October waitlist data is up

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:13 pages of the same, people get a life!

Maybe Jeff can make a separate Basis Forum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fair point that there is no “BASIS way,” at least not one that’s set in stone. I got disillusioned with this head when he wouldn’t let parents of Spanish immersion grads organize low cost after-school language maintenance lessons on campus, or offer these kids remotely challenging 8th grade Spanish. That wasn’t about education or college admissions on the part of the HoS, it was about control. Parents come to DCUM to raise issues for the simple reason that the BASIS DC will not tolerate a PTA.

BASIS parents don’t have a private listserv or fb page or anything? No place where you can discuss issues in a less public setting and without the anonymity?

No.

Huh? Yes, there is a BASIS parent email/site. BASIS-DC-Listserv on io groups. Parents who weren't aware should join!

The list serve isn't an open forum. Any challenging post stands a good chance of being deleted.

Look, the best way to deal with BASIS administrators is to pretend they don't exist. I recommend this 7 years in. If your kid is a high performer and you have the means, you can ignore the semi competent people in charge and bare bones facilities. We hire tutors where AP teachers aren't too hot. Sometimes we do this in league with other parents. We register our teens to take AP tests that BASIS DC doesn't sign off at at other schools in the area. We pay for summer language immersion camps abroad. We don't participate in extra curriculars on campus. We seek out more serious activities and enrichment at venues with good facilities for sports and music.

We pay around 10K/yr per child for additional inputs. Much cheaper than Sidwell, GDS, NCS or St. Albans.

Then those who post challenging posts can start their own forum, yes? Seems some BASIS parents prefer the anonymity of this forum so they can hijack threads about more general topics and make it all about BASIS and themselves.

Do you have observations or comments you'd like to make about the waitlist that you are unable to make because of BASIS posts? By all means, please share.

BASIS attracts rude and entitled parents who cannot seem to hold civil conversations with each other and set their children against one another instead of creating a collegial and supportive school community.

Few BASIS parents enroll in search of a collegial and supportive school community. Parents seek a collection of high AP scores no later than jr. year (just not in Spanish) on the road to impressive college admissions results. That's it.

When I was applying to elite prep schools I don't recall looking through the catalogues and USNews rankings to find the most supportive parental community. I was looking at Ivy admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will say that as a BASIS parent, we're not donating directly to the school. If they want our money (and we were huge donors in elementary), they can allow a PTO.

I don’t want a PTO.

And I’m MUCH happier giving to BASIS, where I know my funds will go directly to teachers, than I was at our prior elementary, where funding was wasted on an endless list of annoying parent-driven pet projects….

My issue is that BASIS should already be paying their teachers well, instead of doing things like advertising on busses. So I don't "know that my funds are going directly to teachers" and instead feel like my funds are paying for BS that I don't actually want to pay for, because BASIS is using parents to pay their staff and putting the BASIS money elsewhere. Plus, there is no transparency, the way there is with a PTO.

It has already been explained that the route for the bus in question goes across the river into neighborhoods and covering demographics that BASIS (and all charters) seek to expand their reach into. Either you don't want to understand this or you are incapable. Either way you are without credibility.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fair point that there is no “BASIS way,” at least not one that’s set in stone. I got disillusioned with this head when he wouldn’t let parents of Spanish immersion grads organize low cost after-school language maintenance lessons on campus, or offer these kids remotely challenging 8th grade Spanish. That wasn’t about education or college admissions on the part of the HoS, it was about control. Parents come to DCUM to raise issues for the simple reason that the BASIS DC will not tolerate a PTA.

BASIS parents don’t have a private listserv or fb page or anything? No place where you can discuss issues in a less public setting and without the anonymity?

No.

Huh? Yes, there is a BASIS parent email/site. BASIS-DC-Listserv on io groups. Parents who weren't aware should join!

The list serve isn't an open forum. Any challenging post stands a good chance of being deleted.

Look, the best way to deal with BASIS administrators is to pretend they don't exist. I recommend this 7 years in. If your kid is a high performer and you have the means, you can ignore the semi competent people in charge and bare bones facilities. We hire tutors where AP teachers aren't too hot. Sometimes we do this in league with other parents. We register our teens to take AP tests that BASIS DC doesn't sign off at at other schools in the area. We pay for summer language immersion camps abroad. We don't participate in extra curriculars on campus. We seek out more serious activities and enrichment at venues with good facilities for sports and music.

We pay around 10K/yr per child for additional inputs. Much cheaper than Sidwell, GDS, NCS or St. Albans.

Then those who post challenging posts can start their own forum, yes? Seems some BASIS parents prefer the anonymity of this forum so they can hijack threads about more general topics and make it all about BASIS and themselves.

Do you have observations or comments you'd like to make about the waitlist that you are unable to make because of BASIS posts? By all means, please share.

