Thomas Edison High School - is it for vocation programs only?

[Anonymous]

We have received an email from Thomas Edison High School with invite to the open house. My DS is very interested in cybersecurity as a career and they actually offered a great sounding cybersecurity option with TIAA comp certificate to boot. I have always though of Thomas Edison as career training program, ie for auto mechanics. technicians, etc., professions that dont necessarily require a college degree at the entry level at least. The cyber program specifically emphasizes college readiness, so I am confused.
Does anyone have any first hand experience with Thomas Edison and Cyber/IT portion of it specifically? Thank you!

[Anonymous]

No first-hand experience but I do know college-bound kids who participated in the cybersecurity, architecture, and criminal justice programs, respectively. They seemed to have a good experience and be well prepared for next steps.

[Anonymous]

Students attend Edison for half the day and their home high school for their core classes. There are certainly kids who go to college after doing this.

[Anonymous]

I was recently at Edison on a Junior Achievement field trip and was amazed at how beautiful the school is. I know what OP means in that back in the day it was definitely a place for non college bound kids but the programs I saw offered definitely made me think it is a shame more kids don't take advantage of this that are indeed college bound.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have received an email from Thomas Edison High School with invite to the open house. My DS is very interested in cybersecurity as a career and they actually offered a great sounding cybersecurity option with TIAA comp certificate to boot. I have always though of Thomas Edison as career training program, ie for auto mechanics. technicians, etc., professions that dont necessarily require a college degree at the entry level at least. The cyber program specifically emphasizes college readiness, so I am confused.
Does anyone have any first hand experience with Thomas Edison and Cyber/IT portion of it specifically? Thank you!

I don’t have firsthand experience, but I will speak to the fact that while they are better known for their vocational program, Edison is not only for kids who don’t pursue a college degree.

I wish MCPS had more schools like Edison spread throughout the county.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have received an email from Thomas Edison High School with invite to the open house. My DS is very interested in cybersecurity as a career and they actually offered a great sounding cybersecurity option with TIAA comp certificate to boot. I have always though of Thomas Edison as career training program, ie for auto mechanics. technicians, etc., professions that dont necessarily require a college degree at the entry level at least. The cyber program specifically emphasizes college readiness, so I am confused.
Does anyone have any first hand experience with Thomas Edison and Cyber/IT portion of it specifically? Thank you!

I don’t have firsthand experience, but I will speak to the fact that while they are better known for their vocational program, Edison is not only for kids who don’t pursue a college degree.

I wish MCPS had more schools like Edison spread throughout the county.

There are also career/technical education programs at Seneca Valley and Rockville, among other schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No first-hand experience but I do know college-bound kids who participated in the cybersecurity, architecture, and criminal justice programs, respectively. They seemed to have a good experience and be well prepared for next steps.

Do they still take all 5 "core courses" every year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No first-hand experience but I do know college-bound kids who participated in the cybersecurity, architecture, and criminal justice programs, respectively. They seemed to have a good experience and be well prepared for next steps.

Do they still take all 5 "core courses" every year?

No, because the Edison courses are taking up three of their elective slots plus they have a travel period on the school bus. They take English and math every year. One year they take their 3rd credit in World History and the other year they take their 3rd science.

[Anonymous]

Do you know there is a way to take all four science and all four world history credits? With tricks like taking some classes during summer school (initially, not as retakes) or at MC? Or taking health in the summer?

My kid would love this program but I worry about college admissions into a STEM program like cybersecurity if he only has three years of high school science.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have received an email from Thomas Edison High School with invite to the open house. My DS is very interested in cybersecurity as a career and they actually offered a great sounding cybersecurity option with TIAA comp certificate to boot. I have always though of Thomas Edison as career training program, ie for auto mechanics. technicians, etc., professions that dont necessarily require a college degree at the entry level at least. The cyber program specifically emphasizes college readiness, so I am confused.
Does anyone have any first hand experience with Thomas Edison and Cyber/IT portion of it specifically? Thank you!

No experience re: TE program but if anything like other programs advertised and offered as niche, be aware what you are getting before you go.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thank you everyone who offered useful feedback!
We are going today to the open house to see for ourselves. From everything I have read above, I should specifically inquire about:
- college readiness, ie is the goal of the program for graduates to go to college or go into workforce
- specific pathways/classes taken, ie what are we loosing out on when we have to account for the travel period
- how "niche" the program is, ie is it cyber only or do they explore other CS disciplines

Anything else I should be on look out for?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Thank you everyone who offered useful feedback!
We are going today to the open house to see for ourselves. From everything I have read above, I should specifically inquire about:
- college readiness, ie is the goal of the program for graduates to go to college or go into workforce
- specific pathways/classes taken, ie what are we loosing out on when we have to account for the travel period
- how "niche" the program is, ie is it cyber only or do they explore other CS disciplines

Anything else I should be on look out for?

The vocational programs will not be the same as cyber security taught as a 300 level elective in a university CS department, they will be the classes taught at a CC trying to get kids a certificate. If you want actual computer science, then the Edison cyber program is probably not for you

[Anonymous]

OP, what are your thoughts on this after attending the open house? My child is also interested in this program, but I am concerned about him not being able to take 4 years of the core subjects because the transportation time.

[Anonymous]

bumping this up to see if anyone else has information about the network operations or cybersecurity programs at Edison for college bound kids

[Anonymous]

My college-bound kid is a junior at Edison in Auto Tech along with a couple of other college-bound kids that we know of from his home school. Because of immersion language credits, we have avoided summer school to have enough credits to graduate. He was able to squeeze in 4 classes at home school once he figure out the timing of transportation. There are definitely ways to get creative with MCC and/or summer school to knock out some required classes to make room for more core classes. And they seem eager to promote college readiness as well as job readiness across all the disciplines at Edison.