If you kid is studying at Williams/Amherst/Pomona/Swarthmore/Wellesley/Bowdoin now,

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Big 3 big shit. No comparison to Blair Magnet. My kids worked hard at the latter and are breezing through Swarthmore and Amherst. Both double majors Engineering or Biophysics + Economics. Both athletes all years and team captains both high school and college. They worked hard in high school and college; however, acknowledged the high leg up the received from a nurturing home and in public high school. What's this Big 3 nonsense!

Calm down, Lauren. Nobody is saying that your precious and perfect children missed out on even the tiniest shred of advantage by going to Blair Magnet. You can sleep tonight.

Hahaha if it meant you really know this mom bc she listed her kids’ schools it’d be hilarious! Hahaha you shared too much detail Lauren!

[Anonymous]

Ok…I assume higher level classes cancel
out lower level…so AB and BC is just one and clearly BC was easier since you took a year of AB. Physics C cancels earlier Physics.

AP HUG and Art History are pointless. Applications also doesn’t count for much.

So it’s 15 APs that mattered which is still imprawive, but I can’t imagine your magnet was forcing you to take the bogus APs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

[Anonymous]

DC goes to one of these colleges, and said repeatedly during their first year that it was so easy compared to [name of fancy private HS.] Grades aren't released yet, but I got the heads from DC that they're likely not so great (3.0 ish at best) - so pride does come before a fall. I hope they learned their lesson. Glad it happened early and hope they re-set expectations or workload.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

That’s true. Math, Chem, English, History, and Philosophy also had a reputation for being very difficult. Tutorials were super challenging (but equally rewarding) no matter the subject!

[Anonymous]

10pages and not one commenter considered that maybe OP’s daughter isn’t a reliable narrator.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Four classes, none of which are STEM, are typically not overwhelming. My guess is that your dd’s high school was not particularly rigorous and it will take her a a semester or two to catch up, just be patient and support her, she’ll figure it out.

I don’t think that’s the driver here.

I think her course mix is. She’s in too many courses with heavy reading and writing loads at once.

I never had this issue as I was Econ (weekly problem sets), a core class, my foreign language (daily classes, weekly tests), and a for language lit or linguistics class (10 or 20 page essays due each month, plus discuss a different book every ten days).

Next semester she should try to get the class syllabus and mix up the type of homework, essay deadlines, and test dates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a colossal reading load in college but learned to read parts closely / skim others / not read parts at all, and I notice that my kid (freshman at a SLAC) doesn’t have those gears yet. It’s a crucial skill in the humanities.

This. Also, my DC who's an English/Poli Sci major has learned to make sure at least one class every semester is less reading-heavy.

I went to one of these schools (but I’m 30s now) and was going to post to this effect. Both my rather intense boarding school high school and my LAC had reading that was near impossible to do in full - but I got good at prioritization. My grades improved most my last two years after major specialization really was underway and graduated with high honors etc

Great point.

Get a study group. Divvy up the work, share notes and discuss main themes. Stem and maths majors do this too. Nothing is worse than spinning your wheels by yourself.

Of course if you need to write your own angle for a paper on a book, study groups can be all group think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

2/3 of those were required and CSA, I don’t know what principles is. Art history was de facto required as something like 90% of students took it at some point

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

That’s true. Math, Chem, English, History, and Philosophy also had a reputation for being very difficult. Tutorials were super challenging (but equally rewarding) no matter the subject!

Yes, it’s always fun talking to people from non-lacs and relaying that history was one of, if not the hardest majors at my college too. First semester did an upper level history seminar and got destroyed in the process, but it was a good class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

Strange AP Euro history is 10th for our school AP bio usually jr. year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

That’s true. Math, Chem, English, History, and Philosophy also had a reputation for being very difficult. Tutorials were super challenging (but equally rewarding) no matter the subject!

Yes, it’s always fun talking to people from non-lacs and relaying that history was one of, if not the hardest majors at my college too. First semester did an upper level history seminar and got destroyed in the process, but it was a good class

My niece that is now a doctor (Hopkins) struggled in AP History. Always cited history as her toughest courses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree. SLACS were simply larger boarding schools. However, for my colleagues at the larger Phillip Academies in Exeter, NH and Andover, MA, some SLACs became too small too soon in their collegiate experience.

Yeah- those kids head to Ivies unless they didn’t get in or playing a sport elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

Strange AP Euro history is 10th for our school AP bio usually jr. year

The history classes tend to bounce around depending on where you’re from. Some schools have freshman year APUSH, and that’s the hardest history exam.

Mine was a senior course, because the teacher had a PhD in it and taught in intense detail, 100s of years of extra content, and made you speed through 30 or more books. Euro as an exam is easy, but that class is harder than my current senior level seminar classes.