TJ admissions now verifying free and reduced price meal status for successful 2026 applicants

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Oh, BS. If they were asking “are you a rich family who had access to free meals during the pandemic for a government program” and EVERYONE was eligible, why the hell would they even ask the question?

Why the hell would they have a teacher recommendation tab or a semifinalist notification tab? Because they used the old applicant which was designed for the previous admissions process and didn't bother to update it to reflect either the new admissions process or the pandemic meals policy. There is no good reason to give them the benefit of the doubt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Oh, BS. If they were asking “are you a rich family who had access to free meals during the pandemic for a government program” and EVERYONE was eligible, why the hell would they even ask the question?

Why the hell would they have a teacher recommendation tab or a semifinalist notification tab? Because they used the old applicant which was designed for the previous admissions process and didn't bother to update it to reflect either the new admissions process or the pandemic meals policy. There is no good reason to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I don’t remember seeing those tabs. Did they open? With the ongoing lawsuit it make sense to keep the tabs and turn them off vs reprogramming.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think they will withdraw offers.

This is what I think. The cheaters will claim that the questions were misleading and they didn’t know any better.

It seems plausible to conclude that everyone who answered yes was originally awarded the experience factor, and that they have for some reason decided that was a bad idea and will now be rescinding the experience factor from anyone who can't demonstrate financial need.

I think we can all agree that the questions were badly asked - at a minimum, they should have asked for verification a long time ago. There need not be any action taken other than to ignore the answers to the questions and award the FRM EF only to those who provide the requested documentation.

That will be enough for some admittees to be unadmitted, namely those who were wrongly awarded the experience factor and who wouldn't have been originally admitted without the EF.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is this coming out now?

My guess is either:

1) A lawsuit

2) The Washington Post decided to start asking questions and the admissions office is now embarrassed.

I’d like to believe it was due to this board!

+ 1

More power to DCUM.

Either some FCPS member on this board felt the heat or WaPo and the likes drew from this board to generate the heat. Either ways we can all feel good.

This is honestly a win-win.

If you answered the question literally and said yes - FCPS is removing the ambiguity and asking you the question again in a clear unambiguous manner. If you qualify, you are good. If you don’t, you are at par with everyone else who does not qualify as it should be. You may still qualify without the points but if you don’t- you miss out on a fair criterion.

If you answered no and felt wronged that others misinterpreted or misrepresented then you should feel good. You are at par with those who erroneously or otherwise answered no. So all is good.

FCPS did not have to create this roundabout process but their incompetence is a story for another day

[Anonymous]

Glad they are taking action. Just hope that those who undeservedly answered YES are also the ones who cheated on the online essay questions. Two birds with one stone kind of thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

This is honestly a win-win.

If you answered the question literally and said yes - FCPS is removing the ambiguity and asking you the question again in a clear unambiguous manner. If you qualify, you are good. If you don’t, you are at par with everyone else who does not qualify as it should be. You may still qualify without the points but if you don’t- you miss out on a fair criterion.

If you answered no and felt wronged that others misinterpreted or misrepresented then you should feel good. You are at par with those who erroneously or otherwise answered no. So all is good.

FCPS did not have to create this roundabout process but their incompetence is a story for another day

Agreed - this will get the process much closer to a fair result. I wouldn't go so far as calling it a win-win, though. Still a lot to be desired with the process as a whole. And lots of unnecessary heartbreak for kids who were not admitted at first but later will be or vice versa.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is honestly a win-win.

If you answered the question literally and said yes - FCPS is removing the ambiguity and asking you the question again in a clear unambiguous manner. If you qualify, you are good. If you don’t, you are at par with everyone else who does not qualify as it should be. You may still qualify without the points but if you don’t- you miss out on a fair criterion.

If you answered no and felt wronged that others misinterpreted or misrepresented then you should feel good. You are at par with those who erroneously or otherwise answered no. So all is good.

