Like surgical scars, once promising or trendy ideas for reform have left their marks all over the D.C. school system. Many came as officials pursued the best way to configure schools for students coping with their turbulent adolescent years.
At one time or another, the city has tried schools starting with kindergarten through ninth grade and K-7; junior highs with grades seven through nine; middle schools with grades six through eight; and, most recently, schools with pre-K through eighth grade.
Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee has decided to expand the District’s investment in that last format, making it a major element in the program of school closures and consolidations she launched last month.
At a cost of $58 million, five elementary and middle schools — Oyster-Adams, Powell, LaSalle, Francis and Brown — will expand to pre-K-8, receiving students from the shuttered schools when classes begin in August. An additional 13 will become pre-K-7 this fall and add eighth grade in 2009.