Walls Versus DCI

[Anonymous]

The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

You can just look at actual, real data to compare schools: https://www.empowerk12.org/dc-report-card-metrics-dashboard

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if you go to DC school report card, you can actually see the breakdown of percentages scoring 3, 4, and 5.

Yes, Walls has about 32% kids total scoring 1,2, and 3 on math - all below grade level.

Which high schools do better?

It’s not about which high schools but how low standards are in this town.

How is it acceptable that our “magnet” and supposedly one of the best high school has 1/3rd kids below grade level in math???

It’s just embarrassing and unacceptable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

Probably overindexing on college admission, which is deeply confounded in DC by other things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if you go to DC school report card, you can actually see the breakdown of percentages scoring 3, 4, and 5.

Yes, Walls has about 32% kids total scoring 1,2, and 3 on math - all below grade level.

Which high schools do better?

It’s not about which high schools but how low standards are in this town.

How is it acceptable that our “magnet” and supposedly one of the best high school has 1/3rd kids below grade level in math???

It’s just embarrassing and unacceptable.

It’s wild that anyone would even get in without scoring at grade level. It’s absolutely unacceptable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

This doesn't look bizarre to me except that J-R should be higher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:US News rankings of best public / charter schools in the DMV (213 total schools):

2. Walls
3. Banneker
16. BASIS DC
26. DCI
32. McKinley Tech
36. Latin DC
37. Duke Ellington
42. J-R

DCI seems fine

But if we look at the original post (walls versus DCI) this isn’t great for DCI. 2nd is amazing. 26th is not.

Well if you self select out everyone but the high performing kids at DCI like Walls, Banneker, and Basis does, DCI would be right up there.

That is how you need to look at things for it to be comparable.

A more accurate statement would be DCI is the best all around non-selective middle and high school in the city.

That is certainly true. Yet one difference is that at an application school, all the classes are grade-level plus. It's a different experience for the student.

1/3rd of the kids at Walls are below grade level, and I hear the school is offering remedial math classes so if true, no not all classes are grade level or higher. The academic caliber of students have fallen which is not surprising with recent changes in admissions.

Data to support this?

2/3 of Walls kids scored a 4 or 5 on CAPE on 2023-2024 scores. So 1/3 scored a 3 or below, with 3 being below grade level.

It's the highest in DCPS and probably higher than all the charter schools except Basis. (I'm not going to dig up the data.)

We've covered this a million times CAPE is a terrible test. Also, it's especially flawed at the high school level for many reasons detailed in this forum. That's why literally no other state uses it. Compare SATs or APs if you want an actually relevant test and want to compare DC to other states.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

They don't seem too bizarre to me. Maybe JR should be higher, but the top 5 look right.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new US News rankings are just out and they’re pretty bizarre:

1. Walls
2. BASIS
3. Banneker
4. Latin
5. McKinley Tech
6. DCI
7. Duke Ellington
8. CHEC
9. Haynes
10. J-R

I just learned that there is a lag -- this year's list is based on the 2022-2023 school year.

[Anonymous]

These types of rankings only matter if you care about the things the lists measure with the same weight. Some schools, like CHEC, juice the rankings by requiring all students to take an AP exam (which is a key measure in the US News rankings) even though the majority of those kids don't pass a single AP test.

At CHEC, 17% of students pass at least 1 AP test, and 31% are proficient in reading.
At JR, it is 59% passing at least 1 AP, and 58% reading proficient.

But somehow, CHEC is ranked higher.

[Anonymous]

move JR up between McKinley and DCI and maybe add an asterisk that Basis is not an entirely typical experience and its pretty accurate