BASIS attracts rude and entitled parents who cannot seem to hold civil conversations with each other and set their children against one another instead of creating a collegial and supportive school community.

Few BASIS parents enroll in search of a collegial and supportive school community. Parents seek a collection of high AP scores no later than jr. year (just not in Spanish) on the road to impressive college admissions results. That's it.

Poor kids. Especially the middle schoolers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will say that as a BASIS parent, we're not donating directly to the school. If they want our money (and we were huge donors in elementary), they can allow a PTO.

I don’t want a PTO.

And I’m MUCH happier giving to BASIS, where I know my funds will go directly to teachers, than I was at our prior elementary, where funding was wasted on an endless list of annoying parent-driven pet projects….

My issue is that BASIS should already be paying their teachers well, instead of doing things like advertising on busses. So I don't "know that my funds are going directly to teachers" and instead feel like my funds are paying for BS that I don't actually want to pay for, because BASIS is using parents to pay their staff and putting the BASIS money elsewhere. Plus, there is no transparency, the way there is with a PTO.

It has already been explained that the route for the bus in question goes across the river into neighborhoods and covering demographics that BASIS (and all charters) seek to expand their reach into. Either you don't want to understand this or you are incapable. Either way you are without credibility.

I understand exactly what they're doing. I just don't choose to pay for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will say that as a BASIS parent, we're not donating directly to the school. If they want our money (and we were huge donors in elementary), they can allow a PTO.

I don’t want a PTO.

And I’m MUCH happier giving to BASIS, where I know my funds will go directly to teachers, than I was at our prior elementary, where funding was wasted on an endless list of annoying parent-driven pet projects….

My issue is that BASIS should already be paying their teachers well, instead of doing things like advertising on busses. So I don't "know that my funds are going directly to teachers" and instead feel like my funds are paying for BS that I don't actually want to pay for, because BASIS is using parents to pay their staff and putting the BASIS money elsewhere. Plus, there is no transparency, the way there is with a PTO.

Yes, but nobody with the power to effect change cares about your issue, not with the BASIS waiting list growing annually.

Transparency? That's for private and suburban schools in this Metro area.

I'm perfectly happy with my kid at BASIS. They're getting an excellent education. BASIS is just not getting cash from me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will say that as a BASIS parent, we're not donating directly to the school. If they want our money (and we were huge donors in elementary), they can allow a PTO.

I don’t want a PTO.

And I’m MUCH happier giving to BASIS, where I know my funds will go directly to teachers, than I was at our prior elementary, where funding was wasted on an endless list of annoying parent-driven pet projects….

My issue is that BASIS should already be paying their teachers well, instead of doing things like advertising on busses. So I don't "know that my funds are going directly to teachers" and instead feel like my funds are paying for BS that I don't actually want to pay for, because BASIS is using parents to pay their staff and putting the BASIS money elsewhere. Plus, there is no transparency, the way there is with a PTO.

It has already been explained that the route for the bus in question goes across the river into neighborhoods and covering demographics that BASIS (and all charters) seek to expand their reach into. Either you don't want to understand this or you are incapable. Either way you are without credibility.

I understand exactly what they're doing. I just don't choose to pay for it.

You are the poster child for why a HoS (at BASIS or anywhere) might be well served to just ignore many parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:13 pages of the same, people get a life!

Maybe Jeff can make a separate Basis Forum.

Yes! Put the rest of us who are completely uninterested in Basis out of our misery. This is beyond ridiculous. They hijack EVERY SINGLE THREAD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:13 pages of the same, people get a life!

Maybe Jeff can make a separate Basis Forum.

Yes! Put the rest of us who are completely uninterested in Basis out of our misery. This is beyond ridiculous. They hijack EVERY SINGLE THREAD.

Who is stopping you from posting about something else?

[Anonymous]

I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

This line could easily have been posted a year ago, or five, or ten. Fact is, 9th grade enrollment continues to fluctuate widely. One year, four dozen 8th graders will re-enroll, the next year 80 will. The state of admissions to Walls seems more relevant than "families feeling more invested in the BASIS HS" in determining how many 8th graders return for 9th grade than what goes on at BASIS.

From what I gather, almost all of my kid's friends will leave for Walls if they get a spot. Pre Covid, these kids would've had a better chance of cracking Walls, with testing dropped from the application during the pandemic, a permanent seeming change.

There's only so much that can be done to convince somewhere between a third and half of the BASIS 8th graders to return to a program with weak facilities, a cramped building jammed with MS students, a v. limited choice of serious extra-curriculars, and an increasingly unstable faculty. BASIS isn't just competing with Walls, it's competing with GW Univ, where Walls students can take college classes. At BASIS, other than for math, no subjects are taught past the AP level. We will leave BASIS for another reason: we don't like how the program crams almost all HS classes into just three years, with senior year devoted to independent research and applying to colleges.

