BASIS DCPCSB to open two PK3-5 campuses

[Anonymous]

A bar of 60% cumulative is low. I am surprised that if you master just over HALF of the material you can be promoted. Sounds like DCPS 2.0.

[Anonymous]

This sounds nightmarish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A bar of 60% cumulative is low. I am surprised that if you master just over HALF of the material you can be promoted. Sounds like DCPS 2.0.

They do hold back kids in the middle school. Not a lot but there are kids who can't meet that percentage in several classes. Some do master the material a second time through and others just leave and go somewhere else.

Conversely in DCPS you cannot receive a grade lower than 50% on any assignment, even if you don'y do anything beyond writing your name on the paper. And students must be given unlimited opportunities for makeup work. That's not how BASIS works, for better or worse.

[Anonymous]

For those who think this is awful - or a grand idea - please submit comments to the DCPCSB via email (details here http://www.dcpcsb.org/public-comment).

They don't typically get many comments on these expansion applications, and do tend to take them seriously. Even if the authorizers found this thread, they can't take them into consideration.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How is BASIS different from DC Prep?

Exactly or KIPP. It's one thing to turn up the heat on middle schoolers, but Kindergarteners? Really? This model will probably backfire on a number of kids by sucking the fun out of school.

Doesn't BASIS already have this model in Arizona? How is it working there?

Schools are fully subscribed and their test scores seem pretty strong. But they've only been in the K-4 game for about 3 years.

Are test scores really the only thing that matter for kids ages 5-9? If your answer is "Yes," or "Test scores aren't the only thing, but they're the most important thing for this age group," then are you actually a parent? It's hard for me to believe that parents would want this for their children, but I suppose Basis is counting on this option seeming preferable to some or the poorest-managed DCPS schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How is BASIS different from DC Prep?

Exactly or KIPP. It's one thing to turn up the heat on middle schoolers, but Kindergarteners? Really? This model will probably backfire on a number of kids by sucking the fun out of school.

Doesn't BASIS already have this model in Arizona? How is it working there?

Schools are fully subscribed and their test scores seem pretty strong. But they've only been in the K-4 game for about 3 years.

Are test scores really the only thing that matter for kids ages 5-9? If your answer is "Yes," or "Test scores aren't the only thing, but they're the most important thing for this age group," then are you actually a parent? It's hard for me to believe that parents would want this for their children, but I suppose Basis is counting on this option seeming preferable to some or the poorest-managed DCPS schools.

I think this model will certain appeal to some DC parents - after all KIPP has many campuses as does DC Prep and good results. Of course the prevailing DCUM attitude toward these schools is, at best, that it might be good for 'some kids' but not their own.

The BASIS DC middle and high school so far is pretty evenly mixed demographically and economically. That will likely change if this is approved and goes forward as planned. It will be hard to join the school in 5th as the students in K-4 will obviously have priority. Higher SES families, who are willing to send a middle or high school student now would have been unlikely to make that decision when their kids were in K-4.

I think they need to significantly boost this application to serve needier population.

[Anonymous]

I'm a BASIS parent who is VERY HAPPY with the school. I have found their to be LITTLE OR NO pressure (quiz every week but you can retake it so no big deal), LITTLE HOMEWORK (mostly 30-questions of math that take under 1 minute/question and fun reading), and LOTS of chances to make up work (extra credit, redo tests, etc). My child was coming from a homeschool experience and did NOT take any tests, do any homework, or have any pressure before BASIS and is still doing great.

HOWEVER --

My gut reaction is to be really wary of a BASIS ES app for 3 reasons:

1. It's a terrible model for elementary school (too much testing, too much expectation for organization, too much homework, and too much stress).

2. It's a terrible fit for young kids (even a socially stable kid in 5th grade isn't going to be stable enough to handle this pressure in K, and a kid with any issues will become a timebomb).

3. Depending on location, it will 100% change the BASIS demographic in the future. Certain locations will be less diverse one way (higher SES) and then there will be NO room come 5th for kids who commute to the Chinatown location for kids from SE (lots commute from there now). OR, it will ONLY get kids who aren't diverse another way (lower SES) and the school won't have the mix of higher SES. I do NOT think SES-only matters, but I do think it's best for kids, adults, and communities when there is a good mix of high SES, low SES, mid SES, white/black/asian/hispanic/etc.

