APS 6th grade pre algebra

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:My kid was in 6th in the 2019-20 school year taking the accelerated 6-7-8 class (this is the class that scrunches three years into one to get ready for Algebra). Then Algebra I intensified was online the next year.

This didn't go well at all. The teachers had to try to teach the missed last quarter of 6-7-8 during algebra and then every other class got behind.

It's very hard to tease out what was pandemic-caused vs poor placement decisions.

But the kids who took 6/7/8 before 19-20 had their compacted year before the pandemic. The current 11th & 12th graders.

Anyway, the more advanced mathy kids still make the cut even with the higher standards - these are the kids who truly need the extra acceleration.

Current 11th and 12th graders were taking a combination of Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 during the virtual years. These courses are the foundation for the advanced classes they are now taking and instruction was unavoidably impaired during virtual learning. These students are having to backfill content while in their advanced courses that was skipped or covered cursorily during virtual learning. Covid had a significant impact on current 11th and 12th graders too.

As to your second point, students that meet nationally accepted definitions of acceleration readiness should be allowed to accelerate. They should not have to surmount artificially inflated thresholds.

A single data point isn’t sufficient determination for acceleration.

Those kids who were appropriately accelerated are doing well now. The pandemic revealed the downsides of accelerating kids who could use more time on the fundamentals. There is no downside for slowing down acceleration for the non-mathy kids. Not every bright kid needs to be multiple years ahead in math.

Pass advanced SOL and a math skill measure (whether MI, IAAT, or other) are the standards for assessing acceleration readiness in NoVa and elsewhere. Test scores are objective measures of readiness.

No. The pandemic revealed how poorly virtual learning served students which is why so many students developed a weaker math foundation that they would have in non-pandemic times.

Each district has different requirements (tests, thresholds) at different points in time. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each test changes/renormalizes periodically (MI in 2019). Thresholds change over time based on a variety of factors. Test changes, classroom performance, standardized testing performance, etc. Placement should also be informed by classroom performance, progress BOY/MOY/EOY, and parent/teacher input.

A higher threshold would support kids who could use more time reviewing foundational skills before jumping into algebra.

FCPS has been using the same threshold for at least 10-15 years; 91+ on IAAT and SOL pass advanced. Other VA districts use similar thresholds. FCPS's approach is transparent and consistent; it is set at the level that they have found leads to student success with acceleration. The constant threshold is also useful in preempting flavor-of-the-day pedagogy from impacting threshold levels.

Ok. Like I said, each district has different requirements. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each of those tests is revised and renormalized periodically. Adjusting thresholds should be expected if they are trying to fine tune placement.

No. FCPS has not adjusted theirs for at least 15 years. APS is the anomaly. And APS has not just adjusted theirs, they have swung it wildly. A better focus would be to look at how districts are readying students to meet the threshold for accelerated math. One reason why FCPS has succeeded with their steady threshold is that they begin acceleration gradually in 3rd grade. In contrast, APS ramps up sharply in 6th grade. APS should use more gradual, earlier acceleration; the focus should be on building downstream readiness instead of ratcheting the threshold around.

You can’t draw any conclusions from FCPS not changing something that has multiple moving parts. Have they ever even considered updating it?

Raising the bar for 2x acceleration will result in better placements.

I do think we need a middle option for 6th grade.

They have a sufficiently high bar to generate good placements as is. They have two parts to their threshold: 91+ IAAT and pass advanced SOL.

If APS’s bar was already “sufficiently high” they wouldn’t need to raise it.

It depends on why they're raising it. Early on, it reflected the problems with how they were implementing the ramped up acceleration in 6th grade. However, the recent threshold increases followed VMPI when there was a pedagogical desire to move toward more heterogenous math classes. Raising the threshold for prealgebra above MI's threshold for Algebra readiness is one way to sharply scale back acceleration and make classes more heterogenous. Thus, raising the threshold is not always motivated solely by performance considerations.

They have already shared that:
- MI data shows that kids are taking higher-level math courses before they reach grade-level proficiency
- AP pass rates for math courses have been below state and national averages

and their goal is to "increase depth and complexity for advanced learners".

Everything isn't some big conspiracy.

The threshold for prealgebra was not set at grade-level proficiency; it was set 1-2 years above grade level proficiency. They effectively said the student needs to already know prealgebra before we let them take prealgebra. That makes no sense. As for AP pass rates versus the state and the US, APS was virtual longer during covid than elsewhere in Virginia and the US which has hurt APS students vis a vis their peers.

