What percentage of Watkins kids actually go to Stuart Hobson - are there really 100 kids that went to Watkins that end up on SH?

Anonymous wrote:http://www.dc.gov/DCPS/Files/downloads/SCHOOLS/Boundary%20Maps%20-%202009/DCPS-Attendance-Zones-Middle-Schools-September-2009.pdf

Not sure what pp is talking about, but here is the inboundary zone for Stuart Hobson. It is quite small and all in ward 6. But it has three feeder elementary schools where the 5th graders have rights to SH in addition to those who live within these boundaries.

the physical boundaries are less of an issue than which schools feed. MS are set up to recieve rising ES kids, many of whom leave before moving up. MS spots are infilled from OOB applicants, especially at one of the "good" MS options for DCPS

Watkins sends 4 classes/year to Peabody. Watkins already attracts OOB, and that number increases with each grade. Couple that with other feeders with large OOB % and you can see why Sh isn't really viewed as a neighborhood school by a lot of Hill families despite its location. There are exceptions, but SH is something like 80-85% OOB, and if anything I see than number increasing if the current feeder patterns are maintained.

SH should become a city-wide test-in academic middle school. Then the addresses and elementary schools should all feed to Eliot-Hine to become a comprehensive, large middle school. Not sure what becomes of Jefferson--it doesn't have any Capitol Hill students there at the moment anyway

http://www.dc.gov/DCPS/Files/downloads/SCHOOLS/Boundary%20Maps%20-%202009/DCPS-Attendance-Zones-Middle-Schools-September-2009.pdf

Not sure what pp is talking about, but here is the inboundary zone for Stuart Hobson. It is quite small and all in ward 6. But it has three feeder elementary schools where the 5th graders have rights to SH in addition to those who live within these boundaries.

I doubt it seriously that Stuart-Hobson boundaries are exclusive to the 10 block area of Capitol Hill. So to assume that Stuart-Hobosn could only survive with that small population is insane. Stuart-Hobson serves a boundary that is inclusive of Ward 5/6/7 the best thing happened for Stuart-Hobson was that Chavez opened up and took some of the students that had every right to attend Stuart-Hobson.