We don't think that this HoS is capable of improving morale. He might retain more 8th graders, given the tough Walls admissions situation, but we doubt that he'll retain more of his best HS teachers going forward.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

This line could easily have been posted a year ago, or five, or ten. Fact is, 9th grade enrollment continues to fluctuate widely. One year, four dozen 8th graders will re-enroll, the next year 80 will. The state of admissions to Walls seems more relevant than "families feeling more invested in the BASIS HS" in determining how many 8th graders return for 9th grade than what goes on at BASIS.

From what I gather, almost all of my kid's friends will leave for Walls if they get a spot. Pre Covid, these kids would've had a better chance of cracking Walls, with testing dropped from the application during the pandemic, a permanent seeming change.

There's only so much that can be done to convince somewhere between a third and half of the BASIS 8th graders to return to a program with weak facilities, a cramped building jammed with MS students, a v. limited choice of serious extra-curriculars, and an increasingly unstable faculty. BASIS isn't just competing with Walls, it's competing with GW Univ, where Walls students can take college classes. At BASIS, other than for math, no subjects are taught past the AP level. We will leave BASIS for another reason: we don't like how the program crams almost all HS classes into just three years, with senior year devoted to independent research and applying to colleges.

We don't think that this HoS is capable of improving morale. He might retain more 8th graders, given the tough Walls admissions situation, but we doubt that he'll retain more of his best HS teachers going forward.

He won't succeed, as measured by 9th grade enrollments. But if enrollments do increase it won't have anything to do with him. Hmmm.

I find it strange that people like PP who were at BASIS for 4 years in MS, whose kids excelled and are able to test into and gain admission to HS so easily complain about BASIS without any acknowledgement of what came before.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

This line could easily have been posted a year ago, or five, or ten. Fact is, 9th grade enrollment continues to fluctuate widely. One year, four dozen 8th graders will re-enroll, the next year 80 will. The state of admissions to Walls seems more relevant than "families feeling more invested in the BASIS HS" in determining how many 8th graders return for 9th grade than what goes on at BASIS.

From what I gather, almost all of my kid's friends will leave for Walls if they get a spot. Pre Covid, these kids would've had a better chance of cracking Walls, with testing dropped from the application during the pandemic, a permanent seeming change.

There's only so much that can be done to convince somewhere between a third and half of the BASIS 8th graders to return to a program with weak facilities, a cramped building jammed with MS students, a v. limited choice of serious extra-curriculars, and an increasingly unstable faculty. BASIS isn't just competing with Walls, it's competing with GW Univ, where Walls students can take college classes. At BASIS, other than for math, no subjects are taught past the AP level. We will leave BASIS for another reason: we don't like how the program crams almost all HS classes into just three years, with senior year devoted to independent research and applying to colleges.

We don't think that this HoS is capable of improving morale. He might retain more 8th graders, given the tough Walls admissions situation, but we doubt that he'll retain more of his best HS teachers going forward.

He won't succeed, as measured by 9th grade enrollments. But if enrollments do increase it won't have anything to do with him. Hmmm.

I find it strange that people like PP who were at BASIS for 4 years in MS, whose kids excelled and are able to test into and gain admission to HS so easily complain about BASIS without any acknowledgement of what came before.

I agree with this sentiment. As the parent of an 8th grader, I feel that my kid has gotten an excellent middle school education at BASIS. I find it hard to believe that the quality somehow becomes subpar in high school. If my kid gets in to Walls, we will have the discussion then about where kid wants to go (and I think a lot of it will depend on whether there will be a "reunion" with elementary school friends at Walls since they all scattered to different middle schools). WRT chances of Walls admission . . . I think there are currently approx 85 8th graders at BASIS. I would guess roughly 30% have the requisite 3.7-3.8 GPA required to get an interview at Walls (last year's GPA cutoff). Applying last year's 64% admit rate to those who got an interview, somewhere around 17 or 18 kids will have the option to go to Walls . . . .others will head to private, leaving (my guess) a 9th grade cohort of 65 or so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

This line could easily have been posted a year ago, or five, or ten. Fact is, 9th grade enrollment continues to fluctuate widely. One year, four dozen 8th graders will re-enroll, the next year 80 will. The state of admissions to Walls seems more relevant than "families feeling more invested in the BASIS HS" in determining how many 8th graders return for 9th grade than what goes on at BASIS.

From what I gather, almost all of my kid's friends will leave for Walls if they get a spot. Pre Covid, these kids would've had a better chance of cracking Walls, with testing dropped from the application during the pandemic, a permanent seeming change.

