I for one really liked what I saw at the Banneker interview. The entry was so different from entering our EOTP middle. The security guards watched you but were friendly, no one was ordering you around, they helped you get through, even though they also weren’t shirking the process.

The kids at the table hustled DS off to his test or whatever it was. Another kid brought me to a nearby space where she answered my million questions. And though a charter kid she was clearly from my kid’s demographic. And just being there I could see a demographic mix I liked. Not dominated by Ward 3 kids, nobody slumming from privates, no Georgetown professor’s kids as far as I could tell.

And the program the AP and teacher and administrator described was rigorous. Character building. Community focused. The kind of thing we just haven’t seen up to this point. To date the program has taught my kid and not much more, he’s spent his time teaching his friends, and it’s tiring after a while despite his inherent goodwill and friendliness.

I think it’ll be good for him. And it’s inspiring to me. I yearn for a community like this. After seeing how DCPS has done so little to integrate or improve, with (now I’m sounding pretentious I know) Obama followed by Voldemort, with BLM ending in a painting on 16th Street, I am really looking forward to a small version of a future that America appears not to want. Where _these_ kids replace us.

Just impressed is all.

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Anonymous wrote:Small point, but they do, in fact, teach Latin at Banneker.

This thread suddenly turned into misinformation zone. Don't rely on it for real information about Banneker, folks.

It's really hard to tell if it's the usual racist trolls or if it's the type As trying to increase the odds of their kids getting in by getting others to drop interest.

They're not even trying hard - readily obvious falsehoods.

Grow up already.

They teach 14 or 15 AP subjects and we're racist trolls for noting that that's not nearly enough in 2024 for an elite "application" high school program. Got it. But our true racist selves emerge when we mention that Banneker IBD scores have been dismal from the get go, for many years now.

It’s also a Title 1 school that requires significant community service hours.

Are the community service requirements different from the usual 100 hours? And the point of offering more APs is that it gives students more choice.

Banneker requires 270 community service hours spread out over four years: 45 in freshman and sophomore year, 90 in junior and senior year.

Am I correct that since the DCPS graduation requirement is 100 hours of community service, Banneker will still allow you to graduate as long as you have 100 hours? The 270 hours of community service is a requirement in theory but cannot be enforced in practice

No clue. I graduated from there years ago, but no one ever challenged it. You have to go to your community lab site every Wednesday. Every other week, school gets out two hours early for that specific purpose. I'm not sure how it is now, but back when I was there you had to get a sign off from your community lab supervisor verifying your progress towards your hours.

This is all still true today. Also, community lab is 1.5 ungraded credits (0.25, 0.25, 0.5, 0.5), and those credits are required for the Banneker diploma. I suppose you could stop midway through your senior year and transfer to your neighborhood school and get a DCPS diploma, but why would you want to?

You can just stay at Banneker and get a DCPS diploma. I believe they would have to give it to you if you fulfill the DCPS graduation requirements. You would not need to transfer to your neighborhood school. And to be honest, barely anyone outside of Banneker is aware there is a separate Banneker diploma and who ever looks at your diploma anyway. I’m not advocating that students skip the Banneker community service requirements but I do believe clarifying options is important. Feel free to ask at the Banneker interview- what happens if a student does not complete all the required 270 hours of community service? If they are honest, they will tell you that the student will still graduate

Idk. My kid is already at Banneker and really enjoys their community lab situation, and also as a parent I try to encourage responsible and pro-social behavior, so I don’t plan to “clarify” this “option.”

Smart. Sounds like an easy way to weed your family out as it’s incredibly entitled to try to circumvent the requirements.

Banneker is not a school that caters to UMC parents nor should it be in a city for the diverse city of students it serves. I would love for them to offer additional IB and AP courses and they probably will eventually. Most kids prefer the AP track though there seems to be more interest than usual in the IB track in the current freshman class.

Brooklyn Tech grad, POC, who couldn't disagree more. Your myopia and, presumably, white guilt, is unacknowledged in the argument you're making. When an urban magnet HS "caters" to UMC parents, what it's doing is serving the talented, hard-working poor kids there better than a more socio-economically segregated program ever could. I doubt that I could have handled a top 10 SLAC on a Pell Grant without having had many high SES and, gasp, white and Asian classmates, in HS. At BT, I became friends with kids whose parents, who I also got to know, had attended my future alma mater. I didn't know those sorts of highly educated and prosperous people before HS. Making high SES friends at school broadened my horizons in a thousand constructive ways, enabling me to imagine my own UMC future. I'd really like to see Banneker become no more as AA and low SES than the population of the District is. The interview my kid just had seemed stuck in a time warp. We're not as interested as we were before our interviews.

