Luther Jackson or Thoreau?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where would one find that a teacher is AAP certified? Vdoe licensure site showed elementary teachers having a gifted endorsement but none of the Jackson teachers my kid had for two years had that endorsement. They're all licensed, and I'm sure they've gone through additional fcps training. im curious about specialized gifted education training, given how much discussion there is about the robustness of the program with regards to differentiation. This is not a criticism of the teachers, just looking for facts to verify PP's claim that most teachers have extra certification for AAP

AAP teachers have 3 or 4 years to get the certification so many teachers teach for years without it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What? The AAP kids are in core subjects with AAP kids. The teachers are not AAP only teachers, but all or almost all ar AAP certified. AAP kids have always been in core with AAP only kids. That has never changed!

Yes, the teams are mixed, but the core classes are not.

For example, 8th grade may have teams A, B, and C. Team A will have an English teacher who teaches sections of regular, honors, and AAP English. Each class will only include kids who are taking that level of English (so the AAP English class will include only AAP-identified students), and will only include kids from Team A. Any PE class will be made up of kids from Team A only (IIRC), regardless of which level they take for the academic classes.

Team B's AAP kids will have a different English teacher, etc.

[Anonymous]

I wouldnt ask a forum but the aap coordinator and the school counselors. If you want they will give you the syllabus of classes and yiu can compare. They were really nice when i asked

That being said i was told there is a difference. Lj is a center
Thoreau is not. The curriculum are not the same and lj may have differences including more project work and the tests expectations of what is tested is more difficult

However from exact class teacher in one to another it may not be true. There could be variances

Its more of
Lj - slightly higher rigor, more diversity, more aap kids
Th-125 aap kids, slightly less rigorous, more potential to know kids at hs (madison),shiny desks, less diverse

It depends where u live. Thoreau and lj are actually not far from each other and getting to lj is faster sometimes for us

[Anonymous]

fwiw, Thoreau is definitely not going to become a center in the next few years. It has about 100 kids in each aap grade this year. not sure they know how many they will have next year. To some extent, the severe over-crowding at LJMS may have the effect of encouraging Thoreau-zoned aap kids to stay at Thoreau.

LJMS is expecting 1600 kids next fall --which makes it severely overcrowded, while TMS is expecting 950 - which is still about 400 undercapacity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:fwiw, Thoreau is definitely not going to become a center in the next few years. It has about 100 kids in each aap grade this year. not sure they know how many they will have next year. To some extent, the severe over-crowding at LJMS may have the effect of encouraging Thoreau-zoned aap kids to stay at Thoreau.

LJMS is expecting 1600 kids next fall --which makes it severely overcrowded, while TMS is expecting 950 - which is still about 400 undercapacity.

By taking away the option for Thoreau students to go to LJ for aap, the will transfer about120 kids to thoreau (60 in 7, and 60 in 8).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:fwiw, Thoreau is definitely not going to become a center in the next few years. It has about 100 kids in each aap grade this year. not sure they know how many they will have next year. To some extent, the severe over-crowding at LJMS may have the effect of encouraging Thoreau-zoned aap kids to stay at Thoreau.

LJMS is expecting 1600 kids next fall --which makes it severely overcrowded, while TMS is expecting 950 - which is still about 400 undercapacity.

1600?!? Are they adding more trailers? The hallways, cafeteria, etc cannot take it. The overcrowding has a very negative impact. I think people who have a choice need to look seriously at Thoreau though I do hear reports of low academic standards and social pressures. I was so ready to be done with Luther Jackson, middle school is hard anywhere, but LJMS was very far from a wholesome experience. If I could do it over, I would look at private schools for 7-12.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:fwiw, Thoreau is definitely not going to become a center in the next few years. It has about 100 kids in each aap grade this year. not sure they know how many they will have next year. To some extent, the severe over-crowding at LJMS may have the effect of encouraging Thoreau-zoned aap kids to stay at Thoreau.

