Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ahh....so we've now exposed the Yu Ying secret. Will Sela adopt the same policy - a different track for the non Hebrew speakers? Okaaay then.

I am a parent at Yu Ying. The non immersion track is not "all black". Get your facts straight.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The two white families transferred opted out and left the school. Given the option, I would transfer my child out as well, if for no other reason to avoid people like you.

Oh come on, don't lower the tone in a thoughtful conversation by getting petty. The PP made a factual statement about an issue that's a sore point with DC Charter, because nobody saw it coming at YY's founding as much as anything else. We're talking about the lengths charters must go to in order to keep kids who struggle, like it or not. The matter at hand is whether or not BASIS alone will be allowed to make it almost impossible for struggling kids to return from one year to the next. It's an open question and a very interesting subject.

No, no and triple no. The PP implied that only Black students were placed in the non-immersion spots at Yu Ying. That is factually incorrect. There were white students who were also failing and thus placed in the non-immersion track. Their parents chose to pull them out of the school altogether. Some of the Black parents made the same choice. The students who remained happened to all be Black, but Blacks were not the only ones placed in the second track. If PP wanted to talk about the lengths charters extend to keep children who struggle in the school, there was absolutely no need, no need at all to bring race into the topic.

Anonymous wrote:These thorny issues should be addressed in the public domain BEFORE BASIS DC OPENS. Parents should be told if the school is going to be a new breed, a charter catering as much to U middleclass families as low and moderate income. There's no whitewashing the issue in the city with the biggest black-white achievement gap. Quality of graduates in upper grades could be maintaned by replacing dropouts with area teens who could perform to the BASIS standard. But is the DC Charter Board open to supporting the city's first majority white/Asian high school? Is BASIS open to that? Public and franchise officials should answer these politically vexing questions. If the answer is no, the result on the college admissions front may still be more inspiring than at SWW, Wilson, Banneker and Latin in 6-10 years.

Anonymous wrote:The two white families transferred opted out and left the school. Given the option, I would transfer my child out as well, if for no other reason to avoid people like you.

Oh come on, don't lower the tone in a thoughtful conversation by getting petty. The PP made a factual statement about an issue that's a sore point with DC Charter, because nobody saw it coming at YY's founding as much as anything else. We're talking about the lengths charters must go to in order to keep kids who struggle, like it or not. The matter at hand is whether or not BASIS alone will be allowed to make it almost impossible for struggling kids to return from one year to the next. It's an open question and a very interesting subject.

Anonymous wrote:Ahh....so we've now exposed the Yu Ying secret. Will Sela adopt the same policy - a different track for the non Hebrew speakers? Okaaay then.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:help me understand this: is there any prohibition on BASIS pulling in students from outside the DC area, who would PAY tuition? I had heard that other charters accepted out-of-staters with tuition...that might make up the numbers as attrition hits the upper grades

I don't think that new kids join BASIS after 6th grade. Beginning in 6th grade, BASIS students must pass comprehensive exams to advance to the next grade.

I suspect that the school will not admit kids into the 7th grade or higher unless they can demonstrate mastery of the material covered in the prior grade by passing the same comprehensive exams, and kids who are not able to pass the comprehensive exams are offered spots in the lower grades. Of course, by the 7th or 8th grade, due to the rigorous curriculum, the likelihood that a student transferring into BASIS can pass those exams approaches 0.The enrollment data presented in the following article support my hypothesis:

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2011/03/blog-post.html

While enrollment occasionally increases from 5th to 6th grade, enrollment only decreases from that point on. In particular, enrollment decreases significantly from 8th to 9th grade, presumably due to large numbers of students choosing neighborhood high schools over BASIS.

I don't get the impression that BASIS cares much about keeping numbers up. They seem to be focused on the quality of the students they graduate, not the quantity.

In any case, they can keep enrollment up in the face of high attrition simply by admitting many more students in the lower grades. That is, if they want to maintain enrollment at about 500 students for a 8-year program, rather than admit 60 student in the 5th grade, they would admit about 100.

It appears that this the approach they've taken.

Sorry, I don't follow why, after 7th or 8th grade, due to the rigorous curriculum, the likelihood that a student transferring into BASIS could pass their end-of-year exams would approach 0 when DC has a good many independents, where some parents struggle to afford tuition, offering equally tough academics. It also has suburbs where parents often move/live primarily because they aren't satisfied with public MS and HS offerings in the District, coupled with lack of funds for independents, but would prefer to live downtown. So you think that a student could only transfer into BASIS from a DCPS school, or another charter, not simply by virtue of being a DC resident capable of passing a comprehensive end-of-year exam? It doesn't seem out of the question that dozens of parents outside DCPS and DC Charter with very bright and well prepared kids would look to BASIS for a comparable, tax-supported education if permitted, particularly if they'd been shut out of 5th or 6th grade lottery admissions and the school was prospering. If residency in the District would be all that was required for a kid of the right age to take, and pass, an end-of-year exam at BASIS in the hopes of being admitted, I'm having a hard time imagining a shortage of qualified takers. A backdoor route to selective admissions would emerge. But then many, if not most, of the incoming kids would be middle-class and white, which wouldn't work politically, at least not for some years. These are awkward public conversations and questions, but perhaps they should be had when taxpayer money is behind BASIS DC.




A lot of the questions you raise are legitimate. But the question about admitting students to BASIS in later grades is not simply about students wanting entry who are bright and well prepared and willing to work hard. It is about the specialized curriculum that they offer and the unique way it is organized.

For example, I believe basis begins teaching chemistry, biology and physics (?) Simultaneously beginning in middle school to preprepare over multiple years for the ap exam in those subjects in maybe 10th grade. So a student wanting to enter in 8 or 9th grade would normally not already have a grounding in chemistry or physics.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:help me understand this: is there any prohibition on BASIS pulling in students from outside the DC area, who would PAY tuition? I had heard that other charters accepted out-of-staters with tuition...that might make up the numbers as attrition hits the upper grades

I don't think that new kids join BASIS after 6th grade. Beginning in 6th grade, BASIS students must pass comprehensive exams to advance to the next grade.

I suspect that the school will not admit kids into the 7th grade or higher unless they can demonstrate mastery of the material covered in the prior grade by passing the same comprehensive exams, and kids who are not able to pass the comprehensive exams are offered spots in the lower grades. Of course, by the 7th or 8th grade, due to the rigorous curriculum, the likelihood that a student transferring into BASIS can pass those exams approaches 0.The enrollment data presented in the following article support my hypothesis:

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2011/03/blog-post.html

While enrollment occasionally increases from 5th to 6th grade, enrollment only decreases from that point on. In particular, enrollment decreases significantly from 8th to 9th grade, presumably due to large numbers of students choosing neighborhood high schools over BASIS.

I don't get the impression that BASIS cares much about keeping numbers up. They seem to be focused on the quality of the students they graduate, not the quantity.

In any case, they can keep enrollment up in the face of high attrition simply by admitting many more students in the lower grades. That is, if they want to maintain enrollment at about 500 students for a 8-year program, rather than admit 60 student in the 5th grade, they would admit about 100.

It appears that this the approach they've taken.