HOWEVER

I am hesitant to actually write all those ideas to the board because maybe this is a great school for some family and they really want it and I'll mess it all up for them by writing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a BASIS parent who is VERY HAPPY with the school. I have found their to be LITTLE OR NO pressure (quiz every week but you can retake it so no big deal), LITTLE HOMEWORK (mostly 30-questions of math that take under 1 minute/question and fun reading), and LOTS of chances to make up work (extra credit, redo tests, etc). My child was coming from a homeschool experience and did NOT take any tests, do any homework, or have any pressure before BASIS and is still doing great.

HOWEVER --

My gut reaction is to be really wary of a BASIS ES app for 3 reasons:

1. It's a terrible model for elementary school (too much testing, too much expectation for organization, too much homework, and too much stress).

2. It's a terrible fit for young kids (even a socially stable kid in 5th grade isn't going to be stable enough to handle this pressure in K, and a kid with any issues will become a timebomb).

3. Depending on location, it will 100% change the BASIS demographic in the future. Certain locations will be less diverse one way (higher SES) and then there will be NO room come 5th for kids who commute to the Chinatown location for kids from SE (lots commute from there now). OR, it will ONLY get kids who aren't diverse another way (lower SES) and the school won't have the mix of higher SES. I do NOT think SES-only matters, but I do think it's best for kids, adults, and communities when there is a good mix of high SES, low SES, mid SES, white/black/asian/hispanic/etc.

HOWEVER

I am hesitant to actually write all those ideas to the board because maybe this is a great school for some family and they really want it and I'll mess it all up for them by writing.

BASIS has the some of the strongest PARCC scores in the city - and no, that's not all that matters - but I think it will be hard for the PCSB to totally reject their expansion. But they can approve with conditions that try to force BASIS to adapt the model in various ways to fit DC including budgeting, hiring and planning for a different school population (the special education section is really weak, as is the ELL supports).

People need to say what gives them pause about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How is BASIS different from DC Prep?

Exactly or KIPP. It's one thing to turn up the heat on middle schoolers, but Kindergarteners? Really? This model will probably backfire on a number of kids by sucking the fun out of school.

Doesn't BASIS already have this model in Arizona? How is it working there?

Schools are fully subscribed and their test scores seem pretty strong. But they've only been in the K-4 game for about 3 years.

Are test scores really the only thing that matter for kids ages 5-9? If your answer is "Yes," or "Test scores aren't the only thing, but they're the most important thing for this age group," then are you actually a parent? It's hard for me to believe that parents would want this for their children, but I suppose Basis is counting on this option seeming preferable to some or the poorest-managed DCPS schools.

I think this model will certain appeal to some DC parents - after all KIPP has many campuses as does DC Prep and good results. Of course the prevailing DCUM attitude toward these schools is, at best, that it might be good for 'some kids' but not their own.

The BASIS DC middle and high school so far is pretty evenly mixed demographically and economically. That will likely change if this is approved and goes forward as planned. It will be hard to join the school in 5th as the students in K-4 will obviously have priority. Higher SES families, who are willing to send a middle or high school student now would have been unlikely to make that decision when their kids were in K-4.

I think they need to significantly boost this application to serve needier population.

Not true across the board. Collectively they have a few high achieving campuses and others with results that look like garden variety mixed bag DC public schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A bar of 60% cumulative is low. I am surprised that if you master just over HALF of the material you can be promoted. Sounds like DCPS 2.0.

They do hold back kids in the middle school. Not a lot but there are kids who can't meet that percentage in several classes. Some do master the material a second time through and others just leave and go somewhere else.

Conversely in DCPS you cannot receive a grade lower than 50% on any assignment, even if you don'y do anything beyond writing your name on the paper. And students must be given unlimited opportunities for makeup work. That's not how BASIS works, for better or worse.

I'd call it for worse. %50 is still a failing grade -- it prevents a single failing grade from overly weighing down average scores, since DCPS would never consider median for evaluation. Why shouldn't a motivated student be given an opportunity to improve on past poor performance? Isn't that the point of repeating a grade? Unless of course the incentives/disincentives are designed to be punitive. Makeup work is a less draconian approach which discourages disengagement when there's little to be gained from trying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A bar of 60% cumulative is low. I am surprised that if you master just over HALF of the material you can be promoted. Sounds like DCPS 2.0.