There's only so much that can be done to convince somewhere between a third and half of the BASIS 8th graders to return to a program with weak facilities, a cramped building jammed with MS students, a v. limited choice of serious extra-curriculars, and an increasingly unstable faculty. BASIS isn't just competing with Walls, it's competing with GW Univ, where Walls students can take college classes. At BASIS, other than for math, no subjects are taught past the AP level. We will leave BASIS for another reason: we don't like how the program crams almost all HS classes into just three years, with senior year devoted to independent research and applying to colleges.

We don't think that this HoS is capable of improving morale. He might retain more 8th graders, given the tough Walls admissions situation, but we doubt that he'll retain more of his best HS teachers going forward.

He won't succeed, as measured by 9th grade enrollments. But if enrollments do increase it won't have anything to do with him. Hmmm.

I find it strange that people like PP who were at BASIS for 4 years in MS, whose kids excelled and are able to test into and gain admission to HS so easily complain about BASIS without any acknowledgement of what came before.

Is lack of acknowledgement what's strangest, or the fact that most of the families still leave after middle school most years?

BASIS obviously does a great job of turning 4th grade families EotP onto the program. Just look at the length of that 5th grade wait list here in the late fall! But the fact remains that the BASIS romance has soured for more than half the families as recently as SY 2021-2022.

Blame parents if you want, and cheer for the HoS, but your arguments aren't as convincing as the numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can see how this thread about ultimate waitlist results for this year shifted to BASIS. It is one of the few (maybe the only?) school which became much harder to get into. This is really significant and is perhaps the reason nobody else is actually chiming in on this thread with other notable waitlist observations. Indeed, many “HRCS” which used to have long waitlists and few people taken off the waitlist now have much shorter waitlists or no waitlists at all. So many reasons for this, including, of course, the way the schools handled the pandemic. What’s interesting though is that post-pandemic people are not as thrilled about these schools because of the lack of rigor and/or classroom management that has perhaps been that way all along but is now more pronounced. BASIS offers the organization and rigor often missing elsewhere around the city and thus the school should have no trouble continuing to attract more students and keeping an ever-growing waitlist.

I think this thread has illuminated some of the important reasons why BASIS attracts students/families initially and why it has trouble keeping them, which has seemingly always been an issue at BASIS. The school, including the HOS (which I personally find extremely responsive and informative, especially compared to our prior school experiences) wants to work with parents to fix retention and improve school morale in whatever ways are feasible. This will take time and effort from both the admins and the parents. To me, it seems that people who might otherwise move or go private might not do so at the same rates in the near future due to the rising costs of both of those options and that may have the consequence of families feeling more invested in the BASIS high school program and hopefully creating the change that they feel would improve the school.

This line could easily have been posted a year ago, or five, or ten. Fact is, 9th grade enrollment continues to fluctuate widely. One year, four dozen 8th graders will re-enroll, the next year 80 will. The state of admissions to Walls seems more relevant than "families feeling more invested in the BASIS HS" in determining how many 8th graders return for 9th grade than what goes on at BASIS.

From what I gather, almost all of my kid's friends will leave for Walls if they get a spot. Pre Covid, these kids would've had a better chance of cracking Walls, with testing dropped from the application during the pandemic, a permanent seeming change.

There's only so much that can be done to convince somewhere between a third and half of the BASIS 8th graders to return to a program with weak facilities, a cramped building jammed with MS students, a v. limited choice of serious extra-curriculars, and an increasingly unstable faculty. BASIS isn't just competing with Walls, it's competing with GW Univ, where Walls students can take college classes. At BASIS, other than for math, no subjects are taught past the AP level. We will leave BASIS for another reason: we don't like how the program crams almost all HS classes into just three years, with senior year devoted to independent research and applying to colleges.

We don't think that this HoS is capable of improving morale. He might retain more 8th graders, given the tough Walls admissions situation, but we doubt that he'll retain more of his best HS teachers going forward.

He won't succeed, as measured by 9th grade enrollments. But if enrollments do increase it won't have anything to do with him. Hmmm.

I find it strange that people like PP who were at BASIS for 4 years in MS, whose kids excelled and are able to test into and gain admission to HS so easily complain about BASIS without any acknowledgement of what came before.

I agree with this sentiment. As the parent of an 8th grader, I feel that my kid has gotten an excellent middle school education at BASIS. I find it hard to believe that the quality somehow becomes subpar in high school. If my kid gets in to Walls, we will have the discussion then about where kid wants to go (and I think a lot of it will depend on whether there will be a "reunion" with elementary school friends at Walls since they all scattered to different middle schools). WRT chances of Walls admission . . . I think there are currently approx 85 8th graders at BASIS. I would guess roughly 30% have the requisite 3.7-3.8 GPA required to get an interview at Walls (last year's GPA cutoff). Applying last year's 64% admit rate to those who got an interview, somewhere around 17 or 18 kids will have the option to go to Walls . . . .others will head to private, leaving (my guess) a 9th grade cohort of 65 or so.

Does BASIS fill the seats of those who leave for ninth grade?