All Save Daniel Webster Comments

“We Can Do It”
Potrero Hill has changed a lot since we moved here 6 years ago and because it has become much more family oriented in the last 2 years, it’s now the time people can band together and try to get a great public school here. I think 4 years ago it would have been too hard b/c there weren’t enough young families. It would be great to send my child to a public school in our neighborhood. Potrero Hill has such a strong sense of neighborhood and with the additional families in the PHPA, it’s become more active. Both of those things can only be an asset for a public school on the Hill.

We need a strong school in the neighborhood, and the family structures now exist to ensure a great school.

At the time our daughter was ready for kindergarten, there was not this unified work by Potrero Hill parents to make DW into the kind of school that we would want to send her and we didn’t feel competent to go it alone. However the kind of dedication + organization that we are seeing now will turn DW into the kind of school that Hill parents would be glad to send their kids to.

I would love to send my 18 month old daughter to our local public school. I love our community and I’m committed to public schools as a whole. I think an involved community can turn around any school.

One of the reasons that we decided to have a child is because of the proximity of that school, and we feel strongly that we want to send her there. We joined Parents for Public Schools when she was only a few months old, and have been involved with that group since then. We love walking by the school and telling her that she will go there one day. I especially embrace the diversity in that school.

We need to preserve and improve our local schools that serve local families. This will only happen if local residents have an interest and stake in the local schools. Daniel Webster meets these criteria and is therefore critical to preserve.

The demographics of Potrero Hill have changed in the past 5 years (and will continue to change with the opening of the new UCSF campus at Mission Bay) to include many families with young children who would choose to send their children to a public school (and contribute to its growth and excellence).

We want to attend a local, neighborhood public school and attend a school that has the same community in which our children are spending their preschool years. We believe in the public school system and Daniel Webster’s potential. In addition we are impressed with DW’s current parents and faculty. We want to build on their success.

It is an important fixture in the Potrero Hill community. Although our child currently attends another SFUSD school, we would prefer one closer to home if we felt it provided a comparable educational experience. Daniel Webster has this potential.

I grew up in a neighborhood where I walked to public school k-5. I walked with the same kids I’d grown up with, we all knew each other’s families, the teachers and the school were part of our community. My parents were involved in the school (my mom was PTA president and a Brownie troop leader!) I want the same for my kids - mine was a suburban NJ neighborhood that wasn’t nearly as ethnically and economically diverse as SF, and I very much want my kids to benefit from our diverse urban environment for their education - I think it’s a critical part of education and of becoming a tolerant person able to relate to all different kinds of people. I love our neighborhood and I value the friendships I’ve made with other parents through our wonderful free events - I would love to send our kids to school together - I think we have a very warm, welcoming, community minded group and if we all work together, we can make Daniel Webster flourish.

I and my wife attended public schools and would ideally like to send my son to public school. Being part of a community of parents in Potrero Hill has meant a lot to us and we would really like the opportunity to send our son to a school with local children.

I want to save Daniel Webster so I can achieve my dream of living, working, and educating my children all in the same neighborhood. It’s a win-win for all. I’m a huge believer in the public school system and I know that, with parent support, Daniel Webster has the potential to be a much better school.

For Our Children
I want Daniel Webster to be available as a strong, local school when my children are old enough to be students there.

I would love to put my child there.

I want my child(ren) to be able to go to a safe, quality public school in my own neighborhood.

I would love to send my child to a local school in the neighborhood. I’m from the east coast where carting my baby across town to a school in another neighborhood is anathema. Would love to send my child (ren) to Daniel Webster, assuming other kids of this neighborhood would be there too.

I would like to be able to send my children to a good public school in the neighborhood. This would allow me to work less and contribute more time to my children’s education and development. I would like my child to go to school with his neighbors and develop friendships within our community. Going to a local school would provide that.

It would be great to send my daughter to a school in the neighborhood so that I wouldn’t have to trek across the city every morning. It would make it easier to get involved with the school also being in the neighborhood.

I would love for our son (currently 6 months old) to be able to walk to school.

