NEWS
- Here's a school-by-school look at DC's high school graduation rates [Friendship PCS, Washington Latin PCS, and KIPP DC PCS mentioned]
- George Washington U. hand-delivers good news — and full scholarships [Cesar Chavez PCS, KIPP DC PCS, Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS, and Washington Latin PCS mentioned]
- GWU Stephen Joel Trachtenberg Scholarships Announced [Cesar Chavez PCS, KIPP DC PCS, Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS, and Washington Latin PCS mentioned]
- D.C. charter school to receive Britain’s Prince Charles [Carlos Rosario International PCS mentioned]
Here's a school-by-school look at DC's high school graduation rates [Friendship PCS, Washington Latin PCS, and KIPP DC PCS mentioned]
Greater Greater Washington
By Natalie Wexler
March 18, 2015
Graduation rates vary a lot among DC's high schools. A series of graphics from the DC government shows just how different they can be.
DC Public Schools had an overall four-year graduation rate of about 58% last year, up by only two percentage points from 2013. And the overall rate for the charter sector fell almost seven points, to 69%.
To calculate the rate, statisticians divide the number of high school graduates in a class by the number of students who entered as 9th-graders four years earlier, with adjustments for students who transfer. Having a four-year rate helps standardize the high school graduation data, but it's not clear we should expect all students to graduate in four years.
Selective DCPS schools push up the average for the sector
The graphic above, which came from DC's Office of Revenue Analysis, shows that five DCPS schools that are selective in their admissions pulled up the average significantly for the traditional public school sector. All had graduation rates over 90%.
The next two highest rates within DCPS are for Columbia Heights Education Campus, which also requires an application for admission, and Wilson High School, which has the highest number of affluent and white students of any neighborhood DCPS high school.
The other DCPS neighborhood high schools are clustered towards the bottom of the spectrum, with rates ranging from 39% at Anacostia to 62% at Roosevelt. (Washington Metropolitan and Luke C. Moore are both alternative schools, while Eastern will graduate its first senior class this year.)
The graphic also allows you to see graduation rates for different subgroups of students at a school, and doing that can change a school's ranking. If you select for special education students, for example, you find that the top-ranked school is a charter, Friendship Collegiate. You can access the full range of graphics here.
Most of the DCPS selective schools aren't listed in this version of the graphic, because they had fewer than 10 students scheduled to graduate in the special education category.
Other filters reveal discrepancies in the graduation rates for subgroups within schools. At Wilson, for example, the graduation rate for white students is third in the District, at 90%. But for black students, Wilson is in 14th place, with a rate of 76%.
The graphic also shows that only three schools in DC had more than 10 white students graduating last year, all of them DCPS schools: Wilson and two selective schools, School Without Walls and Duke Ellington. Wilson is the only school that graduated 10 or more Asian students.
Changes in rates over time
Another set of graphics shows how four-year graduation rates have changed at each school over the last four years for various subgroups. Wilson's data, for example, shows gains for black students but decreases for special education and a mixed record for Hispanic students.
A longitudinal view can also reveal ups and downs in a school's overall rate. DCPS has highlighted the 16-point jump in the graduation rate for H.D. Woodson from 2013 to 2014. But the rate in 2011 was only three points lower than the rate for 2014.
While the charter sector's graduation rate is still well above DCPS's, a seven-point drop seems significant. The executive director of the DC Public Charter School Board told WAMU that the board is looking into reasons for the decline, but he noted that the schools with the lowest rates closed last year or will close at the end of this year.
On the other hand, two of the charter sector's highest-performing schools had double-digit declines. The graduation rate dropped from 96% to 85% at Washington Latin, and from 95% to 85% at KIPP DC College Prep.
Smaller cohorts and greater rigor in charters may explain lower rates
Martha Cutts, the head of Washington Latin, doesn't see the decline as cause for concern. Some classes are simply not as strong academically as others, she said, and when you have a small cohort a few kids can make a big difference.
In Washington Latin's case, the original 9th-grade cohort was 54 students, and 46 of them graduated in four years. In an email, a spokesperson for KIPP DC made a similar point, noting that there were only 69 seniors in the class of 2014. (Disclosure: I have contributed financially to KIPP DC.)
Both schools also noted that a number of students who didn't graduate in four years are on track to graduate next year. Cutts said that she expects three students to do so, and KIPP DC anticipates that the five-year graduation rate for its 2014 cohort will be close to 90%.
