On Jan. 27., Head of School Russell Shaw’s State of the School Address—his second to last—had a little bit of everything: NASA satellites, poetry, a Thurgood Marshall quote and four “waypoints” charting GDS’ future. It wasn’t until slide 55, however, that Board Treasurer Marc Lindsey slipped in some news: GDS tuition will increase by five percent next year.
New tuition rates, which are posted on the GDS website, mean families will have to pay anywhere from $2,331 to $2,811 more than this year. Families with students in ninth through eleventh grade will pay $55,881, and tuition for seniors will cost $56,217. For many families, the tuition increase could not have come at a worse time. In the months since Shaw’s announcement, the Trump Administration has laid off thousands of federal workers and slashed government programs, moves that have hit the D.C. area particularly hard.
Marc Vogl ’91, a GDS parent and government employee, said that “tuition increases always come at an unfortunate time.” As a federal employee, Vogl understands the crucial role the federal government plays in the D.C. area. “D.C.’s number one industry is the government, and when the government sneezes, the whole city catches a cold,” he said.
From March 12 to 13, the school organized a fundraiser called 48 Hours for Financial Aid to support families who had been affected by the layoffs and cuts to federal funding. “Just as our community came together in 2020 to support families through the pandemic, we now ask for your generosity once again to help those facing difficult circumstances,” an email from Shaw to community members read.
GDS’ 1945 founding charter called for the school to have “the best in modern elementary education at a price government workers can afford.” According to Zip Recruiter, the average salary of a government employee in D.C. is about $127,000 a year. That puts a high school tuition at GDS at over 40 percent of an average government salary. Shaw said the school is accessible to households with federal workers through financial aid and that financial aid has tripled in the last 15 years. In the 2024-2025 school year, nearly ten million dollars in total aid went to about 260 students.
On March 15, Shaw emailed parents that nearly $400,000 had been raised to “support current families facing unexpected financial need.” The initial goal of $200,000 was quickly surpassed, and by April 8 the total had reached $396,939.
“A lot of my friends and I have had parents work in government,” junior Helena Oscherwitz said. Oscherwitz’s mom, who worked in the Disability Rights Section of the Department of Justice, recently retired due to instability in the federal government. “Russell just sent an email saying their [the school’s] most important goal is keeping the community together, but then they’re also increasing tuition prices.”
Shaw told the Bit one reason for the tuition increase is the need to match salaries with cost-of-living increases in the D.C. area. “We are a relatively tuition-dependent school,” he said. Eighty-six percent of GDS’ revenue comes from tuition, so in order to combat rising living costs, Shaw said tuition had to increase.
“A lot of our non-salary costs have gone up meaningfully,” Shaw said. He said health insurance, delivery and transportation fuel costs had increased significantly. “The school has to adjust for all of those increases.”
Shaw noted that these price increases were due to inflation. Inflation rates, which have decreased since 2021, now sit at 2.4 percent. Some economists project inflation will rise up to 2.5 percent this year.
“Over the past 15 years, tuition increases at GDS have been lower than those of similar schools,” Director of Enrollment Management and Financial Aid Chris Levy wrote in an email to the Bit. However, next year’s tuition increase is greater than some other independent schools in the D.C. area. In January, Sidwell Friends School and Holton-Arms School announced increases in tuition of 4 and 3.7 percent, respectively. Both Sidwell and Holton charge higher total tuition than GDS.
“We do not expect these increases to affect enrollment, and we have not observed any decline in the number of diverse applicants due to higher tuition,” Levy wrote to the Bit.
Annabel Price contributed reporting.