Save it or Lose Us
I would like to see a quality public school in the neighborhood to send my child so I’m not forced to send them to private school. Also I do not want to see a high school for last stop at risk kids in the neighborhood at it will increase crime and I have fears for the safety of my family.

We have young children that one day might attend DW. Even if we do choose to go private, we want to save the school so other PH families can send their children to a local neighborhood school. We are also willing to volunteer whatever we can to improve the school even if our children do not attend. We want to keep young families here in Potrero.

I would love the opportunity to stay in Potrero Hill once my son reaches school-age! Our plan has been to move to the North or South Bay in a few years because we’d prefer to send him to public school, but don’t feel comfortable with the public schools in SF. We would absolutely send him to Daniel Webster if it were a good academic solution, and we’d do whatever possible to help reach that end.

If there is even the slightest chance of turning DW into a neighborhood school, I would stay in San Francisco. We have a great neighborhood here in Potrero Hill. I would love to send my children to DW and help support the school. Without such hope, I will move out of the city to some place with better public schools.

We are both products of public schools and strongly believe in the public school system. If Daniel Webster were to remain intact and continue to improve in terms of academic standards, we would definitely consider sending our children there. Right now we’re most likely looking at private schooling, which could become so prohibitively expensive that we’d have to leave the city and our beloved Hill.

I would prefer not to move out of the city in order to send my child to public school. It would be wonderful to build a solid reputable school right here in our neighborhood. There are so many young children right here.

We have 3 children. We live 2 blocks away from DW. We would love to send our children to the neighborhood public school. We hope others in Potrero are willing to do the same.

Potrero hill is a great place to raise kids but The lack of a viable public school in the area makes it difficult justify staying in the area.

We have two young children and we thought our only option to send them to public school was to leave SF. If we can find a way to improve the school in our neighborhood to a satisfactory level we would consider staying in SF. We love our neighborhood!

We need good local public schools in our community. The public school system in the US is on the decline and it is sad that in the next few years more and more parents will be forced to consider private school education due to the lack of proper public schools.

The dream is to be able to have our children go to a great school in our own neighborhood. We hope it will be Potrero Hill. We love it here. We and would hate to move to the suburbs in order for our children to get a good education - and then we both would have to commute into the city taking more time away from our family. Potrero has a strong community and parents group which is such a bonus.

Having my child go to a good public school in the neighborhood would be a dream come true. So many of my friends with young families have moved out of San Francisco to find good, affordable education. I don’t want to become one of those people and hope to do what I can to support schools like Daniel Webster that are doing a great job of improving their programs and test scores.

It is vital for our neighborhood to have good public schools to keep families in the neighborhood. There appears to be a boom of young children in the neighborhood over the last four years but I am already seeing friends leave for the suburb due to concerns about schools.

I believe that there are many children in Potrero that in the next year would be old enough to attend Daniel Webster. It would be wonderful to maintain our sense of community, have a school that is close by and have the children who are already friends be able to go to a school that all the parents want to help. It would be a great opportunity for our children and for us to be able to stay in San Francisco and give them an excellent education. If we are forced to find another school that is far or cost a lot it’s possible that we may have to move out of San Francisco. I’m afraid that the proposed school closures would affect San Francisco in such a negative way by leaving only the richest and the poorest with children. Let’s maintain a diverse community and have a safe and academically driven school for our children to learn in.

Pertaining to a previous question, we’d very much PREFER to send our child(ren) to a nearby public school and help it thrive. However, with the current enrollment process and /or the closure of DW, we’d end up sending them to private schools or seriously consider moving out of the city due to the expense of a private education.

Enrich the Community
Education is the most important thing to offer a child. DW should be a pinnacle of the Potrero hill community - why not make it that? It’s an opportunity….

To save the Potrero Hill Neighborhood for families.

