J L Long Middle School (Dallas, Coppell: 2013, how much, transfer to)

[inthemstreets]

Originally Posted by NP78

There isn't a mass exodus between 5th/6th, but that misses a big portion of students leaving the feeder for private schools. A lot of private schools have entry points/additional classes starting at the 4th or 5th grade level so you see a number of kids leave after 3rd grade. Look at Lakewood's enrollment by grade for this past school year:


KN: 160
1st: 151
2nd: 167
3rd: 162
4th: 115
5th: 89








Stonewall isn't as extreme (104 in 3rd, 80 in 5th) and you probably don't really see as much at Robert E. Lee, etc., but that is still a pretty significant chuck of affluent kids that are exiting the feeder pattern prior to J.L. Long.


The reality is not really as extreme as either side would portray. Families that send their kids to Lakewood/Stonewall don't automatically run for the hills when the prospect of their kids going to Long becomes reality, but a significant portion do pursue alternate educational opportunities as that stage nears.


Anecdotally, living in Lakewood, I don't really know anyone that moved out to the suburbs when their kids reached that age, but I know plenty of families that went private/magnet at that stage. Plus, there is a significant cohort of families that send their children to private (St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Johns, etc.) or DISD magnets (Solar/Mata/Dealey/etc.) from the beginning.

Regarding the smaller class sizes in the higher grades at Lakewood/Stonewall, yes, a big fraction of this difference comes from students moving to Travis (DISD magnet) in 4th grade. Of the 4th and 5th graders at Travis this past year, 59 had Lakewood as their home school and 23 had Stonewall. It is also noteworthy that the Lakewood kindergarten class size has increased in recent years, something to take in account when comparing enrollment across different grade levels. For example, in 2010-2011, the kinder class at Lakewood was 127 students. The 10-11 kinder class would have been 6th graders at Long this past year.

[NP78]

Originally Posted by inthemstreets

Regarding the smaller class sizes in the higher grades at Lakewood/Stonewall, yes, a big fraction of this difference comes from students moving to Travis (DISD magnet) in 4th grade. Of the 4th and 5th graders at Travis this past year, 59 had Lakewood as their home school and 23 had Stonewall. It is also noteworthy that the Lakewood kindergarten class size has increased in recent years, something to take in account when comparing enrollment across different grade levels. For example, in 2010-2011, the kinder class at Lakewood was 127 students. The 10-11 kinder class would have been 6th graders at Long this past year.

Yeah, I should have mentioned that it is not just private, but the magnets as well that siphon off students at that age range.

[newinDallas2017]

Thank you for the stats, Cordata! Helpful to look at this analytically. Where did you pull the information from?

[newinDallas2017]

And thank you all for the feedback. I'm also reaching out to the PTA and do plan on visiting the school in the fall. It's been interesting to note (in our case anyways) people's preference for UP and Preston Hollow. One realtor told me, after I started asking questions about Kessler Park - "You can't live in South Dallas. No one will want to be your friend" That one made me chuckle. He's lived here a long time though so I guess I get his perspective and understand his intentions were meant well (I think). I guess I won't be asking him for any inside information on Hexter Elementary any time soon. It's nice to see that there are people committed to a city school. I thought it was strange that my questions about just that would be discounted so quickly. Thanks!!

[JenG1974]

I'm a Stonewall parent about to send my child to Long. All of the Stonewall parents I've talked to are sending their kids to Long if they are not already at Travis. It has changed a lot over the past few years in regards to Lakewood/Stonewall kids going to Long and I'm sure it is the same with Lee. There is a big push and from those I know that are already there - they love it. It's a good school and it feeds in the fantastic Woodrow. Just another voice to add to the pile.

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by newinDallas2017

And thank you all for the feedback. I'm also reaching out to the PTA and do plan on visiting the school in the fall. It's been interesting to note (in our case anyways) people's preference for UP and Preston Hollow. One realtor told me, after I started asking questions about Kessler Park - "You can't live in South Dallas. No one will want to be your friend" That one made me chuckle. He's lived here a long time though so I guess I get his perspective and understand his intentions were meant well (I think). I guess I won't be asking him for any inside information on Hexter Elementary any time soon. It's nice to see that there are people committed to a city school. I thought it was strange that my questions about just that would be discounted so quickly. Thanks!!

It sounds like you're working with a realtor who is not an expert in the areas you want to live. Any in-town realtor worth their salt knows darn well that Kessler Park (and surrounding North Oak Cliff neighborhoods) is just about THE hottest in-town real estate market and has been for the last 7ish years. Even the Parkies go to dinner down there because that's where many of the new and buzzy restaurants are. The fact that he called it "South Dallas" is a huge red flag since South Dallas is located acrosss I-35 from Kessler.

