Former DCPS teacher here.

Grades are inflated at a lot of schools. To meet numbers, a lot of failing students are given BS work at the end of the quarter and receive a D. That doesn't sit well with some teachers who feel that it's unfair to the students who actually earned a D, so rather than stand their ground, they take the "true" D student and bump them up to a C. Then there's the other issue of students getting grades based on behavior instead of academic ability. Schools like Banneker and Walls have mechanisms in place to filter out the true high achievers.

Why don't other schools do this?
There's a lot of posturing going on in the District. The students who have been led to believe that they are high achievers typically have better behavior and more focus than their peers, so while they can't get in to Walls or Banneker, they should be able to go somewhere with students on the same level. Hence the schools with lower requirements.

And under that tier are a handful of charters who take kids through a lottery and ship the misbehaving ones right back to their neighborhood schools any time after count day. The neighborhood schools are at the bottom rung in my opinion. Not because of the quality of the teachers or because of the quality of the majority of the students. It's simply because the other schools have weeded out all of the high flyers who would have balanced things out. This would never happen, but I would love to see what would happen if all students and teachers were subject to a city-wide lottery.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

That's all fine and good but stop calling these schools "selective" and be honest about it.

Selective just means they have an admissions process rather than going by lottery and address. Stop thinking everything is about your demographic.

+1000. Thank you pp.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Phelps is severely underenrolled which is why they will take anyone. Their construction programs are a mess and teacher turnover is very high. McKinley Tech also struggles with underachievement and they will practically take anyone. It is a STEM magnet in name only. Sad but true.

But if they were more selective by increasing the minimum GPA requirement, wouldn't they actually attract more families? Then they would not be under enrolled. It's almost like a chicken and egg thing, but I think SWW and Banneker do well is because they have high standards, which attracts higher achieving students, and results in better test scores, which then attracts more families.

Not necessarily. Phelps and Ron Brown are new, give it a chance. Part of the idea is that kids who did not thrive in regular school may do much better in a different type of school. So a GPA cutoff would not further that mission.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's completely reasonable to wonder why DCPS isn't doing more to serve you, and to see the world through your own eyes.

But DC is a city where half the kids live in Wards 7 and 8, 27% of all kids have household incomes below the poverty line, and more than 3 in 10 won't graduate from high school.

School districts are built around the typical kid, not the exceptional kid. In DC, the typical kid is poor and does poorly in school. When they think of how to make Phelps better, it has nothing to do with your kid at all. It has nothing to do with attracting more kids like your kid. It's about dealing with the kids they currently have, and that's overwhelming enough to them without having to sell themselves to kids who will probably turn out fine regardless of how much effort DCPS puts into them. They won't get more political capital from the bulk of DC residents for trying to do more for your kid--just the opposite. And they won't get money from the big foundations either.

You don't have to like it. But the system isn't designed for you and it doesn't care if you like it.

That's all fine and good but stop calling these schools "selective" and be honest about it.

Selective just means they have an admissions process rather than going by lottery and address. Stop thinking everything is about your demographic.

Anonymous wrote:It's completely reasonable to wonder why DCPS isn't doing more to serve you, and to see the world through your own eyes.

But DC is a city where half the kids live in Wards 7 and 8, 27% of all kids have household incomes below the poverty line, and more than 3 in 10 won't graduate from high school.

School districts are built around the typical kid, not the exceptional kid. In DC, the typical kid is poor and does poorly in school. When they think of how to make Phelps better, it has nothing to do with your kid at all. It has nothing to do with attracting more kids like your kid. It's about dealing with the kids they currently have, and that's overwhelming enough to them without having to sell themselves to kids who will probably turn out fine regardless of how much effort DCPS puts into them. They won't get more political capital from the bulk of DC residents for trying to do more for your kid--just the opposite. And they won't get money from the big foundations either.

You don't have to like it. But the system isn't designed for you and it doesn't care if you like it.

That's all fine and good but stop calling these schools "selective" and be honest about it.

It's completely reasonable to wonder why DCPS isn't doing more to serve you, and to see the world through your own eyes.

But DC is a city where half the kids live in Wards 7 and 8, 27% of all kids have household incomes below the poverty line, and more than 3 in 10 won't graduate from high school.

School districts are built around the typical kid, not the exceptional kid. In DC, the typical kid is poor and does poorly in school. When they think of how to make Phelps better, it has nothing to do with your kid at all. It has nothing to do with attracting more kids like your kid. It's about dealing with the kids they currently have, and that's overwhelming enough to them without having to sell themselves to kids who will probably turn out fine regardless of how much effort DCPS puts into them. They won't get more political capital from the bulk of DC residents for trying to do more for your kid--just the opposite. And they won't get money from the big foundations either.

