Blair SMCS Program October 23 info session

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

He said so during the presentation.

A Blair teacher committed that all the current SMCS program offerings would remain through the 4 years the current 8th graders are at Blair?

No he didn’t. He said that they would be guaranteed to complete the program but that if the proposals go through they will almost certainly have to cut the electives offerings in 11th and 12th grade Freon what is offered currently

12th maybe, for the less popular electives, but for 11th they'll have the 12th graders above them to fill the elective classes like always.

10th graders don't take magnet electives.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:What are the 4 schools?

I know three are Blair, Wootton, and Churchill. It was in some slides presented at one of the BOE meetings. I don’t know the fourth.

It’s not like Wootton and Churchill are the closest schools to Blair, suggesting proximity isn’t the main driver of who utilizes the program.

Ah someone posted the data above. The fourth is WJ.

Yet Whitman and BCC are further away and send relatively few kids to the program. BCC and Whitman have more NMSF than the above schools, so it's hard to argue that they're lacking in talent there.

The schools above send many of their MMSF to Blair which is why Blair is typically so well represented. Even saying Blair (which is the biggest high school in the county) is one of the biggest feeders to SMCS is disingenuous. Even with the leg up of anchored slots in the middle school magnets for Takoma Park that feed SMCS, Blair only sends a small group of kids every year (less than 10) per grade (Out of a freshman class of almost 1000) out of the 110 magnet admissions per grade. Hell the county most likely bumped it up from 100 to get the couple of local kids in. Truth is 261 kids from the 5 Ws take up 60% of the total slots and the other 12 High schools only manage 40% combined. That 60/40 split doesn't even take into account it isn't prioritized or pushed at BCC and Whitman where the need to hunt for peer group is minimal and money provides way more access to colleges than any course load in a public school will ever hope to.

Truth is that without that influx of talent into Blair it will fall precipitously in standing and test scores in the new reginal model

The special Blair curriculum does not exist to give kids good PSAT scores. Parents provide their kids test prep independently of school offerings, just as many parents put their kids in MAP test prep to get into Blair.

760 Math before they even enter 9th grade, and 730 verbal definitely isn't coming from listening to audiobooks in English class.

What evidence do you have that all these Blair students took the PSAT before 9th grade and got those scores?

You can impute PSAT scores from MAP scores from that cohort.

No you can't do that. What are you smoking?

Mom, what's a percentile?

Mom, what's it called when someone makes overly simplistic assumptions based on one dataset by mistakenly attributing its characteristics to another dataset?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

*If* implemented as proposed, I think the answer to whether ALL of the electives will still be available would have to be definitely not, right? They've said they're making the program smaller, so that would mean fewer classes. The outstanding question is by how much will the program be shrunk.

Did they say how much they are going to be cutting Blair magnet staffing, and any idea which staff would be cut? Or are they letting Blair SMCS keep their extra staff and just not giving the new ones any extra staff?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

*If* implemented as proposed, I think the answer to whether ALL of the electives will still be available would have to be definitely not, right? They've said they're making the program smaller, so that would mean fewer classes. The outstanding question is by how much will the program be shrunk.

Did they say how much they are going to be cutting Blair magnet staffing, and any idea which staff would be cut? Or are they letting Blair SMCS keep their extra staff and just not giving the new ones any extra staff?

And are they going to try to offer teachers incentives to transfer to e.g. Wooton or Springbook?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

He said so during the presentation.

A Blair teacher committed that all the current SMCS program offerings would remain through the 4 years the current 8th graders are at Blair?

No he didn’t. He said that they would be guaranteed to complete the program but that if the proposals go through they will almost certainly have to cut the electives offerings in 11th and 12th grade Freon what is offered currently

And the program is mostly electives in 11 and 12 so that is a big concern.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

He said so during the presentation.

A Blair teacher committed that all the current SMCS program offerings would remain through the 4 years the current 8th graders are at Blair?

No he didn’t. He said that they would be guaranteed to complete the program but that if the proposals go through they will almost certainly have to cut the electives offerings in 11th and 12th grade Freon what is offered currently

12th maybe, for the less popular electives, but for 11th they'll have the 12th graders above them to fill the elective classes like always.