This. My kid missed the cut-off for 6th grade pre-algebra by a hair in the fall. The result is that she's been bored in math all year, getting easy As, doing more accelerated math than she gets at school at Mathnasium. The 1-2 years above grade level proficiency system doesn't work well for kids like mine. In Fairfax of Loudoun she would have been on the 1-year acceleration track, so much better.

There should be an intermediate track - math 6/7.

If she’s doing mathnasium and still had borderline scores then maybe it’s good she has more time. But if you truly thought she was going to do well in pre-algebra then you could have parent placed her.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation. The benefit to the high school student, now college students, is that they have seen the material before so it should be a less stressful environment in college. It also reinforces the material which I see a plus for anyone entering into a job that requires hard sciences.

The purposed of accelerated math is to engage kids who need to be engaged. The regular math curriculum is too easy for them and they are bored. By providing the kids with deeper material or moving at a faster pace, the kids are challenged and more engaged. They are less likely to find math boring and develop lazy habits because the math in school is too easy for them. That should help them do better in math as they move into MS and HS.

I'm supportive through Calc BC, but seriously question the high schools that are offering higher level math classes. Those are better taken in college.

If kids are bored, they should diversify and learn an instrument, second language, more advanced science, etc. Don't double down on math just to go faster.

What's your evidence for your belief that the line should be drawn at calc BC in highschool and anything beyond is better studied in college? What about statistics?

[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:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

[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:My kid was in 6th in the 2019-20 school year taking the accelerated 6-7-8 class (this is the class that scrunches three years into one to get ready for Algebra). Then Algebra I intensified was online the next year.

This didn't go well at all. The teachers had to try to teach the missed last quarter of 6-7-8 during algebra and then every other class got behind.

It's very hard to tease out what was pandemic-caused vs poor placement decisions.

But the kids who took 6/7/8 before 19-20 had their compacted year before the pandemic. The current 11th & 12th graders.

Anyway, the more advanced mathy kids still make the cut even with the higher standards - these are the kids who truly need the extra acceleration.

Current 11th and 12th graders were taking a combination of Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 during the virtual years. These courses are the foundation for the advanced classes they are now taking and instruction was unavoidably impaired during virtual learning. These students are having to backfill content while in their advanced courses that was skipped or covered cursorily during virtual learning. Covid had a significant impact on current 11th and 12th graders too.

As to your second point, students that meet nationally accepted definitions of acceleration readiness should be allowed to accelerate. They should not have to surmount artificially inflated thresholds.

A single data point isn’t sufficient determination for acceleration.

Those kids who were appropriately accelerated are doing well now. The pandemic revealed the downsides of accelerating kids who could use more time on the fundamentals. There is no downside for slowing down acceleration for the non-mathy kids. Not every bright kid needs to be multiple years ahead in math.

Pass advanced SOL and a math skill measure (whether MI, IAAT, or other) are the standards for assessing acceleration readiness in NoVa and elsewhere. Test scores are objective measures of readiness.

No. The pandemic revealed how poorly virtual learning served students which is why so many students developed a weaker math foundation that they would have in non-pandemic times.

Each district has different requirements (tests, thresholds) at different points in time. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each test changes/renormalizes periodically (MI in 2019). Thresholds change over time based on a variety of factors. Test changes, classroom performance, standardized testing performance, etc. Placement should also be informed by classroom performance, progress BOY/MOY/EOY, and parent/teacher input.

A higher threshold would support kids who could use more time reviewing foundational skills before jumping into algebra.

FCPS has been using the same threshold for at least 10-15 years; 91+ on IAAT and SOL pass advanced. Other VA districts use similar thresholds. FCPS's approach is transparent and consistent; it is set at the level that they have found leads to student success with acceleration. The constant threshold is also useful in preempting flavor-of-the-day pedagogy from impacting threshold levels.

Ok. Like I said, each district has different requirements. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each of those tests is revised and renormalized periodically. Adjusting thresholds should be expected if they are trying to fine tune placement.

No. FCPS has not adjusted theirs for at least 15 years. APS is the anomaly. And APS has not just adjusted theirs, they have swung it wildly. A better focus would be to look at how districts are readying students to meet the threshold for accelerated math. One reason why FCPS has succeeded with their steady threshold is that they begin acceleration gradually in 3rd grade. In contrast, APS ramps up sharply in 6th grade. APS should use more gradual, earlier acceleration; the focus should be on building downstream readiness instead of ratcheting the threshold around.