You don't have to like it. But the system isn't designed for you and it doesn't care if you like it.

Anonymous wrote:There are only about 4500 8th graders in public school in DC, per https://osse.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/osse/publication/attachments/2016-17%20School%20Year%20Enrollment%20Audit%20Report_0.pdf

SWW, Ellington, and Banneker each have about 150 9th graders and Wilson has 450. That's space for 20% of them right there. Add in Eastern's IB program and the kids who aren't going to leave their local school for anything (like Cato June, who got into Banneker but really wanted to play football for Anacostia) and I'm not sure DCPS feels like there's a lot of kids with 3.0+ GPAs who they don't have room to serve. They'd rather get some of the kids with 2.8s who are well behaved into a place where everyone has at least some motivation.

Don't forgot Ron Brown - there's another 125-150 seats for motivated kids, although it's city-wide lottery not application.

There are only about 4500 8th graders in public school in DC, per https://osse.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/osse/publication/attachments/2016-17%20School%20Year%20Enrollment%20Audit%20Report_0.pdf

SWW, Ellington, and Banneker each have about 150 9th graders and Wilson has 450. That's space for 20% of them right there. Add in Eastern's IB program and the kids who aren't going to leave their local school for anything (like Cato June, who got into Banneker but really wanted to play football for Anacostia) and I'm not sure DCPS feels like there's a lot of kids with 3.0+ GPAs who they don't have room to serve. They'd rather get some of the kids with 2.8s who are well behaved into a place where everyone has at least some motivation.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Phelps is severely underenrolled which is why they will take anyone. Their construction programs are a mess and teacher turnover is very high. McKinley Tech also struggles with underachievement and they will practically take anyone. It is a STEM magnet in name only. Sad but true.

But if they were more selective by increasing the minimum GPA requirement, wouldn't they actually attract more families? Then they would not be under enrolled. It's almost like a chicken and egg thing, but I think SWW and Banneker do well is because they have high standards, which attracts higher achieving students, and results in better test scores, which then attracts more families.

How is that going to close the achievement gap and promote equity? Those are DCPS' strategic objectives. Not attracting more families.

And there ARE schools for higher achieving students now and they aren't full either. SWW went through all of its full waitlist for this fall. Banneker and Ellington both had seats available into October.

Anonymous wrote:Phelps is severely underenrolled which is why they will take anyone. Their construction programs are a mess and teacher turnover is very high. McKinley Tech also struggles with underachievement and they will practically take anyone. It is a STEM magnet in name only. Sad but true.

But if they were more selective by increasing the minimum GPA requirement, wouldn't they actually attract more families? Then they would not be under enrolled. It's almost like a chicken and egg thing, but I think SWW and Banneker do well is because they have high standards, which attracts higher achieving students, and results in better test scores, which then attracts more families.

Phelps is severely underenrolled which is why they will take anyone. Their construction programs are a mess and teacher turnover is very high. McKinley Tech also struggles with underachievement and they will practically take anyone. It is a STEM magnet in name only. Sad but true.

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone know why the selective high schools have different minimum GPA and other admissions requirements? For example, Banneker and SWW have a 3.0 minimum GPA but CHEC has no minimum requirement and Phelps is a 2.4 GPA. A "C" average is not what I would consider "selective." I understand why Duke Ellington would have different criteria since they want to attract artistic talent and not necessary kids with high GPAs, but for these schools that are academically focused, why have such low standards? If they increased the minimum GPA requirement, it may be more attractive to high achievers. My DC does really well in Math & Science and McKinley's focus on STEM would be ideal, but the test scores are pretty bad. It's really a shame.

You assume that's the goal. That's not DCPS' goal at all.

Maybe do 30 seconds of research and you will understand what Phelps is about. It is a great program and I support it.

Selective in DC doesn't mean what you want it to mean.

That said, there's no reason to think that your student wouldn't do well at McKinley, even if he/she has better PARCC scores than many of their classmates.

Go to the McKinley open house in November, ask tough questions about differentiation, teacher qualifications and whether all of the APs in the course catalog are offered every year.

You may also want to check out Washington Leadership Academy.

Does anyone know why the selective high schools have different minimum GPA and other admissions requirements? For example, Banneker and SWW have a 3.0 minimum GPA but CHEC has no minimum requirement and Phelps is a 2.4 GPA. A "C" average is not what I would consider "selective." I understand why Duke Ellington would have different criteria since they want to attract artistic talent and not necessary kids with high GPAs, but for these schools that are academically focused, why have such low standards? If they increased the minimum GPA requirement, it may be more attractive to high achievers. My DC does really well in Math & Science and McKinley's focus on STEM would be ideal, but the test scores are pretty bad. It's really a shame.