PP here. My best friend is Brooklyn Tech grad, SWW for me. We're both disappointed in how drastically the demographics have changed over the years. We're both POC, FYI.

Attending a socioeconomically diverse school was an excellent experience for us as well. However, there was a time when SWW and Brooklyn Tech better reflected the city it serves. UMC families have MacArthur and Jackson-Reed as IB options, in addition to DC magnet. For some hardworking kids in the city, the alternatives are schools like Anacostia or Woodson, where completing HS is the accomplishment. While Banneker was our first choice, our family's backup plan was to move IB for RM or another MoCo school. As frustrating as navigating choices in DCPS can be, I recognize that most families at Banneker will not have the means to change zip codes for better options.

I really do appreciate that Banneker recognizes that some of their students were performing well at underperforming MSs and will arrive behind their peers. The goal is college readiness for everyone. The school is growing and AP/IB offerings will increase over time. Our household is trying to figure out where to fit in Physics with the IB program. Not ideal, but I get it. I've there are only 3 kids in IB desiring Physics, that probably wouldn't move the needle.

Do you mean do physics at Banneker or somewhere else. I don’t think Banneker offers physics

Banneker offers Physics but not an AP option. It's not available to those in the IB program, however.

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Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

While I hope that you do somehow hear about an interview, if not, I wish the best for you and your family - I hope your child is not too disappointed and soon is excited about where they end up. As a parent, it can be tough getting your head around a plan b and the compromises you may need to make. It has taken me three weeks so far, and I'm still working on it. I know some will say I should just get over it, and of course, that will happen. Nonetheless, I think how hard it can be to navigate education in DC is not discussed enough, and it's okay to be sad about not being on a road that you had hoped for. Hope your kid has a great high school experience!

PP here and agree with this wholeheartedly. It's tough especially when there aren't a lot of good options and you feel as if the school would be a great fit for your kid. I moped for at least a week over it and oddly we received a call after "moving on" to focusing on our Plan B option.

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Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

I was literally you last year. I started a thread about Banneker interviews and everything. We were contacted at the last minute for an interview the following morning and DC is enrolled now. Hopefully, you'll hear sometime this week.

To clarify, I heard just after the posted deadline for decisions to be forwarded to MySchoolDC.

Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

I was literally you last year. I started a thread about Banneker interviews and everything. We were contacted at the last minute for an interview the following morning and DC is enrolled now. Hopefully, you'll here sometime this week.

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Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

While I hope that you do somehow hear about an interview, if not, I wish the best for you and your family - I hope your child is not too disappointed and soon is excited about where they end up. As a parent, it can be tough getting your head around a plan b and the compromises you may need to make. It has taken me three weeks so far, and I'm still working on it. I know some will say I should just get over it, and of course, that will happen. Nonetheless, I think how hard it can be to navigate education in DC is not discussed enough, and it's okay to be sad about not being on a road that you had hoped for. Hope your kid has a great high school experience!

Thanks so much! Your kind and comforting words made me feel better. Here’s to hoping for MacArthur then haha.

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Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

Sorry - that's tough. I'd assume it's not going to happen at this stage. My understanding is that they need to have their selections into myschooldc this week so the odds of getting an interview now are pretty low.

I'm not sure if there's any chance of follow up based on waitlist / movement later in the process.

Thanks so much for your kind words! Yes, we are disappointed and I feel so bad for my kid. Banneker has been her first choice since elementary and she has been a good to great student all these years so we also quite surprised. Oh well.

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Anonymous wrote:My kid reported that the interviewer couldn't understand what he was talking about. What he told her about his interests seemed to sail over her head, e.g. studying Russian (one parent from the Soviet Union), Model UN at his school, competing in competitive chess etc. Sounded like she was firmly moored in the last century, vs this one.

There was only one interviewer? Interesting.

NP here. My kid had two interviewers and neither stood out as old-fashioned or unable to understand what we were talking about.

Anonymous wrote:My kid reported that the interviewer couldn't understand what he was talking about. What he told her about his interests seemed to sail over her head, e.g. studying Russian (one parent from the Soviet Union), Model UN at his school, competing in competitive chess etc. Sounded like she was firmly moored in the last century, vs this one.

There was only one interviewer? Interesting.

