Washington DC Area Private Schools

There are parts of the private school application process you never see that quietly decides your kid’s chances before anyone reads a single essay. I went through it here in Washington DC, took the tours, filled out the forms, answered the “identity” questions, watched who got in and who did not. Once I saw how it really works, I could not unsee it.

If you are thinking about private school because public is not working, or you are just quietly panicking about middle school, this is the video I wish I had before we started. This video is not a ranking of schools. It is about how to evaluate private schools, what questions to ask, what red flags I found, and what I would do differently, based on going through the process in Washington DC. Even if you are not in DC, the playbook is very similar in other big metro areas, so a lot of this will still apply.

Step One – Understand the Game You Are Walking Into

Before you evaluate schools, you must understand the basic math.

Applications are at record highs. It used to be that only the wealthiest families applied. Now you have families across a wide range of incomes applying because:

• Public schools feel unsafe, chaotic, or academically off track.
• Private schools have strong diversity and equity missions and want a mix of backgrounds.
• The pandemic pushed people to rethink school completely.

So no, your chances are not amazing in most cases. That does not mean do not apply. It does mean you need to be strategic about where you put your energy.

Other things to know: 

• Most schools will not clearly tell you how many open seats they have in the exact grade you need.
• “Expansion years” are when they add a big chunk of new seats (usually at entry grades like Pre-K, K, 6th, or 9th).
• Every application fee costs money. They have zero incentive to say, “Do not bother, this grade is basically full.”
• No one gets denied. Everyone gets “waitlisted,” which is a nice way of saying “denied.”

Step 2: How To Actually Research Private Schools (Without Losing Your Mind)

Use the portals, but do not stop there

In DC, most schools use Ravenna for applications. Your area may use something similar. Set up the account, get familiar with deadlines, and register for all the things – open houses, information sessions, parent coffees, student shadow days. These are not just “nice to attend.” They are your first real look at how the school operates. And they are also the school’s first look at you. Don’t think they aren’t sizing you up. They are.

Prepare your poker face

Every event has THAT Parent. You will know them immediately. It is the mom or dad asking how the school will challenge their ultra-genius chess-playing child prodigy who is reading seven grade levels ahead, could teach AP Advanced Calculus and already cured world hunger.

You will be tempted to laugh or roll your eyes. Do not. Hone your poker face now, or leave your camera off if it is virtual. Private school culture can be a lot. Your job is to observe, not audition for a reality show. Your job is also to come across as a family that the school would want to have there – not someone who is going to be a demanding pest.

What everyone Else Asks vs What You Should Ask

Most parents ask:

• How rigorous is your math program?
• What sports do you offer? Is it a no-cut policy?
• What colleges do your graduates attend? (Translation: how many Ivies, please be impressed with us.)

Those questions are fine, but they are not the ones that helped us evaluate fit.

The questions that mattered more for us were more centered on how the school operates overall. To me, I think that’s much more indicative of the education your child will receive than asking if there’s rigor in the math program.

1. How long have you been at the school?
   We asked this of almost every teacher, administrator, and tour guide. When you repeatedly hear “I just started,” or “six months,” that is a red flag. There are two potential issues here. First – high turnover tells you a lot about internal culture. Second – why aren’t the long-term teachers and staff front and center at these events. They should believe in the school enough to help recruit too. Recruiting should not be pushed off to the newbies. Not only can they not answer many questions, the lack of longevity shown from a few schools was a real eye-opener.

2. How big is the grade, not just the class?
   Everyone asks about class size. That matters, but so does grade size. We saw schools with only 25 kids per grade in middle school. If your child is social, or needs more friend options, that very small pool can be tough.

3. How well organized is the admissions experience itself?
   This is huge and people ignore it. Things we noticed:
   • Did they forget to post required shadow days in the portal?
   • Were we ping-ponged up and down four flights of stairs for no reason on a tour?
   • Were communications clear and on time?

If you cannot plan a tour or manage a checklist for applicants, how exactly are you planning the whole educational arc of my kid?

Look at Every Private School, Even Schools You Think You Will Reject

Confession time. I almost canceled our tour and interview at the school our daughters now attend. It was not in our ideal location, and it was “only” K–8. Translation: my adult brain decided it was inconvenient.

I went anyway.

What we found:

• A warm environment
• Teachers and staff who had been there 15 to 30 years
• A culture that matched our children

All the marketing and websites in the world cannot give you that feeling. You have to go.

Step 3: The Part They Do Not Say Out Loud – What the Schools Are Looking For

Here is the secret nobody really explains when you start this process.

Getting in is less like checking boxes on a rubric and more like casting a grade level.

Most private schools are not just asking, “Is this child qualified?” A lot of kids are qualified. They are asking, “Does this child and this family fit what we need in this grade and at this moment?” This means they may need to balance number of girls and boys, fill a gap in diversity they want to highlight, prioritize certain talents, backgrounds or family connections.