FCPS did not have to create this roundabout process but their incompetence is a story for another day

Agreed - this will get the process much closer to a fair result. I wouldn't go so far as calling it a win-win, though. Still a lot to be desired with the process as a whole. And lots of unnecessary heartbreak for kids who were not admitted at first but later will be or vice versa.

Probably a good life lesson in there.

[Anonymous]

I still do not believe they will rescind any offers. This may be more of a CYA thing.

[Anonymous]

What’s the word for finding pleasure when unethical people are crapping their pants?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still do not believe they will rescind any offers. This may be more of a CYA thing.

+100

There are 180-190 kids in the class of 2026 who are “economically disadvantaged” and now have to provide proof of income. (Who know how many on the waitlist?) It’s too big of a problem to fix. How will they (try to) fix it?

1) sweep the problem under the rug. (This is FCPS, so clearly the most likely to happen. Am I right?)

2) recind the offers to those that lied and go to the waitlist. But the waitlist is littered with false “economically disadvantaged”
As well. No way do they go to kids who have already been flat out rejected.

[Anonymous]

Yeah, I don’t see what they will actually do with the information.

If an admitted student is worried, they should hire an educational lawyer stat and send all correspondence through him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still do not believe they will rescind any offers. This may be more of a CYA thing.

+100

There are 180-190 kids in the class of 2026 who are “economically disadvantaged” and now have to provide proof of income. (Who know how many on the waitlist?) It’s too big of a problem to fix. How will they (try to) fix it?

1) sweep the problem under the rug. (This is FCPS, so clearly the most likely to happen. Am I right?)

2) recind the offers to those that lied and go to the waitlist. But the waitlist is littered with false “economically disadvantaged”
As well. No way do they go to kids who have already been flat out rejected.

Someone posted earlier that the waitlisted who answered yes received the same letter but I still think admissions will go for option 1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still do not believe they will rescind any offers. This may be more of a CYA thing.

Does anyone else see the absurdity of incentives here? It is a push to show that you make less money and are eligible for government support so that your kids can get into a public magnet school. Rather than focusing on making schools better. It is just a sad and confused society of grifters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is honestly a win-win.

If you answered the question literally and said yes - FCPS is removing the ambiguity and asking you the question again in a clear unambiguous manner. If you qualify, you are good. If you don’t, you are at par with everyone else who does not qualify as it should be. You may still qualify without the points but if you don’t- you miss out on a fair criterion.

If you answered no and felt wronged that others misinterpreted or misrepresented then you should feel good. You are at par with those who erroneously or otherwise answered no. So all is good.

FCPS did not have to create this roundabout process but their incompetence is a story for another day

Agreed - this will get the process much closer to a fair result. I wouldn't go so far as calling it a win-win, though. Still a lot to be desired with the process as a whole. And lots of unnecessary heartbreak for kids who were not admitted at first but later will be or vice versa.

Probably a good life lesson in there.

Life lesson here is to slack and be poor so that the government can give you more freebies or in the least show that you are poor on paper.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is honestly a win-win.

If you answered the question literally and said yes - FCPS is removing the ambiguity and asking you the question again in a clear unambiguous manner. If you qualify, you are good. If you don’t, you are at par with everyone else who does not qualify as it should be. You may still qualify without the points but if you don’t- you miss out on a fair criterion.

If you answered no and felt wronged that others misinterpreted or misrepresented then you should feel good. You are at par with those who erroneously or otherwise answered no. So all is good.

FCPS did not have to create this roundabout process but their incompetence is a story for another day

Agreed - this will get the process much closer to a fair result. I wouldn't go so far as calling it a win-win, though. Still a lot to be desired with the process as a whole. And lots of unnecessary heartbreak for kids who were not admitted at first but later will be or vice versa.

Probably a good life lesson in there.

Life lesson here is to slack and be poor so that the government can give you more freebies or in the least show that you are poor on paper.

I believe the lesson is to not lie on applications.