DC NMSFs 2025

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The assertion that there are so many advanced kids in DC that we can't find all of them a slot at a school where there's a significant cohort of kids at or above grade level does not make any mathematical sense. If there are that many of them, make a school for it, the way there's currently a school for 400 kids, the vast majority are below grade level, where DCPS pretends they're doing college-level work. And if DCPS starts getting kids who enter the system from private school -- oh no, what a problem, whatever shall we do.

the assertion is that in a large urban school district, you’re fooling yourself if you believe your child is entitled to a homogeneous “cohort.” You chose to live in an economically and racially diverse city and no, the school system is not going to create a bespoke HS for your kid. Some urban school districts have extremely selective schools (eg stuy) but they select a VERY small number and leave behing a huge number of bright and hardworking kids.

The assertion is that DC doesn’t have an extremely selective public school that selects a very small number of students with the highest aptitude, regardless of their race or SES/HHI. Yes, it won’t be available to many bright kids. But now it isn’t available to anyone, unlike some urban school districts. Why not?

“Equity.”

As a result, more flee to Basis, Walls, and the suburbs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would be the issue with a system that combines grades and a test score as elements of admission? Wouldn’t that be most effective in identifying the top students?

Why are people afraid of a standardized test?

There is absolutely no ethical issue with this, because it actually was the system in DC for Walls for many, many years, until the pandemic! It's so weird to me that the city hasn't corrected this.

What is the right person/entity to contact to express this view? Is it DME? The chancellor? I confess I don't really understand how DCPS is governed.

I don’t have any personal knowledge, but what I’ve gleaned from DCUM was that the former test was used to identify a pool which was then selected by interview. I don’t think that was much more selective than the current process.

It has become quite a bit more selective because the number of qualified students who apply has increased as the number of DC students who stay through middle school and apply or lottery for public high schools increases.

If I wanted to know more about these processes I would go to my council on education and ask there. Possibly have a meeting or ask questions of my council member (acknowledging that the Mayor's office and the Mayor's office alone has governance over the running of DCPS) and take it from there.

Do you have data that more students are applying to application high schools than in the past? Banneker is a much bigger school now and to my knowledge Walls has had a relatively constant number of applicants each year. Well over a thousand for the past decade plus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would be the issue with a system that combines grades and a test score as elements of admission? Wouldn’t that be most effective in identifying the top students?

Why are people afraid of a standardized test?

There is absolutely no ethical issue with this, because it actually was the system in DC for Walls for many, many years, until the pandemic! It's so weird to me that the city hasn't corrected this.

What is the right person/entity to contact to express this view? Is it DME? The chancellor? I confess I don't really understand how DCPS is governed.

I don’t have any personal knowledge, but what I’ve gleaned from DCUM was that the former test was used to identify a pool which was then selected by interview. I don’t think that was much more selective than the current process.

It has become quite a bit more selective because the number of qualified students who apply has increased as the number of DC students who stay through middle school and apply or lottery for public high schools increases.

If I wanted to know more about these processes I would go to my council on education and ask there. Possibly have a meeting or ask questions of my council member (acknowledging that the Mayor's office and the Mayor's office alone has governance over the running of DCPS) and take it from there.

Do you have data that more students are applying to application high schools than in the past? Banneker is a much bigger school now and to my knowledge Walls has had a relatively constant number of applicants each year. Well over a thousand for the past decade plus.

Waitlist data was previously available for McKinley Tech that supports this. Additionally, the largest increase in students in the system is currently in the high school level. IF there are more students overall it stands to reason that more of them are applying for application high schools. Why wouldn't they?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would be the issue with a system that combines grades and a test score as elements of admission? Wouldn’t that be most effective in identifying the top students?

Why are people afraid of a standardized test?

There is absolutely no ethical issue with this, because it actually was the system in DC for Walls for many, many years, until the pandemic! It's so weird to me that the city hasn't corrected this.

What is the right person/entity to contact to express this view? Is it DME? The chancellor? I confess I don't really understand how DCPS is governed.

I don’t have any personal knowledge, but what I’ve gleaned from DCUM was that the former test was used to identify a pool which was then selected by interview. I don’t think that was much more selective than the current process.