You may be giving his intentions too much credit as he sounds absolutely clueless. Is this a randomly assigned relo agent?

[Walter Benjamin]

Originally Posted by newinDallas2017

One realtor told me, after I started asking questions about Kessler Park - "You can't live in South Dallas. No one will want to be your friend"

Yes, I for one would find it difficult to socialize with someone who lived in such a ghetto-type place as Kessler Park

1052 Kessler Pkwy, Dallas, TX 75208 - realtor.com®

That was a joke, for the record.

[M.abus]

Long is an IB school. There are only a handful of those public middle schools in DFW.
Like at Woodrow Wilson (especially in robotics), Long regularly beats top private schools in math and science competitions.

I wouldn't take the word of someone who doesn't really know Long and Woodrow. They are unique and assumptions don't work.

A lot of private school students have enrolled in these schools since the advent of IB. That's why more new additions are under construction.

[UnfairPark]

Dallas ISD Struggling With Staff Turnover « CBS Dallas / Fort Worth

[NP78]

Originally Posted by cordata

Here's a bit of data to try to answer the question : "Do 'rich' parents using DISD in 5th grade send their kids to J. L. Long?" Remember that some kids siphon off to Travis in Grade 6.

(sorry for the poor formatting, hope you can figure it out)

OOPS: I forgot Robert E Lee... will add ASAP.

Long Population and economically disadvanted:
J L Long Grade 6
Total ED % ED Non ED
2014 397 265 66.8% 132
2015 458 316 69.0% 142
2016 476 325 68.3% 151

So there are 130 to 150 "rich" kids in Long Grade 6 in recent years.

Grade 5 2014
Lakewood 107
Lakeood ED 19
Stonewall 69
Stonewall ED 15
Lipscomp 89
Lipscomp ED 75
Mt Auburn ED 0
Mt Auburn ED 0
Mata 109
Mata ED 100
Lee 55
Lee ED 38
Total 429
Total ED 247
ED % 57.6%
Non ED 182

For kids in Grade 6 in 2016 there were 151 non-ED, same group of kids in 2015 Grade 5 there were 182 non-ED. Difference of 31 "rich" kids going somewhere else.

Grade 5 2015
Lakewood 98
Lakeood ED 18
Stonewall 80
Stonewall ED 18
Lipscomp 75
Lipscomp ED 68
Mt Aubur 0
Mt Auburn ED 0
Mata 117
Mata ED 109
Lee 60
ED 45
Total 430
Total ED 258
ED % 60.0%
Non ED 172
For kids in Grade 6 in 2015 there were 142 non-ED, same group of kids in 2014 Grade 5 there were 172 non-ED. Difference of 30 "rich" kids going somewhere else.

Again there were probably a dozen kids from the feeder pattern going to Travis in Grade 6. There are obviously other factors here: moving in and moving out. Also interesting is that Long gained in absolute numbers of students pretty significantly: Feeder total in 2015 grade 5 of 430 vs Long Grade 6 in 476.. no idea where 46 students came from.

We have much better statisticians than I on here who can debate the merits of this info. Some of the 30 rich kids are going to private school. But I haven't seen any evidence that a vast majority of Lakewood kids go to private school for grade 6. As we have discussed before... where would they go?

Sorry for resurrecting this old thread, but there was a question the other day regarding school progression for kids in Lakewood Elementary and I remembered this discussion so I thought I would revisit it.

A couple of interesting pieces of information looking at the most recent Texas Academic Performance Reports for Long, Woodrow, and their associated elementary school feeders:

1. The % of Economically Disadvantaged kids at Long and Woodrow continues to decline. Long is now 61% ED and Woodrow is about 50/50.

2. One proxy (unfortunate, but true) for determining the progression of Lakewood and Mockingbird elementary students is to look at the number of White kids in Long/Woodrow (both Lakewood and Mockingbird are majority white while the other elementary schools are majority Hispanic). Going back to 2013, Long had 242 White Kids, the most recent TAPR (18-19) shows 427 White Kids. Woodrow had 325 White kids in 2012-13 and that was up to 559 in 18-19.

3. Looking at the enrollment numbers I would expect that trend to continue. Enrollment at Lakewood back in 12-13 was 771 and it was up to 942 in 18-19. Mockingbird also saw an increase from 585 to 670. Enrollment in the Mount Auburn/Lipscomb/Geneva Heights has actually declined (particularly small lower grades at Geneva and Lipscomb now).


The trend is pretty clear that more and more families in this area are utilizing the zoned public schools even with all of the magnet/choice options in DISD (all of which have a significant presence from East Dallas).