Reply to Basis fills a gap that shouldn’t exist.

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[quote=Anonymous]
Previous poster with the kid at the MoCo school whose kid endured the three BASIS subject-mid year teacher crash out (fraudulent math teacher, English teacher crash out and physics teacher position not filled and then filled end then the teacher disappeared).

We are an African American family.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Former BASIS family here. Some might even call our kid “washed out”, or “pushed out”. Bright but not able to recover and teach themself high level math when their teacher at a critical year turned out to be a fraud and had to leave mid-year. Has an English and physics teacher also crash out midyear. The school didn’t help kids adapt. We paid for tutors out of our own pockets . We paid in money and our kid paid in time away from friends and other activities. It was killing our kid’s spirit.

We moved to MoCo. House poor now - but not tutor poor. After a year of middle school transition and rebuilding confidence our kiddo is now thriving.

In an application program at a MoCo public high school now. Rigorous classes, opportunity to write much more, and still take rigorous science. Huge choice in classes and paths. So many clubs and electives. Big homecoming dances, fun sporting events. Our kid is joyful.

They acknowledge that BASIS gave them a strong foundation in chemistry and biology, and exposure to math concepts ahead of many classmates. But in some ways BASIS harmed them. Bad memories even borderline traumatic from trying hard to keep up in the classes where teaching was baaaaaaaad and the school administration mostly gaslit students about it or just kinda said suck it up. (There were some excellent teachers too and a few strong counselors). [/quote]

Thanks so much for this honest, well-written and detailed post, PP. The gaslighting at BASIS was a real problem, borderline abusive. We had a very similar experience, with our recovery in Arlington. Nobody at BASIS noticed that my kid has mild ADHD. In VA, the problem was picked up fast, kid was given support and accommodations, enabling her to emerge as an A student in 11th grade IBD classes. Washington-Liberty not only has strong clubs, facilities, electives, sports, music etc. it has a relationship with a vocational center high school where my kid takes a fun take fun tech class each semester, EMT training, animal care etc.

We've kept our DC row house and plan to return as empty nesters but for now, VA is a much better place for us. With in-state VA tuition an option, we don't need to fret about kid earning merit aid at some college with support from BASIS. We were relieved to divorce dramatically uneven teaching at BASIS, endless pleas for parents to top up teachers' salaries, the dearth of natural light in the building and weak administrators. If I could do it over again, I'd have moved to VA earlier and found my kids summer opportunities to learn advanced biology and chem. In the grand scheme of things, BASIS wasn't worth it for us.[/quote]

Thank you to both prior posters for sharing your perspectives. I want to acknowledge the very real upsides of a large, well-resourced suburban high school with all the traditional features — the kind of place many of us would have dreamed of attending back in the 90s. For many families, these schools offer the best of all worlds: strong academics, arts, sports, and a vibrant social life. It makes complete sense why some of you have decamped into what feel like greener pastures, and I’m glad you’ve found settings that work well for your children.

At the same time, I’m not inclined to push back on any individual’s experience of BASIS, especially if their child faced real academic or social challenges there. That’s valid. But I also think it’s worth remembering that BASIS is not unique in being imperfect. Many schools — including those traditional suburban high schools — can be equally flawed, sometimes in different ways.

For families like ours, BASIS’s cultural rigidity has actually been something of a relief. The relentless focus on academics and the clear, objective grading standards — the 90s club, the constant stream of quizzes — remove a lot of the soft ambiguity where unconscious bias can thrive. Our child comes from a racial background where expectations are often, tragically, low — where deficits may be unconsciously amplified, and early struggles quickly chalked up to race. That’s the backdrop we’re navigating, and it’s a reality that shapes our choices.

In more flexible or “softer” academic environments, that ambiguity can work against kids like ours. If there’s room to give the benefit of the doubt — or withhold it — we worry about where that benefit lands. It’s not paranoia; it’s pattern recognition born of long observation. At BASIS, because the culture is so tightly wound around performance, our child has had frequent, consistent opportunities to demonstrate ability — in ways that are hard to ignore, misread, or explain away. That kind of data trail matters for us.

It’s also important to say: the only reason we were even positioned to take advantage of what BASIS offers is because we spent years laying a foundation outside of school — often without institutional help, often in isolation. We didn’t have the luxury to let things play out. And if we had a child who truly struggled academically, BASIS might not be the right fit. But neither would many of the schools being praised, because we know — again, based on experience — that the same child might not be given the space to find their footing there either, especially not with the social positioning we bring.

And candidly, we believe that many of the big suburban high schools that some see as ideal would — given our social positioning — be ill-fitting, and potentially even toxic. That might be different if our child’s background, or our family’s profile, looked more like the default. But it doesn’t. And so for us, BASIS feels not just sufficient, but uniquely well-suited.

Of course, in an ideal world, those large, sprawling public high schools — with all their promise and resources — would be free of the more insidious dynamics we worry about. They would truly offer high expectations, equitable treatment, and full belonging to every student, regardless of background. But in our lived experience, that’s not reliably in the offing — not yet. So we’ve made the choice that feels safest, smartest, and most empowering for our child, for now.

(And, FWIW, I think it’s ridiculous to slam folks for failing to do their “research” on Basis given the issues specific issues raised.)[/quote]

NP. I'm not white. My children attend large suburban schools in the DMV in the county where their dad lives after we left BASIS 3 years in.

Your arguments for preferring BASIS to the best of the burbs for reasons related to "social positioning" sound overwrought. My guess is that you make the best of BASIS because moving for better schools seems like a worse option, not because your concerns about how your AA children would be treated in every single large suburban middle or high school.

I'm not seeing a "softer" academic environment in my older child's high school classes in VA. I am seeing Black classmates whose parents hail from here and there, the Caribbean, the UK, the DMV, Southern states (at least according to my child). I'm told that most of these teenagers of color are among the strongest students. When I talk to these parents, I don't hear complaining about social positioning issues/racism. I hear parents grumbling about what a hard time their children have in cracking leading roles in school plays, varsity sports spots and first chairs for musical instruments. They also object to how hard it is to clear the National Merit Scholarship Semifinalist bar and get As in IB Diploma language classes (taught 1 or 2 years past AP level) because the competition is so tough in the VA burbs. [/quote][/quote]

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