Reply to SWW - when do notices go out about interviews?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]For the last few years, Walls has been fixated on GPA but, with grade inflation in DC, the school is not necessary selecting the top students.  For example, based on 9th grade PARRC results, over 30% of Walls 9th graders are [i]below[/i] grade level in math.  If they had an admission test, Walls could easily only select 9th graders who are [i]at least[/i] grade level in math.  [b]Just compare Walls to Stuyvesant, a 82% minority magnet school in NYC,[/b] which has an admissions test and where no 9th grader is below grade level in math.  Obviously, Walls is not focused on picking the top students in DC.

This year Walls changed the admissions system so that subjective teacher recs are worth three times more than a kid’s GPA.  And the teacher recs are not based on any numerical rating. [b] Thus, overworked Walls admissions staff are assigning numerical weights to these teacher recs based on general comments such as “this student is great” or “this student is solid” and using these comments to calculate the applicant’s overall numerical score to determine if he or she warrants an interview. [/b] As a result, a student with a relatively low GPA but excellent teacher recs will receive an interview over a kid with a stronger GPA who submitted more lukewarm teacher recs.

Based on this change, it is hard to see how Walls will be picking a stronger class this year than previous years.  It will be interesting to see if the new class, like previous recent ones, includes a high percentage of “straight A” kids testing below grade level.
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While I agree with you that the process leaves a lot to be desired (my 4.0 kid didn't get an interview), I also want to call into question two of your statements. First, Stuyvesant is something like 10% Black and Latino, so saying it's 82% minority effectively means it's 72% Asian. I don't think Asian kids are underrepresented in NYC's selective schools, so it doesn't seem right to include them in the minority stats.

Second, I don't think your comment about Walls choosing based on vague recommendations is correct. The recommendation forms have choices for teachers such as "5: reading level is far advanced for age and grade level," "4: Reads well above expectations for age and grade level," etc. So even though it's subjective based on the teacher's judgment, the admissions staff won't have to assign guesstimates to what "this student is solid" means.[/quote]

Nice for you to supposedly have insight about what the teacher recommendation process looked like. Us mere mortal parents weren't provided transparency. So we'll have to take your word for it, I guess?[/quote]

+100

Here is what a DC teacher who actually did Walls recs this year said:

[b]"There are no rankings in the apps. I was never asked to rank kids or assign some numerical number."[/b][/quote]

I think you're reading too much into what the self-identified teacher said. First, they did not directly say that they did Walls recs this year. They said recommendations for all of the schools use the same form, and that they were "never asked" certain things, suggesting that they wrote recommendations during some period with a definitive endpoint, not that they filled out the form for SWW applicants in the past few months, so they may not even be a current teacher.

They also said their estimate of the SWW applications came from attending an open house, which would be an odd place to find a current DCPS MS Math or English teacher unless they happen to also have a current 8th grader. It's also interesting that the poster did not actually describe the recommendation letter form. They didn't say whether it asks for an open ended narrative, whether it asks short-answer or multiple choice questions, or anything else. All they said was the sentence you quoted, which is pretty sparse in detail.

And even if they are a current teacher and actually did SWW recs this year, the description you're responding to doesn't necessarily assign a "numerical number" or "rank kids." It describes a multiple choice question that asks the teacher to select the most appropriate description for the student's level. It does so in a way that would make it easy to assign a point value, but a teacher who uses the phrase "numerical number" might not spot that.

The description is also consistent with what I was told at the open house. I asked exactly this question because the admissions director talked about how their process was data driven, but it would be very difficult to be consistent about assigning point values to open ended narratives. I can't say I remember the exact answer, but I walked away thinking it would be pretty much what the poster above describes. That also makes sense because it's the only way they could reasonably assign point values to hundreds of recommendation letters within a couple of weeks. 
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