My kid reported that the interviewer couldn't understand what he was talking about. What he told her about his interests seemed to sail over her head, e.g. studying Russian (one parent from the Soviet Union), Model UN at his school, competing in competitive chess etc. Sounded like she was firmly moored in the last century, vs this one.

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Anonymous wrote:Small point, but they do, in fact, teach Latin at Banneker.

This thread suddenly turned into misinformation zone. Don't rely on it for real information about Banneker, folks.

It's really hard to tell if it's the usual racist trolls or if it's the type As trying to increase the odds of their kids getting in by getting others to drop interest.

They're not even trying hard - readily obvious falsehoods.

Grow up already.

They teach 14 or 15 AP subjects and we're racist trolls for noting that that's not nearly enough in 2024 for an elite "application" high school program. Got it. But our true racist selves emerge when we mention that Banneker IBD scores have been dismal from the get go, for many years now.

It’s also a Title 1 school that requires significant community service hours.

Are the community service requirements different from the usual 100 hours? And the point of offering more APs is that it gives students more choice.

Banneker requires 270 community service hours spread out over four years: 45 in freshman and sophomore year, 90 in junior and senior year.

Am I correct that since the DCPS graduation requirement is 100 hours of community service, Banneker will still allow you to graduate as long as you have 100 hours? The 270 hours of community service is a requirement in theory but cannot be enforced in practice

No clue. I graduated from there years ago, but no one ever challenged it. You have to go to your community lab site every Wednesday. Every other week, school gets out two hours early for that specific purpose. I'm not sure how it is now, but back when I was there you had to get a sign off from your community lab supervisor verifying your progress towards your hours.

This is all still true today. Also, community lab is 1.5 ungraded credits (0.25, 0.25, 0.5, 0.5), and those credits are required for the Banneker diploma. I suppose you could stop midway through your senior year and transfer to your neighborhood school and get a DCPS diploma, but why would you want to?

You can just stay at Banneker and get a DCPS diploma. I believe they would have to give it to you if you fulfill the DCPS graduation requirements. You would not need to transfer to your neighborhood school. And to be honest, barely anyone outside of Banneker is aware there is a separate Banneker diploma and who ever looks at your diploma anyway. I’m not advocating that students skip the Banneker community service requirements but I do believe clarifying options is important. Feel free to ask at the Banneker interview- what happens if a student does not complete all the required 270 hours of community service? If they are honest, they will tell you that the student will still graduate

Idk. My kid is already at Banneker and really enjoys their community lab situation, and also as a parent I try to encourage responsible and pro-social behavior, so I don’t plan to “clarify” this “option.”

Smart. Sounds like an easy way to weed your family out as it’s incredibly entitled to try to circumvent the requirements.

Banneker is not a school that caters to UMC parents nor should it be in a city for the diverse city of students it serves. I would love for them to offer additional IB and AP courses and they probably will eventually. Most kids prefer the AP track though there seems to be more interest than usual in the IB track in the current freshman class.

Brooklyn Tech grad, POC, who couldn't disagree more. Your myopia and, presumably, white guilt, is unacknowledged in the argument you're making. When an urban magnet HS "caters" to UMC parents, what it's doing is serving the talented, hard-working poor kids there better than a more socio-economically segregated program ever could. I doubt that I could have handled a top 10 SLAC on a Pell Grant without having had many high SES and, gasp, white and Asian classmates, in HS. At BT, I became friends with kids whose parents, who I also got to know, had attended my future alma mater. I didn't know those sorts of highly educated and prosperous people before HS. Making high SES friends at school broadened my horizons in a thousand constructive ways, enabling me to imagine my own UMC future. I'd really like to see Banneker become no more as AA and low SES than the population of the District is. The interview my kid just had seemed stuck in a time warp. We're not as interested as we were before our interviews.

What do you mean by this? My kid didn't recount every question he was asked, but from what he conveyed the interview seemed fair and appropriate.

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Anonymous wrote:Small point, but they do, in fact, teach Latin at Banneker.

This thread suddenly turned into misinformation zone. Don't rely on it for real information about Banneker, folks.

It's really hard to tell if it's the usual racist trolls or if it's the type As trying to increase the odds of their kids getting in by getting others to drop interest.

They're not even trying hard - readily obvious falsehoods.

Grow up already.

They teach 14 or 15 AP subjects and we're racist trolls for noting that that's not nearly enough in 2024 for an elite "application" high school program. Got it. But our true racist selves emerge when we mention that Banneker IBD scores have been dismal from the get go, for many years now.

