Cancel Virtual Academy

[Anonymous]

My children are in Virtual Academy and it's been great for our family.


1. Virtual education offers great potential for millions of students worldwide, it solves overcrowding and bussing issues, and equitable access to specials and subjects that lack teachers. It's not a mere pandemic solution. It's here to stay, to serve a number of students with varying needs.


2. You are extremely ignorant about all the issues surrounding education and schooling today. Please don't make others suffer just because you are one of those traditionalists who cannot imagine the world making progress and moving on from what you've personally lived and known. There are better solutions out there.

[Anonymous]

I do not think the OP really has a problem with VA. They just want Cogat back and MCPS is using VA as an excuse to not.

[Anonymous]

What do you care if MCPS offers VA? You don't have to send your kids. Who are you to decide when its safe for us to send our kids back in person? Maybe if you behaved more responsibly and MCPS handled covid better, we'd be more comfortable.

Is the real issue you feel guilty sending your kids in person?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

My children are in Virtual Academy and it's been great for our family.


1. Virtual education offers great potential for millions of students worldwide, it solves overcrowding and bussing issues, and equitable access to specials and subjects that lack teachers. It's not a mere pandemic solution. It's here to stay, to serve a number of students with varying needs.


2. You are extremely ignorant about all the issues surrounding education and schooling today. Please don't make others suffer just because you are one of those traditionalists who cannot imagine the world making progress and moving on from what you've personally lived and known. There are better solutions out there.

They have funding for at least several years. So, don't pay these posts any mind.

Until MCPS and MoCo handles covid better, we are staying in VA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pretty much every other state has a virtual academy and manages standardized testing. What exactly threatens you about other parents making this choice for their child?

MCPS not figuring out how to administer CogAT in a VA world.

I don't get why people are talking about VA who don't have kids in it act like they know what's going on.

They offered MAP testing both online and in person last semester. Its not an issue.

Reality is MCPS has very few gifted spots and its a slim chance your child will get in.

MCPS should offer more honors/gifted classes but that has nothing to do with VA.

VA impacts no one who isn't using it. So, why is OP upset MCPS offers it. It pulls kids out of in person which makes class sizes smaller, so its a good thing. Its another new school, like any other new school they offer BUT, it uses no physical space so its far cheaper for MCPS to run. Seems like a win for all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The vaccine doesn’t ensure you won’t get Covid. It only makes it almost impossible to die from. Some families can’t take the risk of illness or hospitalization or long term disability. My kids are back in person full-time, but I respect those people who chose differently. If magnet had been offered virtually, I would have picked the VA.

But this logic would mean VA for ever and no standardized tests.

VA HAS standardized testing. VA is not why they changed up all the tests and aren't doing some. Stop misplacing blame. They dumbed down the curriculum last year as parents complained and many kids weren't doing the work. Now, this year because of those parents, who cannot be bothered parenting their kids, all our kids suffer with a continued dumbed down curriculum, low expectations, etc.

We see how other families are behaving. We read it here and other places. We aren't sending our kids back as we don't feel its safe and if you want us to send our kids back, which would be nice, consider how your behavior impacts us. What you consider the sniffles is a big deal for us and could be serious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the OP really has a problem with VA. They just want Cogat back and MCPS is using VA as an excuse to not.

Then OP should use a little critical thinking before lapping all that up and believing them.

MCPS has wanted to water down their magnet and special needs offerings for a very long time, years before the pandemic. All the special programs costs money, and they have equity concerns over the magnet selection methods, because equity is trendy nowadays and their priority is to position themselves as a group that's very aware of supposed cultural and socio-economic feelings. Furthermore, and this is completely legitimate, MCPS has serious concerns over future demographic trends weighing VERY HEAVILY on all services and programs, particularly in wealthy areas of the county.

As a result, over the years, they've cleaned house and reduced the special needs programs, at times so drastically they had to add teachers back in to prevent collapse, and they wish they could do the same thing to magnets.

This has nothing to do with the creation of virtual programs. But virtual programs are an easy excuse, and MCPS loves easy excuses because explaining budget considerations to parents who pay lots of taxes and expensive real estate doesn't go over too well.

Full disclosure: I am a parent of a child with special needs and a child who went to a magnet program. It's been 11 years of MCPS and I've seen how the reduced budget has affected services, accommodations, and teacher retention in all programs. Public schools need a serious injection of funds to continue to provide quality services in the face of population explosion. It always boils down to money.

[Anonymous]

VA is a great way to help with over crowded schools. I do not see it going away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the OP really has a problem with VA. They just want Cogat back and MCPS is using VA as an excuse to not.

Then OP should use a little critical thinking before lapping all that up and believing them.

MCPS has wanted to water down their magnet and special needs offerings for a very long time, years before the pandemic. All the special programs costs money, and they have equity concerns over the magnet selection methods, because equity is trendy nowadays and their priority is to position themselves as a group that's very aware of supposed cultural and socio-economic feelings. Furthermore, and this is completely legitimate, MCPS has serious concerns over future demographic trends weighing VERY HEAVILY on all services and programs, particularly in wealthy areas of the county.

As a result, over the years, they've cleaned house and reduced the special needs programs, at times so drastically they had to add teachers back in to prevent collapse, and they wish they could do the same thing to magnets.

This has nothing to do with the creation of virtual programs. But virtual programs are an easy excuse, and MCPS loves easy excuses because explaining budget considerations to parents who pay lots of taxes and expensive real estate doesn't go over too well.

Full disclosure: I am a parent of a child with special needs and a child who went to a magnet program. It's been 11 years of MCPS and I've seen how the reduced budget has affected services, accommodations, and teacher retention in all programs. Public schools need a serious injection of funds to continue to provide quality services in the face of population explosion. It always boils down to money.

I think most people would agree we need more gifted and SN programs but you are 100% right it has nothing to do with VA. If anything, VA would be cheaper as it doesn't require the same physical space or staffing an in person school has which is a win for everyone. MCPS needs to do a huge clean up in terms of their spending and get rid of the wasteful spending but I think we all know that will not happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:VA is a great way to help with over crowded schools. I do not see it going away.

How many kids are in VA? Has it grown into a rounding error yet?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do you care if MCPS offers VA? You don't have to send your kids. Who are you to decide when its safe for us to send our kids back in person? Maybe if you behaved more responsibly and MCPS handled covid better, we'd be more comfortable.

Is the real issue you feel guilty sending your kids in person?

You honestly sound like a relic. Your arguments are stale and irrelevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for that response. I was going to ignore the posters who immediately honed in on what it meant for my child, and why I may be bitter. But yes, I do think that my kid who is a straight A student, has MAP scores in the 99th percentile and had CogAT scores in the 99th percentile is more suited (I know people will get triggered if I say deserving), to the Magnet/CES program than kids at the 85% level. Cue up the "Your kid is a robot who was trained by Dr Li" comments.

This is kind of disgusting OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VA is a great way to help with over crowded schools. I do not see it going away.

How many kids are in VA? Has it grown into a rounding error yet?

1500?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VA is a great way to help with over crowded schools. I do not see it going away.

How many kids are in VA? Has it grown into a rounding error yet?

1500?

Out of 160,000+ students and 200+ schools? It's almost a rounding error I suppose.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VA is a great way to help with over crowded schools. I do not see it going away.

How many kids are in VA? Has it grown into a rounding error yet?

3000K, more were on the waitlist but not accepted. It probably goes up and down as some families left back to in person and others have asked in. All our classes are full. They have been clear they have funding for a few years and its here to stay.