They do hold back kids in the middle school. Not a lot but there are kids who can't meet that percentage in several classes. Some do master the material a second time through and others just leave and go somewhere else.

Conversely in DCPS you cannot receive a grade lower than 50% on any assignment, even if you don'y do anything beyond writing your name on the paper. And students must be given unlimited opportunities for makeup work. That's not how BASIS works, for better or worse.

I'd call it for worse. %50 is still a failing grade -- it prevents a single failing grade from overly weighing down average scores, since DCPS would never consider median for evaluation. Why shouldn't a motivated student be given an opportunity to improve on past poor performance? Isn't that the point of repeating a grade? Unless of course the incentives/disincentives are designed to be punitive. Makeup work is a less draconian approach which discourages disengagement when there's little to be gained from trying.

Maybe. I agree the BASIS appraoch is beyond insane at the elementary level.

But for higher grades including high school - where DCPS still does this - I disagree. The DCPS grading guidelines already ensure that ALL tests in a grading period can't be worth even half a student's grade, and homework and participation count for a huge amount.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A bar of 60% cumulative is low. I am surprised that if you master just over HALF of the material you can be promoted. Sounds like DCPS 2.0.

They do hold back kids in the middle school. Not a lot but there are kids who can't meet that percentage in several classes. Some do master the material a second time through and others just leave and go somewhere else.

Conversely in DCPS you cannot receive a grade lower than 50% on any assignment, even if you don'y do anything beyond writing your name on the paper. And students must be given unlimited opportunities for makeup work. That's not how BASIS works, for better or worse.

I'd call it for worse. %50 is still a failing grade -- it prevents a single failing grade from overly weighing down average scores, since DCPS would never consider median for evaluation. Why shouldn't a motivated student be given an opportunity to improve on past poor performance? Isn't that the point of repeating a grade? Unless of course the incentives/disincentives are designed to be punitive. Makeup work is a less draconian approach which discourages disengagement when there's little to be gained from trying.

Maybe. I agree the BASIS appraoch is beyond insane at the elementary level.

But for higher grades including high school - where DCPS still does this - I disagree. The DCPS grading guidelines already ensure that ALL tests in a grading period can't be worth even half a student's grade, and homework and participation count for a huge amount.

I see your point but I wasn't referring to test grades alone. Students get graded on assignments which can be as valuable as tests. It's tough where some students fail for lack of effort and others for lack of ability. The effort can be encouraged without pandering if the ability is there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:By having so many kids held back, it would create a lot of kids who by 9th grade, are considered "at risk" since one of the at-risk categories is being a high school student who is a year or more behind in credits for age.

That creates a whole bunch more kids who are eligible for the at-risk preference for Wilson and other high schools, should that be implemented. It will be interesting to see how that all plays out.

In this case, I think "held back" is a euphemism for getting "counseled out".

[Anonymous]

So if this goes through Bassis middle will become, demographically, akin to Kipp. The demographics who flock to HRCS will not flick to this elementary and they'll be less open slots at 5th and the slots open will be less attractive since, in oru heart fo hearts, we want a good number of middle ses people at our kids' school.

This demographic to be what Basis wants. It has to be their mission. Godo for them. I was never interested in Basis anyway, but it will make latin more competitive. Now, people, start working on middle school charter applications!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So if this goes through Bassis middle will become, demographically, akin to Kipp. The demographics who flock to HRCS will not flick to this elementary and they'll be less open slots at 5th and the slots open will be less attractive since, in oru heart fo hearts, we want a good number of middle ses people at our kids' school.

This demographic to be what Basis wants. It has to be their mission. Godo for them. I was never interested in Basis anyway, but it will make latin more competitive. Now, people, start working on middle school charter applications!!

I totally agree with you - and posted something similar upthread.

Oddly that is NOT the demographic they serve in Arizona for elementary or middle/high school. Quite the opposite. And in this proposal they say they anticipate a 20% economically disadvantaged student population. Maybe they just don't understand the climate here?