It has become quite a bit more selective because the number of qualified students who apply has increased as the number of DC students who stay through middle school and apply or lottery for public high schools increases.

If I wanted to know more about these processes I would go to my council on education and ask there. Possibly have a meeting or ask questions of my council member (acknowledging that the Mayor's office and the Mayor's office alone has governance over the running of DCPS) and take it from there.

Do you have data that more students are applying to application high schools than in the past? Banneker is a much bigger school now and to my knowledge Walls has had a relatively constant number of applicants each year. Well over a thousand for the past decade plus.

Waitlist data was previously available for McKinley Tech that supports this. Additionally, the largest increase in students in the system is currently in the high school level. IF there are more students overall it stands to reason that more of them are applying for application high schools. Why wouldn't they?

So you don’t have data supporting your claim.

[Anonymous]

Not the PP, but the number of high-performing kids in DC schools is certainly going up. For the past three cycles, the NMSF cutoff for DC has been unchanged (223). Here’s the numbers and distribution.

Class of 2023, 2024, 2025
Total: 23, 28, 47
Sidwell: 5, 8, 11
STA/NCS: 5, 7, 9
GDS: 4, 1, 7
Walls: 6, 5, 6
All others: 3, 8, 14

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not the PP, but the number of high-performing kids in DC schools is certainly going up. For the past three cycles, the NMSF cutoff for DC has been unchanged (223). Here’s the numbers and distribution.

Class of 2023, 2024, 2025
Total: 23, 28, 47
Sidwell: 5, 8, 11
STA/NCS: 5, 7, 9
GDS: 4, 1, 7
Walls: 6, 5, 6
All others: 3, 8, 14

But that doesn’t mean more kids are applying to the application high schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would be the issue with a system that combines grades and a test score as elements of admission? Wouldn’t that be most effective in identifying the top students?

Why are people afraid of a standardized test?

There is absolutely no ethical issue with this, because it actually was the system in DC for Walls for many, many years, until the pandemic! It's so weird to me that the city hasn't corrected this.

What is the right person/entity to contact to express this view? Is it DME? The chancellor? I confess I don't really understand how DCPS is governed.

I don’t have any personal knowledge, but what I’ve gleaned from DCUM was that the former test was used to identify a pool which was then selected by interview. I don’t think that was much more selective than the current process.

It has become quite a bit more selective because the number of qualified students who apply has increased as the number of DC students who stay through middle school and apply or lottery for public high schools increases.

If I wanted to know more about these processes I would go to my council on education and ask there. Possibly have a meeting or ask questions of my council member (acknowledging that the Mayor's office and the Mayor's office alone has governance over the running of DCPS) and take it from there.

Do you have data that more students are applying to application high schools than in the past? Banneker is a much bigger school now and to my knowledge Walls has had a relatively constant number of applicants each year. Well over a thousand for the past decade plus.

Waitlist data was previously available for McKinley Tech that supports this. Additionally, the largest increase in students in the system is currently in the high school level. IF there are more students overall it stands to reason that more of them are applying for application high schools. Why wouldn't they?

So you don’t have data supporting your claim.

+1

Just because McKinley has a longer waitlist doesn’t mean more kids are applying to application high schools. It could just be that more kids are adding McKinley to their list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not the PP, but the number of high-performing kids in DC schools is certainly going up. For the past three cycles, the NMSF cutoff for DC has been unchanged (223). Here’s the numbers and distribution.

Class of 2023, 2024, 2025
Total: 23, 28, 47
Sidwell: 5, 8, 11
STA/NCS: 5, 7, 9
GDS: 4, 1, 7
Walls: 6, 5, 6
All others: 3, 8, 14

But that doesn’t mean more kids are applying to the application high schools.

I agree. But it does mean that the pool of potential credible applicants is growing. And I thought it might be interesting to people following this thread titled “DC NMSFs 2025.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would be the issue with a system that combines grades and a test score as elements of admission? Wouldn’t that be most effective in identifying the top students?

Why are people afraid of a standardized test?

There is absolutely no ethical issue with this, because it actually was the system in DC for Walls for many, many years, until the pandemic! It's so weird to me that the city hasn't corrected this.