For the charter sector as a whole, the five-year graduation rate is 80%, an increase of 11 points over its four-year rate. While the DCPS five-year rate is also higher than its four-year rate, the difference isn't as large: 63%, an increase of only five points.
For the last several years, education officials have focused on reporting how many students make it through high school in four years, partly due to a federal effort to standardize the way different states report graduation data.
It's certainly important to compare apples to apples. And it's important that students stay on track to graduate. On the other hand, high school is not a race. What students learn is at least as important as whether they finish "on time." And without any high school exit exam in DC, it's hard to know whether a graduate of one high school really has the same qualifications as someone who has graduated from another.
According to KIPP DC, one reason for the dip in its four-year graduation rate is that the school has increased the rigor of its program after "receiving feedback" from their alumni. "Ultimately we want our students to be well prepared to tackle the challenging coursework that awaits them in college," a spokesperson said.
Of course, not all DC high school graduates are headed to college, and perhaps not all of them should be. But a high school diploma should at least certify that a student has mastered high-school-level material, even if it's taken him longer than four years to do that.
Correction: Based on information from the DC Office of Revenue Analysis, the original version of this post said that the subgroup data didn't include schools with fewer than 25 students in a given category who were scheduled to graduate. Later that office contacted us to say the correct figure was not 25, but 10. We have changed the graphs and text to reflect that information.
Visit link above to view graphics.
George Washington U. hand-delivers good news — and full scholarships [Cesar Chavez PCS, KIPP DC PCS, Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS, and Washington Latin PCS mentioned]
The Washington Post
By Moriah Balingit
March 18, 2015
For Lashae Hunter, it was just another day, and just another 8 a.m. school assembly at Cesar Chavez Public Charter School in Southeast Washington. Her little sister, who walked to school with her that morning, seemed unusually cheerful.
Dozens of teens gathered in the small gymnasium, some groggy, some chatting, some fiddling with their phones, and some watching the odd entourage of adults in their high school.
George Washington University’s president, Steven Knapp, joined a gaggle of media and the school’s mascot, a foam-headed, lumpy-faced George Washington.
“Happy hump day!” said GWU’s director of admissions, Karen Stroud Felton, attempting to drum up energy in the crowd. Knapp took the microphone and made an announcement that threw the crowd into squeals and cheers. Classmates clapped and cheered, “Go Lashae!”
“I do have the pleasure of announcing which one of your classmates at this wonderful school will be the recipient of the Trachtenberg Scholarship,” Knapp said. “It is Miss Lashae Hunter.”
As a Stephen Joel Trachtenberg Scholar, Lashae will pay nothing to attend one of the country’s priciest institutions. Total tuition and board will run $62,285 for the 2015-2016 school year, and about 60 percent of students get financial aid.
The program gives a handful of seniors at D.C. public schools full-ride scholarships. And while there is no income requirement, many of the recipients come from schools where there are high rates of poverty.
For Lashae, it means she will get to stay close to home — she lives just a few blocks from the charter school — and close to her mother. The thrill of it hit her like a wave, leaving her speechless. She walked up to shake Knapp’s hand in a teary daze.
“Oh, my God!” she said, over and over again, trying to process a life where she would no longer carry the stress of figuring out how to pay for college. “I prayed and was hoping to get a full ride at GW.”
She will be the first in her family to attend college. Her mother, Warrenria Hunter, watched her daughter get the news and was overwhelmed with joy.
“I was kind of struggling, and we don’t have to do that for her anymore,” she said.
Knapp paid visits to nine seniors at D.C. high schools Wednesday to deliver the news that they had been accepted to George Washington University and that they were recipients of full-ride scholarships. Many, like Lashae, will be the first in their families to attend college and come from families who have little to contribute financially to their children’s college educations.
The college application process leaves nearly all prospective college students on edge, and it’s one that normally culminates with a letter or an e-mail from an admissions office. Wednesday’s ritual, which GWU dubbed “Prize Patrol,” was a way to put a personal touch on the news. But Felton said it was not just about creating a feel-good moment.
“It’s not just about the scholarship, but it’s about creating a college-going culture for all high school students,” Knapp said.
At McKinley Technology High School, Byron Fullerton got the surprise during his AP calculus class. His father, also named Byron, joined him along with his big sisters and mother.
