MacArthur Blvd DCPS High School Capacity
/September 8, 2022
To the Ward 3 Community Working Group:
I am sorry that I will be unable to attend the meeting tonight. I have a Ward 4 Education Alliance Meeting. The ward 4 DCPS schools will potentially be affected by the enrollment projections and planning for the high school at MacArthur Blvd. (Already the dual feeder rights to Deal for students living within the MacFarland Boundary continue even 8 years after the change in boundaries in 2014.) It is a moment of great potential and opportunity for the city to be opening a new DCPS neighborhood high school. We want to get it right.
I, as the head of the Senior High Alliance of Parents, Principals and Educators and the convener of the Ward 4 Ed Alliance continue to make the argument that a DCPS high school at the MacArthur Blvd location should be 750 not 1000.
- The projected population of 14 to 17 year olds in Neighborhood clusters 4 and 13 is 953 by 2025[i]
- The grade level enrollment at Hardy is about 180 per grade (4 times 180 is 720)
- Students graduating from Hardy will attend the MacArthur School as well as School Without Walls, Ellington, Banneker, private schools as well as potentially some charter schools. They will not all attend MacArthur, similar to the choices available to families from middle to high school across the city.
- There are 204 out of boundary students across the grade span at Hardy. This indicates there are opportunities for students from across the city to have access[ii]
- Further this is a limited site for building, parking and athletic fields as well as transportation options. The neighborhood has expressed concerns on this size and the impact it will have.
- DCPS according to the EdScape numbers on facility capacity has room for 3, 718 additional students in its existing high school buildings. [iii]
DCPS is planning for equitable access or reserved space for students from across the city at MacArthur who are in the District Foster Care system or receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) and high school students who are a year overage. For those of us in neighborhoods with space in our high schools and a welcome for these students- this is a disturbing vision and plan – one that assumes these students “farthest from opportunity” will not get the services they need at their neighborhood high school. When there is room for out of boundary in the 750 student school, priorities can be established if that is the choice.
We would like to see equitable access mean that all students in the city have opportunity close to home. The capital dollars for this expansion are a choice. They are dollars not going somewhere else.
There are many potential ways the for the MacArthur students to have access to more course and partnership opportunities if there is concern about a high school of 750 and the selection of courses that can be offered. DCPS is a system that can leverage joint courses with Ellington and Jackson Reed that are close. Georgetown University is also right there. The DC-XQ project is pushing at some of the limiting policies to expand time, space and technology for high school students.
An educational specification for 750 will relieve the crowding at Jackson Reed. It is the greater than the projected enrollment for this year of 13 of the 18 DCPS high schools including Banneker, Walls or Ellington. We are on the cusp of the Education Master plan, boundary review and adequacy study. Potentially, overbuilding this site will have consequences for these students and for the high school planning across the city.
Thank you for your consideration. Cathy Reilly
[i] https://opendata.dc.gov/datasets/DCGIS::neighborhood-clusters/explore?location=38.893754%2C-77.014470%2C12.59
[ii] https://sites.google.com/site/shappesite/budget-enrollment-capacity-and-programollment-data/enrollment-capacity?authuser=0
[iii] https://sites.google.com/site/shappesite/budget-enrollment-capacity-and-programollment-data/enrollment-capacity?authuser=0