Reply to Do parents choose Latin/BASIS over Deal/J-R?

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Reply to "Do parents choose Latin/BASIS over Deal/J-R?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This former BASIS parent can't agree with you, PP. Most families who bail don't leave because their children fall behind, because the curriculum is over their heads. That dimension of BASIS, while real, is not what makes the program divisive, not here in 2025, 15 years in. BASIS DC still attracts so much derision, particularly from former families, because, overall, it doesn't provide a happy or thoughtful learning experience for students.  This is true no matter how industrious, enthusiastic and bright the kids may be on arrival at any point along the way. Same for parents and teachers. From where I sit, weak, tin-eared, bullying leadership and a franchise that hasn't been founded or run by educators have long been the crux of the problem.

Even so, BASIS has become the jewel in the DPCS crown, getting rave reviews for two reasons, neither of which should wow us. Reason #1:half a dozen seniors with unusual stamina for a dreary high school experience crack some of the country's most highly competitive colleges. Reason #2: public school alternatives for the most academic and ambitious students/families EotP remain even less appealing.

From where I sit, top public-school programs shouldn't operate as survival courses, with self-satisfied pols demurring to BASIS' corporate leadership on almost all aspects of how the place operates. No surprise that the great majority of families in the Deal-J-R pyramid avoid BASIS.[/quote]

Never said kids washing out was the only reason families leave, but otherwise you are essentially making my point. The school didn’t work for your family and you believe it is irredeemable. Both policy-wise and experientially. Again, I think you’d be hard pressed to find current parents who have no issues with the school. [b]But to suggest it is a choice only for those with no better options is just silly. [/b]There are privileged families in the BASIS community, and there are objectively very strong students who stay through high school. They are not on some vision quest, subjecting themselves to the “worst high school experience possible” in service of some higher ideal. Stop kidding yourself. Nor are they trapped. They made a choice that the juice of moving wasn’t worth the squeeze. That’s why people hate BASIS and you can’t convince me otherwise. Those who were unhappy and left can’t understand why anyone with options would stay. And yet we do and kids end up doing great. [/quote]

New Poster. Sorry, but I can't agree with above. We've been at BASIS for 4.5 years. Every family we know there that was able to line up a significantly better option has left by now. We'd leave ourselves if we could afford a private. We would already have left if our kid had cracked Walls (3.9 GPA and couldn't even get an interview). Nobody sends their children to a school like BASIS if they can do better. The building is much too crappy, the extra curriculars are too thin on the ground, the curriculum is too narrow and inflexible and there's too much teacher turnover. You avoid getting melodramatic (like you, PP) and make do.[/quote]

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