Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 22:08     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there. ;)


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb :lol:

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.


Question - did you apply early to YY (right when the lottery opened) to get a good time stamp?

On your last point, I doubt very much our lists are similar. We had to rule out a whole swath of charter schools for location, and as a result we ended up putting a bunch of DCPS on the our list that we really liked when we toured, but they have no cache on DCUM.


Hmm, that's interesting. I just figured most of the charters that have a good reputation everyone is applying for - Cap City PCS, Inspired Teaching, Two Rivers, Mundo Verde, LAMB, Yu Ying, EL Haynes, Bridges, Stokes, Apple Tree and Lee Montessori (yes, I mixed common lottery with schools that aren't). I feel like most parents probably applied to all of these...I hope I'm wrong, but I suspect most of those schools are on most lists. Basically there weren't 12 charters that seemed excellent, so I filled out my 12 with DCPS schools that are close (Powell, West, Raymond). I know some parents might be limited by proximity, but living in Petworth and working downtown means most of the schools in the city east of the park are reasonable options.


I live EOTP and work downtown and tried a bunch of th commutes to th above schools and had to rule a bunch out. The hardest for me was inspired teaching and lee--IT was my favorite school but there was bumper to bumper traffic going to downtown from there. Cap City was awful, too, and both north and east of us--the complete opposite direction from work. I strongly disliked Appletree, so didn't apply there, and by far the worst open house I went to was Haynes, so skipped that too.

I think me and my friends are probably putting a lot more weight on commute than you are.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 22:04     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.


Question - did you apply early to YY (right when the lottery opened) to get a good time stamp?

On your last point, I doubt very much our lists are similar. We had to rule out a whole swath of charter schools for location, and as a result we ended up putting a bunch of DCPS on the our list that we really liked when we toured, but they have no cache on DCUM.


Wow - two rivers would be quite the commute for you. Do you or does your spouse work near there? I am always surprised when people apply to both Cal city and Two Rivers -- obviously similar schools, just geographically far apart.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 22:03     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.


Question - did you apply early to YY (right when the lottery opened) to get a good time stamp?

On your last point, I doubt very much our lists are similar. We had to rule out a whole swath of charter schools for location, and as a result we ended up putting a bunch of DCPS on the our list that we really liked when we toured, but they have no cache on DCUM.


Hmm, that's interesting. I just figured most of the charters that have a good reputation everyone is applying for - Cap City PCS, Inspired Teaching, Two Rivers, Mundo Verde, LAMB, Yu Ying, EL Haynes, Bridges, Stokes, Apple Tree and Lee Montessori (yes, I mixed common lottery with schools that aren't). I feel like most parents probably applied to all of these...I hope I'm wrong, but I suspect most of those schools are on most lists. Basically there weren't 12 charters that seemed excellent, so I filled out my 12 with DCPS schools that are close (Powell, West, Raymond). I know some parents might be limited by proximity, but living in Petworth and working downtown means most of the schools in the city east of the park are reasonable options.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:57     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.


Ok, that part is understood. But I'm going to guess that since you have almost no interest in YY, you did not sleep out or jump to apply right at 8:00am on the day the applications were due. Is that correct? If so, the only way you'd be in a position to take a spot anyway is if you get one of the random lottery spots, which is an actual spot. Unless you were one of the first to apply, your waitlist spot isn't going to get you anything, so you're not taking anything from anyone who really wants to be there unless you get in in the actual lottery.

I still wish you luck, but I was in your position last year and simply did not apply to schools we knew we really didn't want. It just seemed like bad karma to take a spot we knew we'd jump from later at a school that was so hard to get into. I'd never do that at a language immersion school. And we did have a choice at an immersion school, but since it wasn't the one we wanted, we didn't take it (we found out we didn't think it was a good fit after we applied).
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:56     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Just interested, what schools did you pick?


My top choices are Capital City PCS, Inspired Teaching School, and Two Rivers PCS. Those three schools all have a similar philosophy (inspired teaching/expeditionary learning) and I loved my visit to all of these schools. I put EL Haynes next because it is close (and expeditionary learning as well). Mundo Verde, DC Bilingual, etc are all on the list but further down (OK with language immersion but value other things more). We got wait-listed at Creative Minds (121) and LAMB (49). I also applied to Stokes, Shining Stars Montessori (other schools not participating in the common lottery). Powell and Raymond are our in boundary schools and on the list (Raymond last). I liked Powell a lot; did not visit Raymond.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:50     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.


Question - did you apply early to YY (right when the lottery opened) to get a good time stamp?

On your last point, I doubt very much our lists are similar. We had to rule out a whole swath of charter schools for location, and as a result we ended up putting a bunch of DCPS on the our list that we really liked when we toured, but they have no cache on DCUM.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:47     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
We just applied for a few for pre- k4 including Yu Ying. Zoned for a JKLM and will just stay in private preschool if we don't get YY or another top charter and then go IB for K.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:46     Subject: Re:Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It was announced as a possibility so yes there were people in line for PreK 3. The very 1st person in line wanted PreK 3.


We applied online for PK3. They told us at the first open house they might have a class. Our time stamp was 8.10, so probably no chance for us.


Time stamp is very silly in the computer age.

If you had to sleep on the doorstep overnight that would really separate the serious from the non-serious. Having an online application timestamp allows non-serious to compete against serious and it's basically random (internet speed, luck of the page-loading draw, how fast can you type, etc).

For any of these more unusual language schools to really flourish they will eventually need to move to test-in or some other process. I can't imagine trying to teach in mandarin to a class that included a bunch of random students with no interest in chinese, no support for the language at home. This is definitely not a put-down for YY, which sounds excellent - it just doesn't seem a good fit for a city-wide random lottery.