It’s also a Title 1 school that requires significant community service hours.

Are the community service requirements different from the usual 100 hours? And the point of offering more APs is that it gives students more choice.

Banneker requires 270 community service hours spread out over four years: 45 in freshman and sophomore year, 90 in junior and senior year.

Am I correct that since the DCPS graduation requirement is 100 hours of community service, Banneker will still allow you to graduate as long as you have 100 hours? The 270 hours of community service is a requirement in theory but cannot be enforced in practice

No clue. I graduated from there years ago, but no one ever challenged it. You have to go to your community lab site every Wednesday. Every other week, school gets out two hours early for that specific purpose. I'm not sure how it is now, but back when I was there you had to get a sign off from your community lab supervisor verifying your progress towards your hours.

This is all still true today. Also, community lab is 1.5 ungraded credits (0.25, 0.25, 0.5, 0.5), and those credits are required for the Banneker diploma. I suppose you could stop midway through your senior year and transfer to your neighborhood school and get a DCPS diploma, but why would you want to?

You can just stay at Banneker and get a DCPS diploma. I believe they would have to give it to you if you fulfill the DCPS graduation requirements. You would not need to transfer to your neighborhood school. And to be honest, barely anyone outside of Banneker is aware there is a separate Banneker diploma and who ever looks at your diploma anyway. I’m not advocating that students skip the Banneker community service requirements but I do believe clarifying options is important. Feel free to ask at the Banneker interview- what happens if a student does not complete all the required 270 hours of community service? If they are honest, they will tell you that the student will still graduate

Idk. My kid is already at Banneker and really enjoys their community lab situation, and also as a parent I try to encourage responsible and pro-social behavior, so I don’t plan to “clarify” this “option.”

Smart. Sounds like an easy way to weed your family out as it’s incredibly entitled to try to circumvent the requirements.

Banneker is not a school that caters to UMC parents nor should it be in a city for the diverse city of students it serves. I would love for them to offer additional IB and AP courses and they probably will eventually. Most kids prefer the AP track though there seems to be more interest than usual in the IB track in the current freshman class.

I actually think it is a reasonable question. Nothing wrong in asking if they ever have kids who don’t finish the community service requirement and whether they are able to graduate? Asking questions should be encouraged not discouraged so you end up with kids who are the best fit for the school. And it is best for low ses kids to be mixed with upper ses kids. That leads to better college graduation outcomes otherwise lower income kids get a huge culture shock when they get to competitive colleges and often drop out. Trying to keep upper middle class kids out of Banneker is a bad strategy in my opinion. It is important to plan for success for students after Banneker as high school is just a stepping stone

There's already SES diversity. The average DCUM poster complaining about Banneker is often looking for the elusive DCPS which will cater most to UMC families.

Not buying this. I don't believe in average DCUM posters. I believe in parents in search of good public schools for their hard-earned tax dollars. Urban schools that drawn in sizeable cohorts of UMC families are the good ones. We don't have nearly enough of those here in the District. Banneker has considerable potential it could run with at a juncture in history where more UMC parents are willing to give it a shot for lack of a better public high school option EotP. To harness that potential, visionary leadership is needed at Banneker. Will it emerge? I doubt it. But it still could.

This. +100

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Anonymous wrote:Small point, but they do, in fact, teach Latin at Banneker.

This thread suddenly turned into misinformation zone. Don't rely on it for real information about Banneker, folks.

It's really hard to tell if it's the usual racist trolls or if it's the type As trying to increase the odds of their kids getting in by getting others to drop interest.

They're not even trying hard - readily obvious falsehoods.

Grow up already.

They teach 14 or 15 AP subjects and we're racist trolls for noting that that's not nearly enough in 2024 for an elite "application" high school program. Got it. But our true racist selves emerge when we mention that Banneker IBD scores have been dismal from the get go, for many years now.

It’s also a Title 1 school that requires significant community service hours.

Are the community service requirements different from the usual 100 hours? And the point of offering more APs is that it gives students more choice.

Banneker requires 270 community service hours spread out over four years: 45 in freshman and sophomore year, 90 in junior and senior year.

Am I correct that since the DCPS graduation requirement is 100 hours of community service, Banneker will still allow you to graduate as long as you have 100 hours? The 270 hours of community service is a requirement in theory but cannot be enforced in practice

No clue. I graduated from there years ago, but no one ever challenged it. You have to go to your community lab site every Wednesday. Every other week, school gets out two hours early for that specific purpose. I'm not sure how it is now, but back when I was there you had to get a sign off from your community lab supervisor verifying your progress towards your hours.

