What are the ‘Big 3’ equivalent for DMV public high schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The "big 3" is a pretentious term that shouldn't be applied here. There are many good public schools in this area.

LOL…have u seen any of the DMV district posts on here??!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Although magnet schools are public, I would like to see the consensus on the ‘Big 3’ for non-magnet public high schools in the Washington DC metropolitan area.

Actually, the so called big 3 are failed imitation of MoCo Ws.
There is no such thing as big 3 while the Ws are real.

Sure they are - as 38 pages of ‘MCPS is atrocious’ are filled in 3 days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Social capital wise, there probably isn't an equivalent.

The magnets and top tracks at some suburban schools here have similarly-talented students though.

Similarly talented in private? Lol

I'm going to eyeball the list of National Merit Semifinalists from last year.

DC has 21 private NMSF, 6 public NMSF. All of the latter go to the School Without Walls.

That, of course, is the easy one. Now let's check out Northern Virginia, as far South as Fredericksburg and as far west as Loudoun, and you owe me for counting this all up. I may have missed or misclassified a couple, but I think this is at least close to correct:

The big kahoona, of course, is TJ, which has 132 NMSF.
Other publics in NOVA have 143 NMSF
Private + homeschool in Northern Virginia have 33 NMSF.

So ~10% of Northern Virginia high level talent is coming from private schools, which I believe is somewhat larger than the percent of students in private high schools, though I can't lay my hands on that data at the moment.

TJ has a lot of weight in this. I predict that the relative NMSF balance will shift towards private as the local schools continue with the memorizing-multiplication-tables-is-racist brand of equity, but I guess we'll see.

[Anonymous]

You just can't compare places like TJ, SWW and Blair to privates. Nearly 100% of kids in those magnets are talented and hardworking or they would not be there.

At TJ you are surrounded by hundreds of really smart kids in your own grade. At a top private you might have 10-20 in your class if you are lucky. That's a huge difference.

[Anonymous]

Isn’t TJ now open to all as opposed to it being merit-based? Or did I hear that wrong?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Isn’t TJ now open to all as opposed to it being merit-based? Or did I hear that wrong?

It is complex.

They increased the size of the class, removed the test, lowered the gpa floor, and allocated many of the slots on a per high school basis. Not open, and not entirely without merit. But harder for the very bright to get in and easier for the reasonably intelligent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isn’t TJ now open to all as opposed to it being merit-based? Or did I hear that wrong?

It is complex.

They increased the size of the class, removed the test, lowered the gpa floor, and allocated many of the slots on a per high school basis. Not open, and not entirely without merit. But harder for the very bright to get in and easier for the reasonably intelligent.

They actually raised the GPA floor. They did eliminate the standardized tests, but kept the problem-solving essay (basically another type of test) as well as the student portrait sheet.

[Anonymous]

Whitman, Langley, McLean High for non magnets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Social capital wise, there probably isn't an equivalent.

The magnets and top tracks at some suburban schools here have similarly-talented students though.

Similarly talented in private? Lol

I'm going to eyeball the list of National Merit Semifinalists from last year.

DC has 21 private NMSF, 6 public NMSF. All of the latter go to the School Without Walls.

That, of course, is the easy one. Now let's check out Northern Virginia, as far South as Fredericksburg and as far west as Loudoun, and you owe me for counting this all up. I may have missed or misclassified a couple, but I think this is at least close to correct:

The big kahoona, of course, is TJ, which has 132 NMSF.
Other publics in NOVA have 143 NMSF
Private + homeschool in Northern Virginia have 33 NMSF.

So ~10% of Northern Virginia high level talent is coming from private schools, which I believe is somewhat larger than the percent of students in private high schools, though I can't lay my hands on that data at the moment.

TJ has a lot of weight in this. I predict that the relative NMSF balance will shift towards private as the local schools continue with the memorizing-multiplication-tables-is-racist brand of equity, but I guess we'll see.

lol, k-8 schools have more progressive curriculums than publics. Based on your phrasing, you may want to consider BASIS for your kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whitman, Langley, McLean High for non magnets.

Poolesville, BCC, Yorktown, Oakton, Chantilly... there are a lot of good public schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Social capital wise, there probably isn't an equivalent.

The magnets and top tracks at some suburban schools here have similarly-talented students though.

Similarly talented in private? Lol

I'm going to eyeball the list of National Merit Semifinalists from last year.

DC has 21 private NMSF, 6 public NMSF. All of the latter go to the School Without Walls.

