Math Placement
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Anonymous
| I think the trust the schools people are wrong. The placement tests are a very small sample size of material often learned two years ago. It is way less predictive of success in math classes than these people believe. We had a school that tried to keep our child out of Homors Algebra 2 in 9th based on the placement test when we’d always gotten As. We pushed strongly for it, he got As in that class, a 5 on the AP Calc BC, and the highest grade in the class in Linear Algebra. If we had listened to placement child would never have been on that track. |
Anonymous
| Ditto on the schools knowing what they are doing on placement. They are poor at this. People are way to trusting that the schools know what they are doing |
Anonymous
DP: What you will regret is bad grades from being accelerated without understanding. Every college will accept a student who took calculus, no matter the level. The most advanced math students do not necessarily get into better colleges than the other calc students. |
Anonymous
| Our kid tested and ended up repeating Algenra I, despite an A in the course in 8th, and will not be on track for calc at all. We are stuck (so yes fight it OP!) and worry we need to leave the school in favor of a place that will allow for more advancement. Anyone else find their child in this spot and how did they fare with college admissions etc? |
Anonymous
Geometry is a good class for summer school or get the school to approve him taking it online concurrently with Alg II next year (or see if the school will let him take both next year and forego an elective/study hall). There are plenty of accredited, online private schools where your kid could take Geometry if you need to go that route. |
Anonymous
| The problem is most parents in this area have no math background and so just blindly trust the schools. Sometimes their placement is on the money but many, many times it is not. This is one of the big downsides of the private schools. They think they know more than they do. |
Anonymous
| Many, many times? |
Anonymous
Many times what? |
Anonymous
Many parents will fight tooth and nail to get their kids in a higher level math. My kid's school has a placement exam. If kids are zooming ahead or falling too far behind, the school will move them if necessary to give them the best chance of success. (fwiw, we were considering asking to have our kid moved down a level, but a few weeks of afterschool homework support filled in some gaps and he's now fine.) |
Anonymous
My kid did pre-calc in 12th grade and got it to all of the schools he applied to. Not top schools but still good ones. |
Anonymous
Many, many times getting placement “wrong” for students. Not sure how the poster is such an expert 🙄 |
Anonymous
Happy for your kid and happy to hear this. |
Anonymous
| 3 kids: AP Calc, MV Calc, BC Calc. All excellent college results. |
Anonymous
| AB Calc, not AP |
Anonymous
College admissions will be fine. Math level does not make or break an applicant. |