You can’t draw any conclusions from FCPS not changing something that has multiple moving parts. Have they ever even considered updating it?

Raising the bar for 2x acceleration will result in better placements.

I do think we need a middle option for 6th grade.

They have a sufficiently high bar to generate good placements as is. They have two parts to their threshold: 91+ IAAT and pass advanced SOL.

If APS’s bar was already “sufficiently high” they wouldn’t need to raise it.

It depends on why they're raising it. Early on, it reflected the problems with how they were implementing the ramped up acceleration in 6th grade. However, the recent threshold increases followed VMPI when there was a pedagogical desire to move toward more heterogenous math classes. Raising the threshold for prealgebra above MI's threshold for Algebra readiness is one way to sharply scale back acceleration and make classes more heterogenous. Thus, raising the threshold is not always motivated solely by performance considerations.

They have already shared that:
- MI data shows that kids are taking higher-level math courses before they reach grade-level proficiency
- AP pass rates for math courses have been below state and national averages

and their goal is to "increase depth and complexity for advanced learners".

Everything isn't some big conspiracy.

The threshold for prealgebra was not set at grade-level proficiency; it was set 1-2 years above grade level proficiency. They effectively said the student needs to already know prealgebra before we let them take prealgebra. That makes no sense. As for AP pass rates versus the state and the US, APS was virtual longer during covid than elsewhere in Virginia and the US which has hurt APS students vis a vis their peers.

This. My kid missed the cut-off for 6th grade pre-algebra by a hair in the fall. The result is that she's been bored in math all year, getting easy As, doing more accelerated math than she gets at school at Mathnasium. The 1-2 years above grade level proficiency system doesn't work well for kids like mine. In Fairfax of Loudoun she would have been on the 1-year acceleration track, so much better.

There should be an intermediate track - math 6/7.

If she’s doing mathnasium and still had borderline scores then maybe it’s good she has more time. But if you truly thought she was going to do well in pre-algebra then you could have parent placed her.

The fact that the test standards falsely labelled a student who would have been much better served with prealgebra and is bored out of her mind in math 6 as "borderline" is proof that they're incredibly inappropriate. It's like requiring kids to have a 5 on the calc BC exam in junior year in order to take calculus AB as a senior, and putting them in precalculus if they can't.

[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:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation. The benefit to the high school student, now college students, is that they have seen the material before so it should be a less stressful environment in college. It also reinforces the material which I see a plus for anyone entering into a job that requires hard sciences.

The purposed of accelerated math is to engage kids who need to be engaged. The regular math curriculum is too easy for them and they are bored. By providing the kids with deeper material or moving at a faster pace, the kids are challenged and more engaged. They are less likely to find math boring and develop lazy habits because the math in school is too easy for them. That should help them do better in math as they move into MS and HS.

I'm supportive through Calc BC, but seriously question the high schools that are offering higher level math classes. Those are better taken in college.

If kids are bored, they should diversify and learn an instrument, second language, more advanced science, etc. Don't double down on math just to go faster.

What's your evidence for your belief that the line should be drawn at calc BC in highschool and anything beyond is better studied in college? What about statistics?

I get the sense that you've never taken these math or science classes and just have no idea what you're talking about. Statistics isn't the in the calc sequence (Calc 1, 2, 3, Diff Eq, etc).

My experience is having taken advanced math alongside advanced science in college and realized how much better my understanding was when I took the classes together. Several engineers have agreed with me on this thread.

I don't know why you are so convinced that high schools are properly equipped to teach advanced college level math classes or why you don't think it's helpful to take them with the corresponding science and engineering classes that reinforce the math. It is a race to nowhere and there are big drawbacks to taking these math classes years before you can put them to use.

[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:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

Lots of engineering schools do ask students to retake the calc sequence in college. It's taught at a deeper and more theoretical level than what's offered in Calc BC. And this is a great thing for engineering students who really need to know this math backwards and forwards and at a deep level.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:My kid was in 6th in the 2019-20 school year taking the accelerated 6-7-8 class (this is the class that scrunches three years into one to get ready for Algebra). Then Algebra I intensified was online the next year.

This didn't go well at all. The teachers had to try to teach the missed last quarter of 6-7-8 during algebra and then every other class got behind.

It's very hard to tease out what was pandemic-caused vs poor placement decisions.

