TJ Falls to 14th in the Nation Per US News

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

NP. I did some spot checking of TJ pass and pass advanced SOL rates in 2016/2017/2018 and 2021/2022/2023 between TJ and a couple other high schools and the post-pandemic scores are down at all high schools. I didn't see that TJ SOL test scores were worse than other high schools (they are still much higher than at other schools). At all schools, SOL pass advanced rates are down from 2019. SOL scores haven't recovered anywhere in the state, including at TJ. All those people saying that there was no learning loss, or that students have recovered, aren't looking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

DP. I'm not sure why there's a person who keeps posting in these threads who appears by all reasonable interpretations to have a visceral disdain for studying and people who like to study.

Why would anyone disdain people who just studied the test answers they purchased?

That's not what you're doing though. You're talking down any concept that test preparedness can be indicative of a successful student, by conflating it with cheating. You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and frankly it gets somewhat offensive.

The problem was that the majority of the admissions under the old process came from a handful of wealthy feeders where students invested heavily in outside enrichment. Under the new more equitable process many bright and gifted students whose families are not as privileged are selected over the less successful preppers. The largest beneficiary of the change were low-income Asian students. Not sure what you have against low-income Asians but wish you weren't so racist.

That's incorrect.
The entire process was driven by concerns over racial diversity.
There were too many asians and not enough of everyone else.
Now, most of the entering class is a cross section of the applicant pool.
It's not exactly a lottery but it has the effect of being a lottery.

When they eliminated the test, there were a lot of references to all the ivy leagues going test optional.
Now that they are all requiring test scores again, doesn't that logic mean we should re-implement testing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

Nobody is disputing that COVID had an impact on test scores and it will take years to recover.

You are disputing actual data that virginia has released showing rising test scores in recent years while TJ's test scores have dropped.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

Nobody is disputing that COVID had an impact on test scores and it will take years to recover.

You are disputing actual data that virginia has released showing rising test scores in recent years while TJ's test scores have dropped.

14:00 here. I am disputing that. I looked at the SOL test score rates and didn't see that at all. Unfortunately.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

DP. I'm not sure why there's a person who keeps posting in these threads who appears by all reasonable interpretations to have a visceral disdain for studying and people who like to study.

Why would anyone disdain people who just studied the test answers they purchased?

That's not what you're doing though. You're talking down any concept that test preparedness can be indicative of a successful student, by conflating it with cheating. You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and frankly it gets somewhat offensive.

The problem was that the majority of the admissions under the old process came from a handful of wealthy feeders where students invested heavily in outside enrichment. Under the new more equitable process many bright and gifted students whose families are not as privileged are selected over the less successful preppers. The largest beneficiary of the change were low-income Asian students. Not sure what you have against low-income Asians but wish you weren't so racist.

Your thinking is horribly misguided.
If we are looking for the best and brightest, we should not care if they are all black or all white. All poor or all wealthy.
If there are racial or income gaps in academic achievement, they should be rectified so the gaps no longer exist, not overlooked as if the gaps never existed.
If you want more smart kids, get rid of holistic admissions.
Stuyvesant in NYC uses a single test to get into the most competitive school in NYC and about half of the school is on free/reduced lunch.
75% of the stuy students are asian. 90% of the stuy students on free or reduced lunch are asian.

Even in fairfax, we see schools like twain in a recent year had 20 students get into the pool of students based on test scores but NONE of them were admitted out of the pool because of the holistic filter. Holistic admissions benefit wealthier and whiter students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

Nobody is disputing that COVID had an impact on test scores and it will take years to recover.

You are disputing actual data that virginia has released showing rising test scores in recent years while TJ's test scores have dropped.

14:00 here. I am disputing that. I looked at the SOL test score rates and didn't see that at all. Unfortunately.

What test scores did you look at?

TJ advance pass rates for algebra went from 70% in 2020/2021 to 29% for 2021/2022
Langley advance pass rates for algebra went from 0% in 2020/2021 to 3% for 2021/2022
McLean advance pass rates for algebra went from 2% in 2020/2021 to 7% for 2021/2022

TJ advance pass rates for geometry went from 73% in 2020/2021 to 42% for 2021/2022
Langley advance pass rates for geometry went from 6% in 2020/2021 to 24% for 2021/2022
McLean advance pass rates for geometry went from 3% in 2020/2021 to 25% for 2021/2022

TJ advance pass rates for algebra2 went from 70% in 2020/2021 to 29% for 2021/2022
Langley advance pass rates for algebra2 went from 9% in 2020/2021 to 45% for 2021/2022
McLean advance pass rates for algebra2 went from 33% in 2020/2021 to 31% for 2021/2022

TJ advance pass rates for english went from 100% in 2020/2021 to 95% for 2021/2022
Langley advance pass rates for english went from 18% in 2020/2021 to 56% for 2021/2022
McLean advance pass rates for english went from 28% in 2020/2021 to 52% for 2021/2022

Every test dropped in advance pass at TJ between the 2020/2021 school year to the 2021/2022 school year.