It was a weighty moment for the elder Fullerton, who arrived in Washington from Jamaica as a teenager, struggled for two years in middle school and dropped out long before graduating. Now his son, who has already taken classes at GWU through a dual-enrollment program, plans to pursue a career in digital media at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, now part of GWU.
“It’s just showing how one generation can make such a difference,” said the younger Fullerton. He said his father worked most of his life as a plumber or a landscaper. “That experience shows how important education is.”
Other recipients included Mario Velasquez of Benjamin Banneker Academic High School, Carlos Palencia of School Without Walls Senior High School, Elissa Hipolito-Magsalin of St. John’s College High School, Faith Hudson of Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter School and Coumba Gueye of Washington Latin Public Charter School.
Bruce Beuzard IV and Matthew Jenkins, good friends and seniors at KIPP DC College Preparatory, got the news in their homeroom class and will be the first to attend college in their respective families. The two have known each other since fifth grade and have had a friendly competition over grades and test scores in high school.
The two beamed giddily — Jenkins broke down in tears — as they digested the news that they would not only attend college for free, but would get to continue their education together. Bruce wants to be an engineer and Matthew wants to be an architect. Wednesday, shortly after getting the news, Jenkins said that maybe someday they could build something together — maybe even a new school for KIPP.
But first, they made plans for the fall.
“Hey Bruce,” Matthew said. “Wanna move in with me?”
GWU Stephen Joel Trachtenberg Scholarships Announced [Cesar Chavez PCS, KIPP DC PCS, Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS, and Washington Latin PCS mentioned]
The Examiner
By Mark Lerner
March 19, 2015
I don't know about you but yesterday was a tough day at work. It is easy to come to the opinion that difficult challenges is all the world is about. But then you wake up to the news that a group of high school students, many of whom live in poverty, have been given an all expense paid college education at the George Washington University through winning a Stephen Joel Trachtenberg Scholarship, and you realize how great life is. I met my wife when she was a freshman at GW and I work at the hospital.
If you have a chance please take a few minutes to watch the video showing the announcement of the awards. There you will see Lashae Hunter talk about her joy at receiving the scholarship. Like many recipients, Ms. Hunter, who attends the Cesar Chavez Public Charter School for Public Policy's Parkside Campus, will be the first in her family to attend college. Since she was a little girl she has wanted to be a physician. Now she could go on to study at the George Washington University School of Medicine. This med school gets more applications then any training program for doctors in the country.
George Washington University’s president Steven Knapp then went on to KIPP DC College Preparatory Academy to present the prize to two students, Bruce Beuzard IV and Matthew Jenkins. The award is worth over $62,000 a year in tuition and board.
Other winners, according to the Washington Post's Moriah Balingit, include Byron Fullerton, McKinley Technology High School; Mario Velasquez, Benjamin Banneker Academic High School; Carlos Palencia, School Without Walls Senior High School; Elissa Hipolito-Magsalin, St. John’s College High School; Faith Hudson, Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter School; and Coumba Gueye of Washington Latin Public Charter School.
Years ago, when Dr. Trachtenberg was still President of the the George Washington University, I called his office to complain that no students who attended charter schools were being presented with his scholarship. The response I received was that private school students were not eligible. Last year, at a discussion of one of his books at the Politics and Prose Bookstore, I was able to thank him for the scholarships that are in his name.
D.C. charter school to receive Britain’s Prince Charles [Carlos Rosario International PCS mentioned]
The Washington Times
By Deborah Simmons
March 18, 2015
Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School opened its doors in Northwest D.C. in the late 1990s — and on Thursday it rolls out the royal welcome mat, literally.
Britain’s Prince Charles is scheduled to visit the school, where international flavor and a global mission are part and parcel of its academic schooling.
The school and its student body reflect the dedication and success of their namesake.
Carlos Manuel Rosario had been to Africa, France and Germany before he began calling the District home in the early 1950s, helping to establish the Columbia Heights/Adams Morgan area as vibrant communities for immigrants decades ahead of D.C. home rule.
A native of Puerto Rico and an Army veteran, Rosario had seen and heard much abroad, leading him to do for D.C. Spanish-speakers what needed to be done: bilingual education, a cultural celebration of Hispanic American heritage, a clinic and job-training programs, among other things.
Rosario’s foresight is reflected today at the charter school, where teens and adults from more than 80 nations earn GEDs, and become fluent in speaking, reading and writing English. They are prepared for the job market, higher education and to become U.S. citizens.
__________
FROM FOCUS
 |
Upcoming events
Click Here > |
__________