Reply to BASIS student, have they left the school?

Forum Index » DC Public and Public Charter Schools

Reply to "BASIS student, have they left the school?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]
We're looking at BASIS for DC2 but I've pretty much lost faith at this point, feeling fed up with affirmative action/lottery admissions and aggressively PC parents.  I just want a public school where a great education also tends to mean first-rate facilities and admission to a top college.  How could Basis possibly afford to wash out half the 7th and 8th graders?  Who would replace them if they did?  Nobody can tell us. Indian immigrant, guess we'll see you in MoCo....
[/quote]

I've tried to explain the model, as I understand it, several times on these threads.

BASIS is non-selective and yet very selective in a way.  They invite all fifth and sixth graders to enroll and offer them two years prepare  for the comprehensive exams.  (Sixth graders only get one year.)  Promotion, i.e., admission, to the seventh and subsequent grades is predicated on passing comprehensive exams in half a dozen subjects.  Interestingly, I understand that the BASIS model was originally sixth through 12th, and fifth was added later, presumably because many kids were less prepared than BASIS expected, so an extra "comp-free" year was added.

Passing the comps is no easy task, and predictably, BASIS has a high attrition rate.  A while back I took a look at the enrollment numbers at one of the Arizona schools and found the yearly attrition rate to be in the mid to high teens.  With a yearly attrition rate of 15%, let's say, a BASIS school would keep about 40% of its incoming fifth graders after six years.  (BASIS students have the option of graduating after the 11th grade, and I'm assuming that any student who makes it to the 11th grade would graduate within two years, if not one.)

Suppose BASIS wants to graduate about, say, 60 kids in each incoming class after seven or eight years (11th or 12th) using a curriculum that results in a 15% yearly attrition rate.  Should they admit 60 kids into the fifth grade and admit more kids into the class each year to replace the 9 or so who can be expected to leave?  Of course not.  Since the curriculum is accelerated, the material gets harder from year to year, as do the comps.  The attrition rate among the kids who are admitted in later years will be very high.  (This might explain the reportedly high attrition rates among this year's seventh and eighth graders.)

Instead, they should admit about 150 kids into the fifth grade and not replace any of the departing kids, except perhaps for adding a small number of sixth graders whose parents failed to or were unable to make the switch after fourth grade.

In many ways, the non-selective BASIS model is fairer than selective admissions.  Rather than admit only the 60 kids with the highest graduation potential from a pool of 150 applicants, BASIS admits them all and allows the 60 who graduate to select themselves.  In a selective model, the applicant with the 61st highest graduation potential is nearly as qualified as the applicant with the 60th, but the cut has to be made somewhere.

Unfortunately, the non-selective BASIS model becomes less fair in the face of a lottery for admission to the fifth grade.  In that case, kids with the highest graduation potential might lose in the lottery.  Hopefully, BASIS will have the space to accommodate all interested fifth graders going forward, as they did last year, obviating the need for a lottery.  If not, they should probably continue to admit sixth graders to replace the outgoing fifth graders who (or whose families) underestimated the amount of preparation and hard work required to succeed at BASIS.

As for the economics, the cost of running the school is amortized over enrollment in all grades, not just the upper grades.  By admitting 150 fifth graders each year, a BASIS school with a 15% yearly attrition rate would reach a total enrollment of 680 kids in fifth through 11th after six years, plus perhaps one or two dozen lingering 12th graders.  In other words, the fifth graders pay 22% of the cost of running the school, rather than the 14% they would pay if they were only 1/7 of the total enrollment.  (On the other hand, the fifth graders would probably cost the school more than the 22% of the funding they contribute, as they would probably need the most remedial services.)

So, to answer your question more directly, PP, BASIS will replace this year's departing seventh and eight graders with [u]fifth graders[/u] next year.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics