Anonymous
05/21/2025 13:47
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Not to be cynical, but on DCUM it’s pretty easy to pretend to be someone you’re not. And according to My School, no one was waitlisted for 9th grade at McKinley this year.
Caveat lector.
You don't understand the process. Kids who didn't get into McKinley earlier in the process would not be waitlisted.
I understand the process fine. The PP said she knew kids “waitlisted at McKinley.” In actual fact, zero kids were waitlisted at McKinley.
Anonymous
05/21/2025 13:31
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Not to be cynical, but on DCUM it’s pretty easy to pretend to be someone you’re not. And according to My School, no one was waitlisted for 9th grade at McKinley this year.
Caveat lector.
You don't understand the process. Kids who didn't get into McKinley earlier in the process would not be waitlisted.
Anonymous
05/21/2025 13:22
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Not to be cynical, but on DCUM it’s pretty easy to pretend to be someone you’re not. And according to My School, no one was waitlisted for 9th grade at McKinley this year.
Caveat lector.
Caveat lector.
Anonymous
05/21/2025 12:21
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:“Unpredictable” only matters if it’s also difficult. If it’s somewhat unpredictable which of the four major application schools a kid will match with, but it’s a near-guarantee that a college-bound student will match with one, that’s really not a big deal.
No, it's not a near guarantee. I know solid students who have been shut out. I don't know what makes you think you have the data to make these assertions.
I’m an 8th grade teacher at a DCPS middle school (not Deal/Hardy), and this year was tough for our students. A LOT of surprising results—top students shut out of Banneker, waitlisted at McKinley, etc.
DC had a “baby boom” in the early 2010s, and those kids are just starting to enter HS. Those of us who have been here for awhile remember the days of the 600+ waitlists for desirable PK programs—these are those same kids. I imagine the application process for HS will only become more competitive as the years go on.
Ugh, so sorry to hear that. I had been hoping Latin Cooper plus MacArthur plus more seats at Banneker would make a difference in alleviating the crunch years.
Where do you think disappointed kids will end up?
Anonymous
05/21/2025 12:09
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:“Unpredictable” only matters if it’s also difficult. If it’s somewhat unpredictable which of the four major application schools a kid will match with, but it’s a near-guarantee that a college-bound student will match with one, that’s really not a big deal.
No, it's not a near guarantee. I know solid students who have been shut out. I don't know what makes you think you have the data to make these assertions.
I’m an 8th grade teacher at a DCPS middle school (not Deal/Hardy), and this year was tough for our students. A LOT of surprising results—top students shut out of Banneker, waitlisted at McKinley, etc.
DC had a “baby boom” in the early 2010s, and those kids are just starting to enter HS. Those of us who have been here for awhile remember the days of the 600+ waitlists for desirable PK programs—these are those same kids. I imagine the application process for HS will only become more competitive as the years go on.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 13:59
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Walls, for best or worse, is the school of rich and middle class legacy kids. The kids succeed because of their family structure.
Rich?
No
+1. This is laughable. The rich families never even had their kids in DCPS or got out after elementary.
Depends on your lens.
Sorry pumpkin but if your HHI is 250k+ and you have 600k in equity on your home that your parents helped with the down-payment for, you are rich by all my factors.
Am I still rich if we saved for the whole down payment ourselves?
NP. Compared to the general public (including me): Yes, you are. You are in a bubble if you think that you aren't.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 12:33
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Walls, for best or worse, is the school of rich and middle class legacy kids. The kids succeed because of their family structure.
Rich?
No
+1. This is laughable. The rich families never even had their kids in DCPS or got out after elementary.
Depends on your lens.
Sorry pumpkin but if your HHI is 250k+ and you have 600k in equity on your home that your parents helped with the down-payment for, you are rich by all my factors.
Am I still rich if we saved for the whole down payment ourselves?
Anonymous
05/20/2025 11:09
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:When the teachers and the counselor submit their letters, the student gets a confirmation that x teacher submitted their recommendation letter. The students can track who submitted the letters!
Right. But if a letter or any other element somehow got lost after that point, there's no way to know, until the lottery results come out and the kid is marked incomplete. And more broadly, there's no way to try to correct any of these problems.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 11:06
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
When the teachers and the counselor submit their letters, the student gets a confirmation that x teacher submitted their recommendation letter. The students can track who submitted the letters!
Anonymous
05/20/2025 11:03
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:From everything I read on this forum, I thought the chances of DS getting into his top school was slim. He got in and virtually everyone in his 8th grade class got into one of the application HS. Maybe not everyone got into their first choice but they got into one of their top 3. Stop stressing people out by making it sound like it’s impossible to get into these schools.
For some, it was impossible and a lot of of kids did get shut out.
Gloat elsewhere.
So you know kids that applied to Banneker, Walls, and McKinley and didn't get in anywhere? I won't include Duke b/c it's a specialty.
I do. Of course, you never know what was in the essay, interviews, and recs. But I know two kids who were shut out for no reason I can discern. Its not that it's really hard to get into these schools, it's that it's pretty arbitrary and hard to predict. Honestly if it were a straight up GPA-qualified lottery, that would at least be easy to understand and way less work for everyone.
Of course, McKinley is not for everyone either. Without a sincere enthusiasm for math and science, a kid is unlikely to be happy there.
So did these kids apply to McKinley or not? There were several kids from my child’s middle school who had decent but not exceptional grades and got in (mostly Bs). I find it hard to believe that they couldn’t get into McKinley. And if they only applied to Walls and Banneker, then yes it will be difficult to get a spot. If they applied to McKinley (and/or Duke) and didn’t get a spot, they were unlikely to be shut out for no apparent reason because the bar is not so high that it’s unachievable.
They did, and didn't get in.
Another problem with the process is there's really no way to confirm that the schools have all your materials. I've seen kids get rejected for incomplete applications who had no idea that anything was missing.
This is disheartening. This means that the teachers and counselors at the middle school did not do their jobs and sabotaged the students! This really needs to be investigated.
No, it could also have been missed or misplaced somehow by the high school admissions people. There's really no way to know, and no way to appeal or anything.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 10:54
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:From everything I read on this forum, I thought the chances of DS getting into his top school was slim. He got in and virtually everyone in his 8th grade class got into one of the application HS. Maybe not everyone got into their first choice but they got into one of their top 3. Stop stressing people out by making it sound like it’s impossible to get into these schools.
For some, it was impossible and a lot of of kids did get shut out.
Gloat elsewhere.
So you know kids that applied to Banneker, Walls, and McKinley and didn't get in anywhere? I won't include Duke b/c it's a specialty.
I do. Of course, you never know what was in the essay, interviews, and recs. But I know two kids who were shut out for no reason I can discern. Its not that it's really hard to get into these schools, it's that it's pretty arbitrary and hard to predict. Honestly if it were a straight up GPA-qualified lottery, that would at least be easy to understand and way less work for everyone.
Of course, McKinley is not for everyone either. Without a sincere enthusiasm for math and science, a kid is unlikely to be happy there.
So did these kids apply to McKinley or not? There were several kids from my child’s middle school who had decent but not exceptional grades and got in (mostly Bs). I find it hard to believe that they couldn’t get into McKinley. And if they only applied to Walls and Banneker, then yes it will be difficult to get a spot. If they applied to McKinley (and/or Duke) and didn’t get a spot, they were unlikely to be shut out for no apparent reason because the bar is not so high that it’s unachievable.
They did, and didn't get in.
Another problem with the process is there's really no way to confirm that the schools have all your materials. I've seen kids get rejected for incomplete applications who had no idea that anything was missing.
This is disheartening. This means that the teachers and counselors at the middle school did not do their jobs and sabotaged the students! This really needs to be investigated.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 10:49
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
McKinley probably looks for some expressed interest in science/technology and the tracks that they offer which is not going to fit all students.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 10:46
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:From everything I read on this forum, I thought the chances of DS getting into his top school was slim. He got in and virtually everyone in his 8th grade class got into one of the application HS. Maybe not everyone got into their first choice but they got into one of their top 3. Stop stressing people out by making it sound like it’s impossible to get into these schools.
For some, it was impossible and a lot of of kids did get shut out.
Gloat elsewhere.
So you know kids that applied to Banneker, Walls, and McKinley and didn't get in anywhere? I won't include Duke b/c it's a specialty.
I do. Of course, you never know what was in the essay, interviews, and recs. But I know two kids who were shut out for no reason I can discern. Its not that it's really hard to get into these schools, it's that it's pretty arbitrary and hard to predict. Honestly if it were a straight up GPA-qualified lottery, that would at least be easy to understand and way less work for everyone.
Of course, McKinley is not for everyone either. Without a sincere enthusiasm for math and science, a kid is unlikely to be happy there.
So did these kids apply to McKinley or not? There were several kids from my child’s middle school who had decent but not exceptional grades and got in (mostly Bs). I find it hard to believe that they couldn’t get into McKinley. And if they only applied to Walls and Banneker, then yes it will be difficult to get a spot. If they applied to McKinley (and/or Duke) and didn’t get a spot, they were unlikely to be shut out for no apparent reason because the bar is not so high that it’s unachievable.
They did, and didn't get in.
Another problem with the process is there's really no way to confirm that the schools have all your materials. I've seen kids get rejected for incomplete applications who had no idea that anything was missing.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 10:43
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:From everything I read on this forum, I thought the chances of DS getting into his top school was slim. He got in and virtually everyone in his 8th grade class got into one of the application HS. Maybe not everyone got into their first choice but they got into one of their top 3. Stop stressing people out by making it sound like it’s impossible to get into these schools.
For some, it was impossible and a lot of of kids did get shut out.
Gloat elsewhere.
So you know kids that applied to Banneker, Walls, and McKinley and didn't get in anywhere? I won't include Duke b/c it's a specialty.
I do. Of course, you never know what was in the essay, interviews, and recs. But I know two kids who were shut out for no reason I can discern. Its not that it's really hard to get into these schools, it's that it's pretty arbitrary and hard to predict. Honestly if it were a straight up GPA-qualified lottery, that would at least be easy to understand and way less work for everyone.
Of course, McKinley is not for everyone either. Without a sincere enthusiasm for math and science, a kid is unlikely to be happy there.
So did these kids apply to McKinley or not? There were several kids from my child’s middle school who had decent but not exceptional grades and got in (mostly Bs). I find it hard to believe that they couldn’t get into McKinley. And if they only applied to Walls and Banneker, then yes it will be difficult to get a spot. If they applied to McKinley (and/or Duke) and didn’t get a spot, they were unlikely to be shut out for no apparent reason because the bar is not so high that it’s unachievable.
Anonymous
05/20/2025 10:08
Subject: Selective HS not that difficult to get into
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:From everything I read on this forum, I thought the chances of DS getting into his top school was slim. He got in and virtually everyone in his 8th grade class got into one of the application HS. Maybe not everyone got into their first choice but they got into one of their top 3. Stop stressing people out by making it sound like it’s impossible to get into these schools.
For some, it was impossible and a lot of of kids did get shut out.
Gloat elsewhere.
So you know kids that applied to Banneker, Walls, and McKinley and didn't get in anywhere? I won't include Duke b/c it's a specialty.
I do. Of course, you never know what was in the essay, interviews, and recs. But I know two kids who were shut out for no reason I can discern. Its not that it's really hard to get into these schools, it's that it's pretty arbitrary and hard to predict. Honestly if it were a straight up GPA-qualified lottery, that would at least be easy to understand and way less work for everyone.
Of course, McKinley is not for everyone either. Without a sincere enthusiasm for math and science, a kid is unlikely to be happy there.