But the kids who took 6/7/8 before 19-20 had their compacted year before the pandemic. The current 11th & 12th graders.

Anyway, the more advanced mathy kids still make the cut even with the higher standards - these are the kids who truly need the extra acceleration.

Current 11th and 12th graders were taking a combination of Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 during the virtual years. These courses are the foundation for the advanced classes they are now taking and instruction was unavoidably impaired during virtual learning. These students are having to backfill content while in their advanced courses that was skipped or covered cursorily during virtual learning. Covid had a significant impact on current 11th and 12th graders too.

As to your second point, students that meet nationally accepted definitions of acceleration readiness should be allowed to accelerate. They should not have to surmount artificially inflated thresholds.

A single data point isn’t sufficient determination for acceleration.

Those kids who were appropriately accelerated are doing well now. The pandemic revealed the downsides of accelerating kids who could use more time on the fundamentals. There is no downside for slowing down acceleration for the non-mathy kids. Not every bright kid needs to be multiple years ahead in math.

Pass advanced SOL and a math skill measure (whether MI, IAAT, or other) are the standards for assessing acceleration readiness in NoVa and elsewhere. Test scores are objective measures of readiness.

No. The pandemic revealed how poorly virtual learning served students which is why so many students developed a weaker math foundation that they would have in non-pandemic times.

Each district has different requirements (tests, thresholds) at different points in time. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each test changes/renormalizes periodically (MI in 2019). Thresholds change over time based on a variety of factors. Test changes, classroom performance, standardized testing performance, etc. Placement should also be informed by classroom performance, progress BOY/MOY/EOY, and parent/teacher input.

A higher threshold would support kids who could use more time reviewing foundational skills before jumping into algebra.

FCPS has been using the same threshold for at least 10-15 years; 91+ on IAAT and SOL pass advanced. Other VA districts use similar thresholds. FCPS's approach is transparent and consistent; it is set at the level that they have found leads to student success with acceleration. The constant threshold is also useful in preempting flavor-of-the-day pedagogy from impacting threshold levels.

Ok. Like I said, each district has different requirements. There isn’t a universal threshold for placement. And each of those tests is revised and renormalized periodically. Adjusting thresholds should be expected if they are trying to fine tune placement.

No. FCPS has not adjusted theirs for at least 15 years. APS is the anomaly. And APS has not just adjusted theirs, they have swung it wildly. A better focus would be to look at how districts are readying students to meet the threshold for accelerated math. One reason why FCPS has succeeded with their steady threshold is that they begin acceleration gradually in 3rd grade. In contrast, APS ramps up sharply in 6th grade. APS should use more gradual, earlier acceleration; the focus should be on building downstream readiness instead of ratcheting the threshold around.

You can’t draw any conclusions from FCPS not changing something that has multiple moving parts. Have they ever even considered updating it?

Raising the bar for 2x acceleration will result in better placements.

I do think we need a middle option for 6th grade.

They have a sufficiently high bar to generate good placements as is. They have two parts to their threshold: 91+ IAAT and pass advanced SOL.

If APS’s bar was already “sufficiently high” they wouldn’t need to raise it.

It depends on why they're raising it. Early on, it reflected the problems with how they were implementing the ramped up acceleration in 6th grade. However, the recent threshold increases followed VMPI when there was a pedagogical desire to move toward more heterogenous math classes. Raising the threshold for prealgebra above MI's threshold for Algebra readiness is one way to sharply scale back acceleration and make classes more heterogenous. Thus, raising the threshold is not always motivated solely by performance considerations.

They have already shared that:
- MI data shows that kids are taking higher-level math courses before they reach grade-level proficiency
- AP pass rates for math courses have been below state and national averages

and their goal is to "increase depth and complexity for advanced learners".

Everything isn't some big conspiracy.

The threshold for prealgebra was not set at grade-level proficiency; it was set 1-2 years above grade level proficiency. They effectively said the student needs to already know prealgebra before we let them take prealgebra. That makes no sense. As for AP pass rates versus the state and the US, APS was virtual longer during covid than elsewhere in Virginia and the US which has hurt APS students vis a vis their peers.

This. My kid missed the cut-off for 6th grade pre-algebra by a hair in the fall. The result is that she's been bored in math all year, getting easy As, doing more accelerated math than she gets at school at Mathnasium. The 1-2 years above grade level proficiency system doesn't work well for kids like mine. In Fairfax of Loudoun she would have been on the 1-year acceleration track, so much better.