The main entry yrs are preK 3 and prek4. The random 3 and 4 yr olds with no interest in learning mandarin and no support at home manage to learn mandarin. Really.

-signed elementary YY parent.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:42     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


You would think if someone is going to makeup a scenario, they would make is vaguely plausible. Dumb

I read it as her having put down 11 preferable-to-YY schools PLUS Raymond on her common application, for a total of 12.


I'm the original poster - who was not so interested in Yu Ying. I applied to my 12 schools in the lottery plus every school that didn't participate in the lottery (5 I think) - just trying to get in somewhere. I think what's sad about the lottery is that you aren't choosing a school. The idea that this is choice is nuts! Sure, it would be wonderful if only parents interested in their child learning to speak Chinese applied to Yu Ying. But as long as the school you get is based purely on chance, I'm going to maximize my chances and apply to as many schools as possible. I guess the silver lining for those specifically interested in Yu Ying might be that as long as I get into somewhere else (other than Raymond) I'm not going to be using my spot on the waiting list, and someone else can have it.

I'm sure that there are many parents who want to go to Yu Ying and nowhere else if they can help it, that still applied for 12 schools in the common lottery. The sad thing is that all parents who care probably applied for almost the same 12 schools. It's probably only our in-boundary safety schools that differ.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 21:08     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
also to the PP who said they would think it's fine to put their kid in for PS-3 and Pk-4 and then move when they got another spot, you realize you are also disadvantaging the kid who gets in at Kindergarten and couldn't get in earlier as well as the whole class. He or she could have had two full years of Chinese language immersion in school. Starting at ground zero in K is harder and hurts the whole class because it drags down the overall proficiency when you have a bunch of kids with no exposure to the language starting two years later.

We are a current YY family and I have to say the one thing that made me nervous when we toured the school was to see lots of students--including those in upper grades who were mostly speaking in English. They clearly understood the teachers but they weren't speaking Chinese. We hope that PS and PK immersion will make a difference here, since there are almost no native speakers at the school, but that will be all that much harder if people put their kids in for a year or two of free school and then pull out later.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 20:50     Subject: Re:Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It was announced as a possibility so yes there were people in line for PreK 3. The very 1st person in line wanted PreK 3.


We applied online for PK3. They told us at the first open house they might have a class. Our time stamp was 8.10, so probably no chance for us.


Time stamp is very silly in the computer age.

If you had to sleep on the doorstep overnight that would really separate the serious from the non-serious. Having an online application timestamp allows non-serious to compete against serious and it's basically random (internet speed, luck of the page-loading draw, how fast can you type, etc).

For any of these more unusual language schools to really flourish they will eventually need to move to test-in or some other process. I can't imagine trying to teach in mandarin to a class that included a bunch of random students with no interest in chinese, no support for the language at home. This is definitely not a put-down for YY, which sounds excellent - it just doesn't seem a good fit for a city-wide random lottery.


The time stamp ensures there are no random students with no interest in Chinese. Parents do wait overnight. Every family that gets in wants to be there and is willing to put in the work. That's the intent of the application procedure.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 20:34     Subject: Re:Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It was announced as a possibility so yes there were people in line for PreK 3. The very 1st person in line wanted PreK 3.


We applied online for PK3. They told us at the first open house they might have a class. Our time stamp was 8.10, so probably no chance for us.


Time stamp is very silly in the computer age.

If you had to sleep on the doorstep overnight that would really separate the serious from the non-serious. Having an online application timestamp allows non-serious to compete against serious and it's basically random (internet speed, luck of the page-loading draw, how fast can you type, etc).

For any of these more unusual language schools to really flourish they will eventually need to move to test-in or some other process. I can't imagine trying to teach in mandarin to a class that included a bunch of random students with no interest in chinese, no support for the language at home. This is definitely not a put-down for YY, which sounds excellent - it just doesn't seem a good fit for a city-wide random lottery.
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 20:29     Subject: Re:Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:No, you can't. Because once they fill up the open slots in the random lottery, everyone else gets on the waitlist according to their time stamp of their application. They won't be trying to figure out the timestamp order of all the remaining applicant's on site.

You won't know your spot on the waitlist until they publish the waitlist, but they're good about publishing it so it shouldn't be too too long. They probably already have it, but will just have to make adjustments to the siblings of newly admitted students (who, like everywhere else, go to the top of the waitlist if there wasn't a slot available when the sib got in), and adjust for the admitted students.


Would you expect the waitlist to be posted Thursday night or Friday morning?
Also, is it possible to look up how many seats they are putting in the lottery for each grade?
Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 20:27     Subject: Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:If it makes anyone feel better, I applied to Yu Ying for my three year old, but we'll go there only if we don't get in anywhere else. I don't have any interest in him learning Chinese and would rather not have my son in a language immersion school of any type. But we would definitely go there over at least one of my in-boundary options (Raymond). Any of my other 11 schools I would probably prefer over Yu Ying. I hear it's a great school, but I think just not for us.


Not that I can't see someone feeling this way, but it's pretty clear you are making this post up if you put YY down as one of your 12 lottery choices... glad you will not be taking up a spot there if you have zero interest in being there.


she's saying she put 11 schools with Raymond at 12th and would choose YY over Raymond.



Anonymous
Post 03/29/2014 20:22     Subject: Re:Yu Ying waitlist hypothesis
Anonymous wrote:It was announced as a possibility so yes there were people in line for PreK 3. The very 1st person in line wanted PreK 3.


We applied online for PK3. They told us at the first open house they might have a class. Our time stamp was 8.10, so probably no chance for us.