LJMS is expecting 1600 kids next fall --which makes it severely overcrowded, while TMS is expecting 950 - which is still about 400 undercapacity.

By taking away the option for Thoreau students to go to LJ for aap, the will transfer about120 kids to thoreau (60 in 7, and 60 in 8).

Actually, it's more like 45-50 kids per grade. I checked the most recent transfer reports.

That said, there is NO plan to remove the LJMS center option in the coming years. Whether the transfer numbers (45-50) go down b/c people want to avoid the crowding at LJMS, I don't know. This coming school year will be an indication for that. The coming year at LJMS will be the worst of the crowding probably b/c in fall 2018, some of the kids (non-aap) who are zoned for LJMS near Oakton HS will be re-zoned to Thoreau as their required MS. That will take *some* pressure off of LJMS, but probably not 400-500 kids worth. Probably more in the range of 100 kids (at most). But, the bottom line is that (1) LJMS is severely over crowded, (2) Thoreau is not going to be a center, and therefore (3) Thoreau based AAP kids will still have the option to to to LJMS.

FWIW, it appears that 2 out of 3 Thoreau-zoned AAP kids have chosen to stay at Thoreau this current year (they have 100 in the 7th grade class, and there are about 50 kids who chose LJMS for the center). There must be something 2/3rds of the AAP people like about Thoreau.

[Anonymous]

I agree with the 2/3. I think Thoreau should be the default unless a parent has a real reason to go to LJ.

[Anonymous]

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it but one from talking to a kid who did AAP at LJ instead of Thoreau, LJ has a serious drug problem, not just pot but this kid said that a girl in her locker block got busted for heroin. LJ is also much rougher with more fights and discipline problems. Those may not directly affect your child in the AAP classrooms but it's something they'll still have to deal with at the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it but one from talking to a kid who did AAP at LJ instead of Thoreau, LJ has a serious drug problem, not just pot but this kid said that a girl in her locker block got busted for heroin. LJ is also much rougher with more fights and discipline problems. Those may not directly affect your child in the AAP classrooms but it's something they'll still have to deal with at the school.

I don't believe this. I hope that there would not be a serious drug problem at any middle school, but if there was I would want to know. I'm at LJ every day and have not heard anything about this. This seems like a nasty rumor and not credible in my opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it but one from talking to a kid who did AAP at LJ instead of Thoreau, LJ has a serious drug problem, not just pot but this kid said that a girl in her locker block got busted for heroin. LJ is also much rougher with more fights and discipline problems. Those may not directly affect your child in the AAP classrooms but it's something they'll still have to deal with at the school.

I don't believe this. I hope that there would not be a serious drug problem at any middle school, but if there was I would want to know. I'm at LJ every day and have not heard anything about this. This seems like a nasty rumor and not credible in my opinion.

The kids talk about a drug problem. But, I have not heard of it from anyone else.

[Anonymous]

Reviving this thread since the Thoreau vs Jackson talk is on another thread. The last post on this thread mentioned a drug problem at LJ. If you look at the incident reports of both schools, LJ has quite a LOT. 7 incidents of weapons last year?

[Anonymous]

Thoreau has a TPT-like problem. Tons of bullying, too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thoreau has a TPT-like problem. Tons of bullying, too.

What is TPT? Bullying in AAP or everywhere?

[Anonymous]

Don't know what TPT is, but my child goes to TMS and has not experienced any bullying. Dc is the type who you might expect to be bullied b/c dc is not into clothes/appearance and doesn't have a lot of friends (introverted). Dc does not see what PP claims is a big problem. Dc has friends in both reg and aap. I have been in the lunch room and on various field trips. I have not seen anything like bullying (not to say that my observations are the last word).

Just saying that what bullying there may be is not routinely observed. In addition, my experience with principal and counselors is that they would be active in addressing bullying. I would expect bullying happens everywhere. But it is not the norm.