There should be an intermediate track - math 6/7.

If she’s doing mathnasium and still had borderline scores then maybe it’s good she has more time. But if you truly thought she was going to do well in pre-algebra then you could have parent placed her.

The fact that the test standards falsely labelled a student who would have been much better served with prealgebra and is bored out of her mind in math 6 as "borderline" is proof that they're incredibly inappropriate. It's like requiring kids to have a 5 on the calc BC exam in junior year in order to take calculus AB as a senior, and putting them in precalculus if they can't.

Lots of middle schoolers are “bored out of their mind” at school even when appropriately challenged.

[Anonymous]

I don't see why it's a bad thing for kids to be accelerated in high school AND retake math later for concept reinforcement. I was parent-placed a million years ago, got a 5 in BC Calc in 11th, took multivariate and diff eq in 12th, and then took multivariate and linear algebra later in college. I'm not in a STEM career, so I guess it was a "race to nowhere," but I loved my high school math classes and my peer group. There are lots of reasons to learn and enjoy math, and I'm excited to have an excuse to relearn it with my kids.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation. The benefit to the high school student, now college students, is that they have seen the material before so it should be a less stressful environment in college. It also reinforces the material which I see a plus for anyone entering into a job that requires hard sciences.

The purposed of accelerated math is to engage kids who need to be engaged. The regular math curriculum is too easy for them and they are bored. By providing the kids with deeper material or moving at a faster pace, the kids are challenged and more engaged. They are less likely to find math boring and develop lazy habits because the math in school is too easy for them. That should help them do better in math as they move into MS and HS.

I'm supportive through Calc BC, but seriously question the high schools that are offering higher level math classes. Those are better taken in college.

If kids are bored, they should diversify and learn an instrument, second language, more advanced science, etc. Don't double down on math just to go faster.

What's your evidence for your belief that the line should be drawn at calc BC in highschool and anything beyond is better studied in college? What about statistics?

I get the sense that you've never taken these math or science classes and just have no idea what you're talking about. Statistics isn't the in the calc sequence (Calc 1, 2, 3, Diff Eq, etc).

My experience is having taken advanced math alongside advanced science in college and realized how much better my understanding was when I took the classes together. Several engineers have agreed with me on this thread.

I don't know why you are so convinced that high schools are properly equipped to teach advanced college level math classes or why you don't think it's helpful to take them with the corresponding science and engineering classes that reinforce the math. It is a race to nowhere and there are big drawbacks to taking these math classes years before you can put them to use.

Believing that Calc 1 is "college-level" math is a very US-centric point of view, and myopic at that.
In all other civilized countries, Calc I is considered a prerequisite for even attending a university (not for majoring in STEM). We're not talking about math kids, it's considered part of pre-university training.
The US calls it "college level" to make people like you feel good (I'm guessing.) It firmly belongs in 11/12th grade for anyone wanting to pursue postsecondary education.
Only Calc 2 and higher is internationally considered university level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

Please read
Virginia Tech AP Credits.
A 3 in Calculus BC automatically gives you credit for Math 1225, and a 4 or 5 for Math 1226. Now look at, for instance, the CS Majors Checksheet which lists Math 1225 and Math 1226 as courses otherwise requires in your first semester.
If you come in with credit for these, you have 2 open slots in your schedule, allowing you take higher-level math courses, double-major, or graduate early.
There's real advantages to that. I see first hand the difference between students who have to catch up on calculus I in college and those who are ready to take (real) college-level classes.

Tech is just one local example. Every university publishes these rules. Check UVA, for instance.
Or MIT.

[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:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

Please read
Virginia Tech AP Credits.
A 3 in Calculus BC automatically gives you credit for Math 1225, and a 4 or 5 for Math 1226. Now look at, for instance, the CS Majors Checksheet which lists Math 1225 and Math 1226 as courses otherwise requires in your first semester.
If you come in with credit for these, you have 2 open slots in your schedule, allowing you take higher-level math courses, double-major, or graduate early.
There's real advantages to that. I see first hand the difference between students who have to catch up on calculus I in college and those who are ready to take (real) college-level classes.

Tech is just one local example. Every university publishes these rules. Check UVA, for instance.
Or MIT.