10th graders don't take magnet electives.

Yes I’m very familiar with the magnet, thanks for pointing out that 10th graders don’t take electives, even though I referenced 11th and 12th only.

Don’t count on “less popular” only being dropped and also remember that some electives are only offered every two years. It will definitely impact them in 11th grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

*If* implemented as proposed, I think the answer to whether ALL of the electives will still be available would have to be definitely not, right? They've said they're making the program smaller, so that would mean fewer classes. The outstanding question is by how much will the program be shrunk.

Did they say how much they are going to be cutting Blair magnet staffing, and any idea which staff would be cut? Or are they letting Blair SMCS keep their extra staff and just not giving the new ones any extra staff?

He did say that some staff had indicated that they’d be interested in moving to a magnet closer to their home. 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:What are the 4 schools?

I know three are Blair, Wootton, and Churchill. It was in some slides presented at one of the BOE meetings. I don’t know the fourth.

It’s not like Wootton and Churchill are the closest schools to Blair, suggesting proximity isn’t the main driver of who utilizes the program.

Ah someone posted the data above. The fourth is WJ.

Yet Whitman and BCC are further away and send relatively few kids to the program. BCC and Whitman have more NMSF than the above schools, so it's hard to argue that they're lacking in talent there.

The schools above send many of their MMSF to Blair which is why Blair is typically so well represented. Even saying Blair (which is the biggest high school in the county) is one of the biggest feeders to SMCS is disingenuous. Even with the leg up of anchored slots in the middle school magnets for Takoma Park that feed SMCS, Blair only sends a small group of kids every year (less than 10) per grade (Out of a freshman class of almost 1000) out of the 110 magnet admissions per grade. Hell the county most likely bumped it up from 100 to get the couple of local kids in. Truth is 261 kids from the 5 Ws take up 60% of the total slots and the other 12 High schools only manage 40% combined. That 60/40 split doesn't even take into account it isn't prioritized or pushed at BCC and Whitman where the need to hunt for peer group is minimal and money provides way more access to colleges than any course load in a public school will ever hope to.

Truth is that without that influx of talent into Blair it will fall precipitously in standing and test scores in the new reginal model

The special Blair curriculum does not exist to give kids good PSAT scores. Parents provide their kids test prep independently of school offerings, just as many parents put their kids in MAP test prep to get into Blair.

760 Math before they even enter 9th grade, and 730 verbal definitely isn't coming from listening to audiobooks in English class.

What evidence do you have that all these Blair students took the PSAT before 9th grade and got those scores?

You can impute PSAT scores from MAP scores from that cohort.

No you can't. Unless you're just making things up. Cite your source.

Sources is personally knowing the NMSF kids at Blair

Yes, you have to be one of the in-crowd already to get this privileged information.

I have an NMSF kid at Blair and PP is just making things up. It never ceases to amaze me that folks in the magnets claim they know every kid in detail and their entire academic history.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

*If* implemented as proposed, I think the answer to whether ALL of the electives will still be available would have to be definitely not, right? They've said they're making the program smaller, so that would mean fewer classes. The outstanding question is by how much will the program be shrunk.

Did they say how much they are going to be cutting Blair magnet staffing, and any idea which staff would be cut? Or are they letting Blair SMCS keep their extra staff and just not giving the new ones any extra staff?

He did say that some staff had indicated that they’d be interested in moving to a magnet closer to their home. Unfortunately

That doesn't surprise me, but as a parent of a freshman in SMCS, it is disappointing that electives that my kid is interested in may no longer be options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

*If* implemented as proposed, I think the answer to whether ALL of the electives will still be available would have to be definitely not, right? They've said they're making the program smaller, so that would mean fewer classes. The outstanding question is by how much will the program be shrunk.

Did they say how much they are going to be cutting Blair magnet staffing, and any idea which staff would be cut? Or are they letting Blair SMCS keep their extra staff and just not giving the new ones any extra staff?

He did say that some staff had indicated that they’d be interested in moving to a magnet closer to their home. Unfortunately

That doesn't surprise me, but as a parent of a freshman in SMCS, it is disappointing that electives that my kid is interested in may no longer be options.