This is all still true today. Also, community lab is 1.5 ungraded credits (0.25, 0.25, 0.5, 0.5), and those credits are required for the Banneker diploma. I suppose you could stop midway through your senior year and transfer to your neighborhood school and get a DCPS diploma, but why would you want to?

You can just stay at Banneker and get a DCPS diploma. I believe they would have to give it to you if you fulfill the DCPS graduation requirements. You would not need to transfer to your neighborhood school. And to be honest, barely anyone outside of Banneker is aware there is a separate Banneker diploma and who ever looks at your diploma anyway. I’m not advocating that students skip the Banneker community service requirements but I do believe clarifying options is important. Feel free to ask at the Banneker interview- what happens if a student does not complete all the required 270 hours of community service? If they are honest, they will tell you that the student will still graduate

Idk. My kid is already at Banneker and really enjoys their community lab situation, and also as a parent I try to encourage responsible and pro-social behavior, so I don’t plan to “clarify” this “option.”

Smart. Sounds like an easy way to weed your family out as it’s incredibly entitled to try to circumvent the requirements.

Banneker is not a school that caters to UMC parents nor should it be in a city for the diverse city of students it serves. I would love for them to offer additional IB and AP courses and they probably will eventually. Most kids prefer the AP track though there seems to be more interest than usual in the IB track in the current freshman class.

Brooklyn Tech grad, POC, who couldn't disagree more. Your myopia and, presumably, white guilt, is unacknowledged in the argument you're making. When an urban magnet HS "caters" to UMC parents, what it's doing is serving the talented, hard-working poor kids there better than a more socio-economically segregated program ever could. I doubt that I could have handled a top 10 SLAC on a Pell Grant without having had many high SES and, gasp, white and Asian classmates, in HS. At BT, I became friends with kids whose parents, who I also got to know, had attended my future alma mater. I didn't know those sorts of highly educated and prosperous people before HS. Making high SES friends at school broadened my horizons in a thousand constructive ways, enabling me to imagine my own UMC future. I'd really like to see Banneker become no more as AA and low SES than the population of the District is. The interview my kid just had seemed stuck in a time warp. We're not as interested as we were before our interviews.

PP here. My best friend is Brooklyn Tech grad, SWW for me. We're both disappointed in how drastically the demographics have changed over the years. We're both POC, FYI.

Attending a socioeconomically diverse school was an excellent experience for us as well. However, there was a time when SWW and Brooklyn Tech better reflected the city it serves. UMC families have MacArthur and Jackson-Reed as IB options, in addition to DC magnet. For some hardworking kids in the city, the alternatives are schools like Anacostia or Woodson, where completing HS is the accomplishment. While Banneker was our first choice, our family's backup plan was to move IB for RM or another MoCo school. As frustrating as navigating choices in DCPS can be, I recognize that most families at Banneker will not have the means to change zip codes for better options.

I really do appreciate that Banneker recognizes that some of their students were performing well at underperforming MSs and will arrive behind their peers. The goal is college readiness for everyone. The school is growing and AP/IB offerings will increase over time. Our household is trying to figure out where to fit in Physics with the IB program. Not ideal, but I get it. I've there are only 3 kids in IB desiring Physics, that probably wouldn't move the needle.

Do you mean do physics at Banneker or somewhere else. I don’t think Banneker offers physics

Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

While I hope that you do somehow hear about an interview, if not, I wish the best for you and your family - I hope your child is not too disappointed and soon is excited about where they end up. As a parent, it can be tough getting your head around a plan b and the compromises you may need to make. It has taken me three weeks so far, and I'm still working on it. I know some will say I should just get over it, and of course, that will happen. Nonetheless, I think how hard it can be to navigate education in DC is not discussed enough, and it's okay to be sad about not being on a road that you had hoped for. Hope your kid has a great high school experience!

Anonymous wrote:NP. If we still haven't been called for an interview, I am assuming it's not gonna happen, correct? I was holding out hope and watching this thread until this past Friday March 8. It would have been our top choice

Sorry - that's tough. I'd assume it's not going to happen at this stage. My understanding is that they need to have their selections into myschooldc this week so the odds of getting an interview now are pretty low.

I'm not sure if there's any chance of follow up based on waitlist / movement later in the process.