And yet I know people who passed the Calc AP exam and ended up retaking Calc at some of those University because of their scores on the placement tests that they took. I also know people who earned credits in LA who ended up taking the intro level classes based on placement exam results. Maybe kids could choose not to retake those classes but the ones I know did not take that path. And yes, I know people who have attended Cal Tech and MIT and Northwestern so this is not thoughts out of a vacuum.

I have no problem with kids taking Calc BC or Multivariate and similar classes in HS if they are capable of doing those classes and they want to take them. I appreciate that the option is there. I don't think that it is a guarantee that they will skip those classes in college, regardless of what is written on the websites. I am sure some do and do just fine. I am sure some do and struggle in the college level math classes because their foundation isn't as strong as they think. Kind of like any other subject that students take in collee. Most of us went figuring that we were prepared and found that there were areas that we needed to strengthen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

I never said you said your understanding is perfect, but given that you insist on something I've already disproven (It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test), it seems you really do believe your beliefs are above being updated in light of new evidence.

[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:

Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

Please read
Virginia Tech AP Credits.
A 3 in Calculus BC automatically gives you credit for Math 1225, and a 4 or 5 for Math 1226. Now look at, for instance, the CS Majors Checksheet which lists Math 1225 and Math 1226 as courses otherwise requires in your first semester.
If you come in with credit for these, you have 2 open slots in your schedule, allowing you take higher-level math courses, double-major, or graduate early.
There's real advantages to that. I see first hand the difference between students who have to catch up on calculus I in college and those who are ready to take (real) college-level classes.

Tech is just one local example. Every university publishes these rules. Check UVA, for instance.
Or MIT.

And yet I know people who passed the Calc AP exam and ended up retaking Calc at some of those University because of their scores on the placement tests that they took. I also know people who earned credits in LA who ended up taking the intro level classes based on placement exam results. Maybe kids could choose not to retake those classes but the ones I know did not take that path. And yes, I know people who have attended Cal Tech and MIT and Northwestern so this is not thoughts out of a vacuum.

I have no problem with kids taking Calc BC or Multivariate and similar classes in HS if they are capable of doing those classes and they want to take them. I appreciate that the option is there. I don't think that it is a guarantee that they will skip those classes in college, regardless of what is written on the websites. I am sure some do and do just fine. I am sure some do and struggle in the college level math classes because their foundation isn't as strong as they think. Kind of like any other subject that students take in collee. Most of us went figuring that we were prepared and found that there were areas that we needed to strengthen.

of course MIT and Caltech have high standards for transferring in course credit.

It's ridiculous to imply that taking advanced math before college hurt these students; on the contrary they likely had a much easier time in these classes than students who were exposed to the material for the first time.

[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:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Shouldn't be too hard to look back over many years of acceleration and see the results for these students, broken down by the performance on entrance tests to this pathway, SOL, MAP, COGAT, grades, etc.

SOL data is public. The 7th grade accelerated cohort has much stronger SOL performance in Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 than the 8th or 9th grade Algebra 1 cohorts.

Obviously, there are many kids who should be accelerated 2 years and comparing the average test scores of those three populations would reflect that. The question is teasing out which kids (at the bottom of that cohort) would have been better served with just 1 year acceleration.

What % of those kids struggling is acceptable? How much would they benefit by getting another year of foundation skills?

The objective of raising the bar for placement is to improve outcomes for the kids on the cusp, which should theoretically increase SOL performance for two of the groups (7th & 8th Algebra 1).

There's also the issue of teasing out which 8th grade algebra 1 students (at the top of the distribution) would have been better served with 2 years of acceleration, and which 7th grade algebra 1 students (at the middle to top of the distribution) would have been better served with 3 or more years of acceleration.

3 + years should be the rare exception.

Why? Given how much better 7th grade algebra 1 students do than 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students, it's clear that many of them likely would have been at least as successful as 9th or 8th grade algebra 1 students had they taken algebra 1 in 6th instead.

Aside from the true math prodigies there is very little benefit. Race to nowhere.

What's a "true math prodigy"? If you acknowledge there's at least a little benefit (which I think is false given the significant differences in achievement between accelerated and non-accelerated students), why do you use the phrase "race to nowhere" which falsely implies there being no benefit?

The Young Sheldons. (Shout out to Arlington native, Iain Armitage!)

It’s a race to nowhere for 99% of the kids.

Ideally, we want to maximize the pass rate for kids. Pushing some kids to a 3rd year of acceleration would bring down the pass rate for the 3x and 2x acceleration cohorts. And there is no real benefit for 3x acceleration for 99% of the kids.