What is the right person/entity to contact to express this view? Is it DME? The chancellor? I confess I don't really understand how DCPS is governed.

I don’t have any personal knowledge, but what I’ve gleaned from DCUM was that the former test was used to identify a pool which was then selected by interview. I don’t think that was much more selective than the current process.

It has become quite a bit more selective because the number of qualified students who apply has increased as the number of DC students who stay through middle school and apply or lottery for public high schools increases.

If I wanted to know more about these processes I would go to my council on education and ask there. Possibly have a meeting or ask questions of my council member (acknowledging that the Mayor's office and the Mayor's office alone has governance over the running of DCPS) and take it from there.

Do you have data that more students are applying to application high schools than in the past? Banneker is a much bigger school now and to my knowledge Walls has had a relatively constant number of applicants each year. Well over a thousand for the past decade plus.

This is available here: https://enrolldcps.dc.gov/node/61

9th grade applicants

SY14-15
Banneker 754
McKinley 897
Walls 1097

SY15-16
Banneker 654
McKinley 693
Walls 1016

SY16-17
Banneker 588
McKinley 652
Walls 969

SY17-18
Banneker 678
McKinley 704
Walls 1095

SY18-19
Banneker 713
McKinley 801
Walls 1240

SY19-20
Banneker 796
McKinley 780
Walls 1213

SY20-21
Banneker 815
McKinley 1101
Walls 1263

SY21-22
Banneker 854
McKinley 931
Walls 1325

SY22-23
Banneker 1050
McKinley 979
Walls 1447

SY23-24
Banneker 1149
McKinley 1216
Walls 1627

SY24-25
Banneker 1291
McKinley 1271
Walls 1527

[Anonymous]

Wow. I am the PP who didn’t have the stats.
I guess my gut feeling and cursory review of some data was right. That’s a huge increase in students applying to application schools over time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow. I am the PP who didn’t have the stats.
I guess my gut feeling and cursory review of some data was right. That’s a huge increase in students applying to application schools over time.

It is obviously an increase but it’s hard to say if it is a huge one. We can’t know if those are all discrete students or overlap.

[Anonymous]

I also think, at least with Walls, that some of this is a function of having an admissions test versus not. More kids might apply because they don’t have to take a test to get in. Kind of like college admissions went through the roof when kids didn’t need to submit SAT scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow. I am the PP who didn’t have the stats.
I guess my gut feeling and cursory review of some data was right. That’s a huge increase in students applying to application schools over time.

It is obviously an increase but it’s hard to say if it is a huge one. We can’t know if those are all discrete students or overlap.

Obviously a lot of overlap between the schools, but by following a single school’s numbers over time you can see an obvious increase in absolute application numbers. That doesn’t tell you whether the number of “good” applicants is increasing, but PP pointed to some other data (eg the NMSF).

So there are more applicants, plus more and more of the applicants are highly qualified students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow. I am the PP who didn’t have the stats.
I guess my gut feeling and cursory review of some data was right. That’s a huge increase in students applying to application schools over time.

It is obviously an increase but it’s hard to say if it is a huge one. We can’t know if those are all discrete students or overlap.

Obviously a lot of overlap between the schools, but by following a single school’s numbers over time you can see an obvious increase in absolute application numbers. That doesn’t tell you whether the number of “good” applicants is increasing, but PP pointed to some other data (eg the NMSF).

So there are more applicants, plus more and more of the applicants are highly qualified students.

Also grade inflation increased during this period, meaning more students met the Walls GPA threshold, increasing applications.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow. I am the PP who didn’t have the stats.
I guess my gut feeling and cursory review of some data was right. That’s a huge increase in students applying to application schools over time.

It is obviously an increase but it’s hard to say if it is a huge one. We can’t know if those are all discrete students or overlap.

Obviously a lot of overlap between the schools, but by following a single school’s numbers over time you can see an obvious increase in absolute application numbers. That doesn’t tell you whether the number of “good” applicants is increasing, but PP pointed to some other data (eg the NMSF).

So there are more applicants, plus more and more of the applicants are highly qualified students.

You don’t know that more and more of the applicants are highly qualified.