It's mostly the opposite for other schools in FCPS.

If this is the result of COVID then the rest of FCPS seems to be recovering while TJ is getting worse.
Your rationale just seems like rationalization.

[Anonymous]

It’d be more helpful to include the two years prior and the two years following. And add a few more schools that are more representative of FCPS.

Just comparing two data points for affluent schools isn’t incredibly meaningful.

DP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’d be more helpful to include the two years prior and the two years following. And add a few more schools that are more representative of FCPS.

Just comparing two data points for affluent schools isn’t incredibly meaningful.

DP.

The link to all the data is above but here it is again.
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
There is nothing for the 2019/2020 school year, SOLs were cancelled that year because of COVID

If you think I'm cherry-picking data, you can look at the data yourself, I picked to two largest feeder pyramids that were likely to see the effects of students that were left behind under the new system.

[Anonymous]

Langley and McLean are most similar in academic rigor to TJ. C'mon. But sure let's throw Annandale, Mount Vernon and Lewis HS in there as comparators!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’d be more helpful to include the two years prior and the two years following. And add a few more schools that are more representative of FCPS.

Just comparing two data points for affluent schools isn’t incredibly meaningful.

DP.

The link to all the data is above but here it is again.
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
There is nothing for the 2019/2020 school year, SOLs were cancelled that year because of COVID

If you think I'm cherry-picking data, you can look at the data yourself, I picked to two largest feeder pyramids that were likely to see the effects of students that were left behind under the new system.

“Students left behind”

JFC. No one is entitled to a seat at TJ. It’s a community resource; it’s not just for wealthy kids from Langley/McLean.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

DP. I'm not sure why there's a person who keeps posting in these threads who appears by all reasonable interpretations to have a visceral disdain for studying and people who like to study.

Why would anyone disdain people who just studied the test answers they purchased?

That's not what you're doing though. You're talking down any concept that test preparedness can be indicative of a successful student, by conflating it with cheating. You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and frankly it gets somewhat offensive.

The problem was that the majority of the admissions under the old process came from a handful of wealthy feeders where students invested heavily in outside enrichment. Under the new more equitable process many bright and gifted students whose families are not as privileged are selected over the less successful preppers. The largest beneficiary of the change were low-income Asian students. Not sure what you have against low-income Asians but wish you weren't so racist.

That's incorrect.
The entire process was driven by concerns over racial diversity.
There were too many asians and not enough of everyone else.
Now, most of the entering class is a cross section of the applicant pool.
It's not exactly a lottery but it has the effect of being a lottery.

When they eliminated the test, there were a lot of references to all the ivy leagues going test optional.
Now that they are all requiring test scores again, doesn't that logic mean we should re-implement testing?

They don’t all require test scores again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’d be more helpful to include the two years prior and the two years following. And add a few more schools that are more representative of FCPS.

Just comparing two data points for affluent schools isn’t incredibly meaningful.

DP.

The link to all the data is above but here it is again.
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
There is nothing for the 2019/2020 school year, SOLs were cancelled that year because of COVID

If you think I'm cherry-picking data, you can look at the data yourself, I picked to two largest feeder pyramids that were likely to see the effects of students that were left behind under the new system.

The statement that the data was meant to support was:
“ The relevant statement is that TJ test scores fell while the rest of FCPS improved.”

Only comparing the two wealthiest schools is not representative of “the rest of FCPS”.

Looking at a broader set of schools over a longer period would be more meaningful. If you truly aren’t trying to cherry pick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

NP. I did some spot checking of TJ pass and pass advanced SOL rates in 2016/2017/2018 and 2021/2022/2023 between TJ and a couple other high schools and the post-pandemic scores are down at all high schools. I didn't see that TJ SOL test scores were worse than other high schools (they are still much higher than at other schools). At all schools, SOL pass advanced rates are down from 2019. SOL scores haven't recovered anywhere in the state, including at TJ. All those people saying that there was no learning loss, or that students have recovered, aren't looking.

They're attempting to establish this false narrative that attributes the learning loss from COVID which affected everyone to changes in TJ's selection process that eliminated the advantage which wealthier schools had with the previous method.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’d be more helpful to include the two years prior and the two years following. And add a few more schools that are more representative of FCPS.

Just comparing two data points for affluent schools isn’t incredibly meaningful.

DP.

The link to all the data is above but here it is again.
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
There is nothing for the 2019/2020 school year, SOLs were cancelled that year because of COVID

If you think I'm cherry-picking data, you can look at the data yourself, I picked to two largest feeder pyramids that were likely to see the effects of students that were left behind under the new system.

Your analysis seems thoughtful and more on point since you are attempting an apples to apples comparison of like schools. Thank you!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:TJ applicants all deserve a chance to grow and foster their love of STEM. Even if they weren’t lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family.

TJ exists for learning and enrichment; it’s not just a prize for lucky kids.