If you really wanted to maximize the pass rate, you would force all students to repeat algebra 1 throughout high school (or even repeat first grade math through all 12 years of school). This would give a much higher pass rate. Obviously, the pass rate is not the most important metric.

I think the goal for these “accelerated kids” should be the number of 5s on the AP BC Calc exam.

Then force everyone to take it senior or junior year, and delay graduation for as long as legally possible (20 years old in VA) forcing them to repeat BC each year and only taking the exam the last year. Once again, this is not done because that is not the goal.

Yikes, hyperbole much?

The question is how do we figure out which kids to accelerate in 6th grade. I believe we are accelerating too many kids. I suspect those accelerated kids—despite being excellent math students—are not performing “excellently” on Junior year BC calculus. I suspect if we gave them another year, they’d do much better. We’d be preparing them better for college. I think we need to examine how well the accelerated kids perform years later when we harm them by accelerating them.

Seniors taking BC calc would also do better if given an extra year. The question is whether that is useful in the long run. This has been studied extensively, and the research is overwhelmingly in favor of acceleration. (Read A nation empowered)

Except there are almost no practical advantages of taking BC calc in jr year vs sr year. It’s a race to nowhere.

Why does there have to be an advantage? Some kids are good at math and appreciate being challenged. The acceleration is supposed ot be for those kids. There are kids who enjoy math competitions and the like. Kids can choose to take Calc A/B if they want. Plenty of kids don't take Calculus at all. There is nothing wrong with providing courses for kids who are really good at the subject or want to move faster.

FCPS ends up with a small percentage of kids in Algebra 1 in 7th grade.

The downside is that the math is being taken out of sync with the corresponding science or engineering course work that applies that math.

As I understand it, many engineering schools require students retake the calculus they took in high school to make sure that all of the students have a strong foundation.

This is false. Even MIT gives credit for calculus BC, as do other engineering schools

I never said my understanding is perfect. As I understand it, students take math placement tests when they arrive at college. They need to hit a certain score on those tests in order to skip specific classes in college. It is not an automatic out placement because you scored a certain level on the AP Test. My kid is on the advanced math track in FCPS. We are waiting on his IAAT scores to see if he will have a shot at Algebra 1 in 7th, so he is on the track for Calc BC as a Junior. He enjoys math and wishes the math at school would be more challenging, at the same time, he knows plenty of his classmates do not find the math at school easy. If he can skip some math in college, fine. If not, fine. I prefer he be in classes that are challenging him at school. I suspect that college versions of the same class will reinforce what he learned in HS and probably touch on somethings he was not exposed to.

Please read
Virginia Tech AP Credits.
A 3 in Calculus BC automatically gives you credit for Math 1225, and a 4 or 5 for Math 1226. Now look at, for instance, the CS Majors Checksheet which lists Math 1225 and Math 1226 as courses otherwise requires in your first semester.
If you come in with credit for these, you have 2 open slots in your schedule, allowing you take higher-level math courses, double-major, or graduate early.
There's real advantages to that. I see first hand the difference between students who have to catch up on calculus I in college and those who are ready to take (real) college-level classes.

Tech is just one local example. Every university publishes these rules. Check UVA, for instance.
Or MIT.

And yet I know people who passed the Calc AP exam and ended up retaking Calc at some of those University because of their scores on the placement tests that they took. I also know people who earned credits in LA who ended up taking the intro level classes based on placement exam results. Maybe kids could choose not to retake those classes but the ones I know did not take that path. And yes, I know people who have attended Cal Tech and MIT and Northwestern so this is not thoughts out of a vacuum.

I have no problem with kids taking Calc BC or Multivariate and similar classes in HS if they are capable of doing those classes and they want to take them. I appreciate that the option is there. I don't think that it is a guarantee that they will skip those classes in college, regardless of what is written on the websites. I am sure some do and do just fine. I am sure some do and struggle in the college level math classes because their foundation isn't as strong as they think. Kind of like any other subject that students take in collee. Most of us went figuring that we were prepared and found that there were areas that we needed to strengthen.

of course MIT and Caltech have high standards for transferring in course credit.

It's ridiculous to imply that taking advanced math before college hurt these students; on the contrary they likely had a much easier time in these classes than students who were exposed to the material for the first time.

DP Agree. Studies have shown that students retaking calculus in college receive higher grades than those taking it for the first time and that comparison does not include students taking it for the first time that struggled and dropped the course.