We were in the lobby of the admissions office of one school and one of the sports coaches was talking to this tween boy who was slouched down in his chair, and who could barely muster a full “yes” to his questions. I was wildly embarrassed for that child. But also, I was irritated. This coach was trying so hard to get this kid to take interest, likely because he plays a sport where they needed to fill a spot, and the kid was a dud. This is when I learned private school admissions is nothing remotely close to a level playing field.

Some schools will lean more heavily into legacy or well-connected families, financial full-pay families, or other highly visible diversity markers that fit their mission.

You will see hints of this in the application questions.

We had one application which started with these questions on page 1:

• Which race categories we identified with
• If the applicant or anyone in the family identified as LGBTQ
• If there was any additional gender information to specify beyond male or female

Nothing wrong with any of those questions by themselves. What was interesting was how clearly you could see the admissions priorities in the first page alone.

It was obvious that, in some cases, your odds were effectively decided based on how you fit their current “needs” before anyone read your beautifully crafted essays or recommendations.

That does not mean “do not bother.” It means:

• Read between the lines.
• Ask yourself, “Does this school’s stated values match what I want for my kid?”
• Understand that rejection, or in this area, “waitlisting,” is often about their puzzle, not your child’s worth.

Step 4: How To Decide If a Private School Is Right For YOUR Kid

Here is the actual evaluation filter I wish someone had handed me.

When you tour and apply, pay attention to:

1. Staff tenure and turnover
   Lots of long-term teachers and staff usually equals a healthier culture. Lots of “I just started” is a warning sign.
2. Grade size and social fit
   Class size you can Google. Ask instead, “How many kids are in this grade?” Then picture your child in that social ecosystem.
3. How the school talks about academics for real humans
   Is everything about rigor and achievement and college lists, or do they also talk about:
   • Executive functioning
   • Learning how to study
   • Mental health
   • Kids who are not Ivy-bound robots
4. How they handle communication and logistics
   Application portals, tour planning, follow up. This is the “tell” for how they will treat you once they have your tuition money.
5. Whether their values align with yours
   Every school has a “thing,” whether it is social justice, traditional academics, arts, faith, or a particular philosophy. None of them are neutral. Make sure the “thing” matches what you actually want.
6. How your kid feels when they leave
   Not “did you like the climbing wall.” Ask:
   • Did you feel comfortable?
   • Could you see yourself here?
   • Did the teachers seem like people you could talk to?

Our final choice was not the fanciest campus or the most impressive name. It was the school where our kid felt seen, the adults stuck around more than a couple of years, and the culture matched how we want her to grow up. 

Why Families Start Looking At Private School

I am a Washington DC mom who loved the idea of our kids attending city schools. I thought if it stops working, “I’ll figure things out later,” right up until “later” smacked us the face. It started with the slow unraveling of public school. I loved our elementary school. Amazing community, great teachers, all of that. But here is the question I had to get honest about:

Can a typical overcrowded public elementary school, with dozens of languages spoken at home, kids with wildly different home lives and abilities, truly prepare everyone for middle school in the same way?

For us, the answer was no.

Layer on Covid fallout and you get:

• Behavior issues
• Mental health crises
• Violence creeping into schools
• And systems that default to “teaching to the middle” to survive the chaos

I did not really understand “teach to the test” until I watched it happen. In Public Schools, testing starts in third grade. I naively thought “teach to the test” meant they would still teach the full curriculum and drill what was on the test.

What actually happened is they stop teaching the larger curriculum for a while and shift into pure test prep. Parents are told the scores “help the school,” which is true. But the staff can also get bonuses tied to performance. Great for adults, less great when your kid loses real instruction time.

“Teaching to the middle” is the companion problem. The idea is that everyone stays in one big mixed-level class in the name of equity. In theory, lovely. In practice, with post-Covid behavior and mental health issues, it becomes survival mode. The kids who need more, and the kids who need different, get stuck.

If your child is a self-advocating, straight-A, self-propelling machine, they might be fine. If they are not, you may find yourself wondering about private school.

So yes, there are families chasing rigor, top colleges, and sports. We are not Ivy League people. We just wanted our kids to be able to learn how to learn, and not have opportunities quietly removed because they never learned how to study.

The private school landscape has changed. It is no longer just polo shirts and trust funds. Families at all income levels are applying. Schools are trying to reshape themselves around diversity, equity, inclusion, and post-Covid realities.

Whether that sticks or swings back in a few years, nobody knows.

What you can control is how you evaluate schools. Look past the brochure and the college list. Watch how they treat you during the process. Listen for what they care about underneath the marketing language. Choose the school that will actually teach your child how to learn, not just how to perform.

If you are in DC, Maryland, or Virginia and you are trying to figure out how school choices fit into where you live, reach out. I help families make that call all the time. I am happy to talk through neighborhood, public, charter, and private options with you.

And if you are somewhere else, use this as your framework. You cannot control the acceptance rate, but you can absolutely control how intentional you are about where you apply.