That, of course, is the easy one. Now let's check out Northern Virginia, as far South as Fredericksburg and as far west as Loudoun, and you owe me for counting this all up. I may have missed or misclassified a couple, but I think this is at least close to correct:

The big kahoona, of course, is TJ, which has 132 NMSF.
Other publics in NOVA have 143 NMSF
Private + homeschool in Northern Virginia have 33 NMSF.

So ~10% of Northern Virginia high level talent is coming from private schools, which I believe is somewhat larger than the percent of students in private high schools, though I can't lay my hands on that data at the moment.

TJ has a lot of weight in this. I predict that the relative NMSF balance will shift towards private as the local schools continue with the memorizing-multiplication-tables-is-racist brand of equity, but I guess we'll see.

lol, k-8 schools have more progressive curriculums than publics. Based on your phrasing, you may want to consider BASIS for your kids

Also, the Big 3 privates pick off the very top academic kids at 9th, no matter where they did K-8. More medium-high kids in public.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Social capital wise, there probably isn't an equivalent.

The magnets and top tracks at some suburban schools here have similarly-talented students though.

Similarly talented in private? Lol

I'm going to eyeball the list of National Merit Semifinalists from last year.

DC has 21 private NMSF, 6 public NMSF. All of the latter go to the School Without Walls.

That, of course, is the easy one. Now let's check out Northern Virginia, as far South as Fredericksburg and as far west as Loudoun, and you owe me for counting this all up. I may have missed or misclassified a couple, but I think this is at least close to correct:

The big kahoona, of course, is TJ, which has 132 NMSF.
Other publics in NOVA have 143 NMSF
Private + homeschool in Northern Virginia have 33 NMSF.

So ~10% of Northern Virginia high level talent is coming from private schools, which I believe is somewhat larger than the percent of students in private high schools, though I can't lay my hands on that data at the moment.

TJ has a lot of weight in this. I predict that the relative NMSF balance will shift towards private as the local schools continue with the memorizing-multiplication-tables-is-racist brand of equity, but I guess we'll see.

lol, k-8 schools have more progressive curriculums than publics. Based on your phrasing, you may want to consider BASIS for your kids

Also, the Big 3 privates pick off the very top academic kids at 9th, no matter where they did K-8. More medium-high kids in public.

I'm fairly certain that Sidwell, STA, and NCS keep the kids who attended in 8th. Are you saying that their lower school curriculums aren't progressive?

[Anonymous]

If you want to know about terms that some people actually use, there are just the “W schools” in MCPS (Whitman, Churchill, Wootton, and Walter Johnson - w/B-CC sometimes included) and the “Big 5” in FCPS (Langley, McLean, Madison, Woodson, and Oakton).

Not everyone agrees these are the best schools in those districts or worthy of being separately mentioned, but those are the only terms used with any frequency. And, yes, there’s a high correlation with family wealth.

Otherwise you’re just asking for people to engage in a brand-new pissing contest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you want to know about terms that some people actually use, there are just the “W schools” in MCPS (Whitman, Churchill, Wootton, and Walter Johnson - w/B-CC sometimes included) and the “Big 5” in FCPS (Langley, McLean, Madison, Woodson, and Oakton).

Not everyone agrees these are the best schools in those districts or worthy of being separately mentioned, but those are the only terms used with any frequency. And, yes, there’s a high correlation with family wealth.

Otherwise you’re just asking for people to engage in a brand-new pissing contest.

The only real one is the Ws in MoCo.
There is no such thing as the "big 3" in private and definitely not "Big 5" in FCPS. That's the newest copycat one. LOL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you want to know about terms that some people actually use, there are just the “W schools” in MCPS (Whitman, Churchill, Wootton, and Walter Johnson - w/B-CC sometimes included) and the “Big 5” in FCPS (Langley, McLean, Madison, Woodson, and Oakton).

Not everyone agrees these are the best schools in those districts or worthy of being separately mentioned, but those are the only terms used with any frequency. And, yes, there’s a high correlation with family wealth.

Otherwise you’re just asking for people to engage in a brand-new pissing contest.

The only real one is the Ws in MoCo.
There is no such thing as the "big 3" in private and definitely not "Big 5" in FCPS. That's the newest copycat one. LOL

This thread is bad and there is no Big 3 or 5 publics. By supposed best high schools, it is probably Whitman, Churchill and Langley. Labgley and McLean are almost the same.