Keep the neighborhood kid-friendly

1. Improve local schools so that children have the opportunity to go to their neighborhood school 2. Not limit the ability for Daniel Webster to continue to thrive 3. Not limit the possibility for Starr King to expand the Mandarin language immersion program and create another desirable neighborhood school

The community benefits by having an elementary school. The neighborhood continues to flourish bringing more and more families. When I first moved to Potrero hill almost 10 years ago, the concept of raising a child in the city was unthinkable. Now the Hill has so many children and families, it feels like a suburban neighborhood where I would like to raise my children.

We would love to support our neighborhood school in the hopes that our child can attend when she’s of age. I think it is time that the schools become part of their community and the community takes the school under its wing–whether someone has children or not, they benefit when the school is thriving.

I want my daughter to be able to walk to a great neighborhood school and her classmates are friends she has grown up with from the neighborhood. I want to help make Daniel Webster a great school for her and for all the children in the neighborhood. If I have to send her off the hill, my involvement will be less. Doesn’t anyone think of the environmental impact of all the kids on busses and parents in cars just getting to and from school and activities? Save the air and keep the heart of our neighborhood here!

I think that providing local, high-quality schools are vital for sustaining and fostering a vibrant community. That’s Community with a Capital “C” for caring.

Would like to support the community, and strong desire to send child to neighborhood public school.

To keep a fine school in our neighborhood.

I would like to have a neighborhood school where I would feel comfortable…or even PROUD to send my child to. It would also build community and help bring together the very different groups of people who live in PH. Lastly, with all of the commuting we do, it would be great to walk our children to school every day!

Having a vibrant Daniel Webster simply makes Potrero Hill a better and more exciting place to live.

I believe a good education should be free to our children. Part of a good education is diversity, which is what public schools provide.

I believe in the public school system, and think that every neighborhood should have a good public school for local children

Think its in a great location to serve the neighborhood. Do not want a high school for troubled youth nearby. Think DW school needs a lot of physical improvements though. It does not appear to be a facility that I would want to send my child to.

Other
It was meant to be an elementary school - it should stay that!

I am not convinced it should be save since most of the current students do not come from the neighborhood, are not supposedly by its predominantly white and middle to upper class neighbors. Since they don’t live here, why should these poor children be bused out of their neighborhoods?

I would like to be able to consider a neighborhood school for my children. But at this point, I am not willing to sacrifice the education of my older child and be a pioneer at Daniel Webster.

I’d like to make sure that the site remains an elementary school, not a center for ‘problem’ high school-age kids. Frankly, we already have enough trouble from a few bad-apple teenagers around here who have been carrying out muggings, etc. From what I have seen just walking by Daniel Webster, I don’t think it likely I would be sending my daughter there because I doubt it would be academically challenging enough. I had one year in the SF public school system as a 3rd grader, and spent the entire year in the library doing book reports because I was ahead of the rest of the class (bc. I came from an accelerated program that was shut down the year busing started…). I attended private schools from the fourth grade on, and my education was by far the greatest gift my parents ever gave me (-and they had to sacrifice a great deal to do so). I know how good a quality educational institution can be, and I intend to do all I can to give my daughter the same opportunities and experiences I had. I am very conflicted about this issue, because I believe that EVERY child deserves a challenging, top-notch education, and I think that should be our #1 budget priority… BUT, I don’t think I would sacrifice my daughter’s education to my *hope* that one day the public schools can be improved… One thing that also made a big impression on me was a news report I saw last year about kids who had staged a walk-out at their school to protest the conditions of their bathrooms, which the camera crews showed were filthy, horrible places with no seat covers and often no toilet paper. It was an absolute disgrace. What kind of message does it communicate to those kids about how much we as a society value them or the concept of education when they have to try to learn in that kind of environment?! (The other very disheartening thing was that when the kids were interviewed, they added that it would be nice if they could have textbooks, too…!!!!) So, to reiterate, I would wholeheartedly support any efforts to improve our public education system. Providing the children of this city with a first-rate education benefits EVERYONE, and it is something I would gladly pay taxes to support. But until or unless ENORMOUS improvements are made to the existing school system, I don’t think I will be sending my daughter to a public school here in SF (-which is a real shame!).