If a program is for the most academically gifted students then you should probably be selecting the most academically gifted students without regard to how they became academically gifted.
If you want to level the playing field so that poor kids are as likely to become academically gifted as wealthier kids, what's your plan?
But you are trying to treat all kids as if they are equally academically gifted and treat TJ admissions like a bingo prize.

If you want more poor kids then make the admissions based purely on a test.
NYC does this with its flagship magnet schools and the majority of the students at those schools are on free or reduced lunch.
Holistic admissions and subjective criteria favors kids with resources.

TJ is for qualified students who have an interest in STEM.

It's not supposed to be.

TJ is a governor's school.

"The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners." https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learnin...n/governor-s-schools

The pool of qualified students includes about 40% of FCPS
That is how many students in FCPS have 8th grade algebra and at least a 3.5 GPA.
That includes a lot of mediocre students.

Mediocre according to who? Their teachers who are giving them A's don't seem to think so...

Medicare is relative here. I am comparing these students compared to students selected under the previous method. Using that standard, these students are mediocre according to:

PSAT scores
SOL advance pass rates
The TJ math department email to students
The return to base school rates
A metric crap ton of anecdotal evidence.

40% of FCPS 8th graders have a 3.5 GPA of higher. That's not really what I would call selective.

If there are that many qualified students then TJ needs to expand even further!

They're not qualified.
Not for TJ.

You can create another school for the mediocre kids you want to give participation trophies to but humanity needs to develop the smart kids so the mediocre kids can pretend they solved global warming by blocking traffic and throwing tomato soup on the Mona Lisa

I get that you hate the reforms but you really need to stop lying. Sure, the kids getting in now may not have had years of expensive prep but seem to have much greater potential than the third rate preppers that were being admitted in the past.

And yet, the current crop of students need remedial classes, get PSAT scores 100 points lower than before, get lower gpa, just less qualified along every academic metric.

The previous crop of students also had issues. Nothing has really chagned.

You mean aside from the 100 point drop in PSAT
Much lower rates of pass advance SOL.
Fewer Math Olympiad winners
Fewer academic contest winners.
Way more remedial students.
Much higher wash out rates.
A lot has changed, especially at the bottom end of the curve.

The silver lining is that the kids that actually belong there are less stressed because the unqualified kids fill up the bottom half of the curve but they came to TJ for MORE competition, not less.

I know it's sad that the learning loss from virtual school during the pandemic impacted test scores. I'd read that it will be years before we fully recover.

We recovered like 2 years ago. This is publicly available information
https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results
In 2022 when the advance pass rates for almost every other school in FCPS was rising back to previous levels. The SOL advance pass rates at TJ were plummeting.

The PSAT scores barely budged in 2022 except at TJ where they dropped 100 points.
We will not have SAT score information for the new cohort for a while but it should be noted that SAT scores weren't adversely affected by COVID.

It's really crazy because overall scores are still way down after the pandemic but because of test optional reported scores appear higher despite the huge overall drop. People with low scores just don't report which messes with overall stats these days.

So why did test scores everywhere else go up bot go down at TJ and pretty much only TJ?

#fakenews

You damage the credibility of everyone on your side by denying citable facts.
Once again, here is the link to the Virginia DOE SOL results.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/data-policy-funding/data-reports/statistics-reports/sol-test-pass-rates-other-results

NP. I did some spot checking of TJ pass and pass advanced SOL rates in 2016/2017/2018 and 2021/2022/2023 between TJ and a couple other high schools and the post-pandemic scores are down at all high schools. I didn't see that TJ SOL test scores were worse than other high schools (they are still much higher than at other schools). At all schools, SOL pass advanced rates are down from 2019. SOL scores haven't recovered anywhere in the state, including at TJ. All those people saying that there was no learning loss, or that students have recovered, aren't looking.

That is so intellectually dishonest, it borders on just plain dishonest.
NOONE is saying that TJ's SOLs in 2022 were as high as or higher than they were in 2019.
NOONE is saying that TJ's SOL advance pass rates dropped below base school advance pass rates.

I said that TJ's SOL advance pass rates dropped between 2021 and 2022, the students admitted under the new system were scoring lower on the SOLs than students admitted under the old system.
Then someone asked if this might be a delayed effect of school closures during covid.
So then I compared SOL advance pass rates between 2021 and 2022 at OTHER FCPS schools and did not see the sort of across the board drops we saw at TJ. If this was covid realted, you would expect to see similar profiles at other schools
But, in fact most schools saw improvements between 2021 and 2022.
The schools that saw the most improvements were the schools that used to send a lot of kids to TJ under the old system but send fewer kids under the new system, so they got to keep more of their better students.
The schools that saw the least improvement were the schools that used to send few or no kids to TJ and now send 7-10 of their better students at schools with advance pass rates in the single dfigits, this can make a difference.

We are getting close to the point where if you still think that the students admitted under the new system are as competitive as the students admitted under the old system, you are either lying or stupid.
We will see what the SAT's look like for the current senior class. I suspect that will be the nail in the coffin.