High school magnet test

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is the latest on HS Criteria Magnet programs

This year’s Pandemic Plan for the high school magnet admission process will continue using multiple measures and professional review committees. Multiple criteria will include pre-COVID and 2020 data such as report card grades, reading level, external assessments (Measures of Academic Progress-Reading and Measures of Academic Progress-Mathematics) and student services (students who receive services in ESOL—English for Speakers of Other Languages, FARMS—Free and Reduced-price Meals System, IEP—Individualized Education Plan and or 504 plan. Due to limitations with in-person instruction and test security, the Cognitive Abilities Assessment (CogAT) and scored essay will not be administered. In addition, as a result of conditions associated with virtual-only instruction, teacher recommendations will not be part of the process this year. Students with incomplete data and private/home schooled students will be considered in the review.

So, grades, MAP, and FARMS/IEP/ESOL status. I hope they didn't get a lot of applications. I have no idea how they'll be able to differentiate between kids with this.

My guess is, they'll come up with a MAP/GPA benchmark and consider everyone with scores higher than that for a lottery. Isn't it how TJ in Virginia is now handling admissions? Everyone with a GPA over a certain number is eligible to participate in the lottery but that lottery isn't school blind, it is set within school clusters so kids only compete with others from their cluster. That - at least, theoretically - increases equity within the district.
At least, that was the idea at TJ a couple of months ago.

Yeah, but (at least according to PP), MCPS has specifically said that the ES and MS processes will use a lottery, but they haven't said that for HS. They also say the process is school blind, so I don't know how they could use cluster.

+1 MCPS already stated that there is no lottery for HS. However, the process can still be school blind but also pick a number of kids from a cluster or school. School blind may only apply to the review committee. In other words, the reviewers may not know the school or name of the student; however, earlier in the process applications could be separated into groups by different criteria and reviewers instructed to pick X amount of students from each group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

MCPS acknowledges this issue in the letter: "Students with incomplete data and private/home schooled students will be considered in the review."

But being considered doesn't remove the injury. The injury arises from utilizing disparate evaluation criteria across the admissions pool.

MCPS kids with high MAP scores are being given an opportunity to excel in admissions screening that is not afforded to non-MCPs kids with similarly high Scantron/SSAT scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

MCPS acknowledges this issue in the letter: "Students with incomplete data and private/home schooled students will be considered in the review."

But being considered doesn't remove the injury. The injury arises from utilizing disparate evaluation criteria across the admissions pool.

MCPS kids with high MAP scores are being given an opportunity to excel in admissions screening that is not afforded to non-MCPs kids with similarly high Scantron/SSAT scores.

I don't disagree with your point but I don't think MCPS really cares. If you look at the admissions data for the last 3-4 years, on average, less than 10 non-MCPS students are admitted to each criteria based program. I suspect that the number of non-MCPS applicants is not significant each year.

[Anonymous]

Still no details on how having an IEP or 504 has an impact on admission.

Someone could read it as meaning that if you have a disability (IEP/504) you're at a disadvantage. Would seem to open them up to (even more) lawsuits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

Nice try. DC has been in ADW schools since moving here early in elementary school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Still no details on how having an IEP or 504 has an impact on admission.

Someone could read it as meaning that if you have a disability (IEP/504) you're at a disadvantage. Would seem to open them up to (even more) lawsuits.

Can you explain? I don't interpret as negative. I read the info as contextual meaning MCPS will evaluate scores/ grades within the context of having a disability, which could be a bump like ESOL and FARM students. Am I missing something?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Still no details on how having an IEP or 504 has an impact on admission.

Someone could read it as meaning that if you have a disability (IEP/504) you're at a disadvantage. Would seem to open them up to (even more) lawsuits.

Can you explain? I don't interpret as negative. I read the info as contextual meaning MCPS will evaluate scores/ grades within the context of having a disability, which could be a bump like ESOL and FARM students. Am I missing something?

It can be read in that optimistic way. A pessimistic way to read it would be that they are assuming that a student that needs extra help (IEP/504) won't be able to keep up with a rigorous magnet program.

I'm hopeful the optimistic interpretation is the real one. MCPS could have added a single sentence to clarify that but they didn't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Still no details on how having an IEP or 504 has an impact on admission.

Someone could read it as meaning that if you have a disability (IEP/504) you're at a disadvantage. Would seem to open them up to (even more) lawsuits.

Can you explain? I don't interpret as negative. I read the info as contextual meaning MCPS will evaluate scores/ grades within the context of having a disability, which could be a bump like ESOL and FARM students. Am I missing something?

It can be read in that optimistic way. A pessimistic way to read it would be that they are assuming that a student that needs extra help (IEP/504) won't be able to keep up with a rigorous magnet program.

I'm hopeful the optimistic interpretation is the real one. MCPS could have added a single sentence to clarify that but they didn't.

I don't think there is one generic answer - I would imagine they'd look at each student's application holistically, as they have said they would and discuss each case in their "committee" until they have their list.

[Anonymous]

I wonder how many seats would be left, if any, if they took all the 4.0 99percentile kids who applied. Plus the kids who got close in grades/scores while facing challenges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

Nice try. DC has been in ADW schools since moving here early in elementary school.

Then, what are you complaining about? You choose that knowing the situation and there is no injury. Move your kids to MCPS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

Nice try. DC has been in ADW schools since moving here early in elementary school.

Then, what are you complaining about? You choose that knowing the situation and there is no injury. Move your kids to MCPS.

Yes Pp knew their was a pandemic and the magnet test wouldn’t happen when she enrolled her kid in private middle school two and half years ago. Seriously!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

Nice try. DC has been in ADW schools since moving here early in elementary school.

Then, what are you complaining about? You choose that knowing the situation and there is no injury. Move your kids to MCPS.

Yes Pp knew their was a pandemic and the magnet test wouldn’t happen when she enrolled her kid in private middle school two and half years ago. Seriously!

It amazes me that MCPS allows kids from private schools to apply to the programs unless there is a drastic change of personal circumstances and the kid would go to a local public for HS anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wonder how many seats would be left, if any, if they took all the 4.0 99percentile kids who applied. Plus the kids who got close in grades/scores while facing challenges.

We would only know this if MCPS chose to be transparent. Good luck with that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about students attending non-MCPS schools that don't conduct standardized testing? Those kids are injured - you can't provide one set of children an opportunity to excel (MAP, reading level) without a reasonable accommodation (private student submits SSAT, etc)?

What about parochial students attending ADW schools? Same injury. Will MCPS accept Scantron scoring/percentiles as part of review?

Guess you should've kept your kids in MCPS this year. Oops.

Nice try. DC has been in ADW schools since moving here early in elementary school.

Then, what are you complaining about? You choose that knowing the situation and there is no injury. Move your kids to MCPS.

Yes Pp knew their was a pandemic and the magnet test wouldn’t happen when she enrolled her kid in private middle school two and half years ago. Seriously!

It amazes me that MCPS allows kids from private schools to apply to the programs unless there is a drastic change of personal circumstances and the kid would go to a local public for HS anyway.

Why does it amaze you? The families pay the same realestate taxes as those who attend public school - therefore private school and homeschool students are eligible just like other students. They are at a disadvantage during the application process though because they do not have the same data points, and the data they do have is not considered.