Don’t just be disappointed, fight back! Write emails, testify, organize…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I would imagine the in person demand is part of getting people to grapple with the time and distance. If you can’t show up for a single info session, is this Bery demanding commute going to be something you can manage for your family every weekday?

The "bery" demanding commute isn't as much of an issue since Blair SMCS offers bus service to kids every day. But if you think that part of MCPS admissions to a magnet should be the ability to drive 40 minutes each way for a single hour on a single school night, well, that's your vision of what equity and merit looks like.

+1 They have so many calls that are streamed out--why couldn't they do that for the RMIB and Blair SMCS ones unless they were trying to make it harder for people to get the information? It was particularly striking because they offered the Poolesville info session via email with a virtual link in the same email where they said the Blair session was only in person at Blair.

I don't get why people only seem to be whining about Blair SMCS not having a virtual option. Other than Poolesville, none of the other schools did to my knowledge. We live in East County and my kid is interested in the Whitman program - and the open house would have been a hike for us - but I'm not complaining. We did attend the Blair SMCS OH and honestly most of the time was spent going through those Q&As. If you didn't attend, I don't think you missed much in terms of information for parents. The kids were split into 3 groups and left to have mini-sessions with Blair students where they talked about electives, after-school activities, and stuff 8th graders would be interested in. So, if you didn't go in person, your kid missed that, but in terms of the Q&As there wasn't much substance outside of the slides (he did go into more depth, but again, nothing significant that I can recall).

What is this, demonstrated interest? What if student and/or family sick evening of this gathering?

This was like a kindergarten orientation where prospective students and parents in different rooms

I don't understand your point. Again, almost all the schools did in-person sessions so if the student and/or parent couldn't attend, they would miss it, but at least there was a slide presentation.

I thought separating the kids was a good idea. It was a huge turnout and everyone could barely fit in the auditorium at the beginning. The kids then went to presentations in different rooms which gave them the opportunity to tour the school and see some classrooms. Meanwhile, the parents got to hear from the program director.

Honestly though if you missed this it's NO BIG DEAL at all. We missed a few open houses due to other conflicts (e.g., Montgomery IB). Your kid can still apply to all the programs, and there are open houses in the spring for admitted students.

It's telling that if there is that much interest something is not going right in the other 16+ HS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given that the magnet serves mostly kids from wealthy schools that presumably have advance coursework at their home schools, this seems….like a bad use of taxpayer dollars.

But what exactly is that coursework? If home high school has advanced courses in...say history but student is interested in the courses/sequence/program Blair SMCS offers, shouldn't student try for Blair, if Mcps can't offer "magent" type of program at each HS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

Can you please tell the MAP score of your child? Some say it should be in 300s?

About 350

Is this for real? How do you get a 350 in the 8th grade? Is the student in calculus or higher level?

Not that PP. There is a range of scores. Certainly not 350 to be qualified.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why they can't at least post the slides from *this* year's presentation.

so the person upthread posted slides from last year's Blair presentation? Sigh.

No. The person upthread shared the link that was shared at the presentation. Definitely that link, i just checked.

Yes It is this year’s presentation. Bad news is that it is fairly useless in terms of content

What additional content do you want to know? There are parents on this forum who may be able to help, unless you’re wondering about stuff like potential changes due to the regional programs.

As a parent of a SMCS junior, I can't answer if all the upper-level electives are going to remain selectable for next year's new students. I bet Mr. O doesn't know either.

Can you please tell the MAP score of your child? Some say it should be in 300s?

About 350

Did anyone ask this question during the info session? The DCUM responses are often crazy and seem like other parents trying to scare away applicants

Yep it's actually 370 from last we heard

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the 4 schools?

I know three are Blair, Wootton, and Churchill. It was in some slides presented at one of the BOE meetings. I don’t know the fourth.

It’s not like Wootton and Churchill are the closest schools to Blair, suggesting proximity isn’t the main driver of who utilizes the program.

Ah someone posted the data above. The fourth is WJ.

Yet Whitman and BCC are further away and send relatively few kids to the program. BCC and Whitman have more NMSF than the above schools, so it's hard to argue that they're lacking in talent there.

So why are they paired up with Blair in the new regional proposal…? The county should leave the existing structures in tact AND offer more options at the other high schools.