Using Noetic Math Contest Results in TJ Application?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

They might not be on the honor roll because they didn’t take it but I would think that every kid at TJ should be on the honor roll if they took the exam. DS is in 6th grade and took a practice exam for the AMC 8. He scored 18 out of 25 on it. I have no idea how he will do on the exam when he takes it in a few weeks but I would not be surprised if he does well on it. He is normally in the 95th or 99th percentile of the kids participating in math competitions. The kids who want to go to TJ because they love STEM are likely to be the kids who do well on things like the AMC8. That is kind of who the school is meant to serve.

Getting honor roll for AMC8 is very hard - there's fewer than 3000 in the entire country. There's no way all 500 kids in NOVA are "good" enough to get it. I believe there are about 20 NOVA kids each year getting on the AMC8 honor roll.

It really isn't. One of the reasons it's so easy to make honor roll is that a lot of the top kids stop bothering with AMC 8 as soon as they reach AIME levels. My kid made the honor roll in early elementary, but as soon as he started AIME qualifying on the AMC 10 in 6th grade, he didn't see the point of continuing to do the AMC 8. I know a lot of other top kids in the same boat.

This is ridiculous.

It's not "easy". Your brilliant kid qualified for the AIME in 6th. Congrats!
You know who didn't qualify? Most of the 2000 TJ students in 9th-12th!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

They might not be on the honor roll because they didn’t take it but I would think that every kid at TJ should be on the honor roll if they took the exam. DS is in 6th grade and took a practice exam for the AMC 8. He scored 18 out of 25 on it. I have no idea how he will do on the exam when he takes it in a few weeks but I would not be surprised if he does well on it. He is normally in the 95th or 99th percentile of the kids participating in math competitions. The kids who want to go to TJ because they love STEM are likely to be the kids who do well on things like the AMC8. That is kind of who the school is meant to serve.

Getting honor roll for AMC8 is very hard - there's fewer than 3000 in the entire country. There's no way all 500 kids in NOVA are "good" enough to get it. I believe there are about 20 NOVA kids each year getting on the AMC8 honor roll.

I love my DS and I think he is pretty smart but he is a 6th grader whose score on his first practice test was 1 question away from the honor roll for the test that he took. While I get that is a practice test at home, it does not make me think that the AMC 8 is super challenging for kids who enjoy math and have been taking math competitions for a while. I would not think of enrolling him in the AMC 10 but I know that there are parents of kids his age who do just that. Some of those parents have posted here. Maybe if he does well enough on the AMC 8 this year we will try the AMC 10 next year.

Take a look at the break down of who is taking tests like the Noetic and the like, you will see certain states are well over represented in the honor roll. So yes, I can see that there would be a large number of kids in the NoVA area taking the AMC 8 in ES and earning honor roll.

I don’t think it should be a stretch for kids applying to TJ be able to score high enough to earn honor roll on the AMC 8, especially if they were to take it in 8th grade. If your kid is not able to score on the honor roll on the AMC 8 as an 8th grader, then TJ might not be the best fit.

It’s getting even more ridiculous.

Ok, we get it, your kid is a genius, although I’m guessing you’re not even in remotely in the vicinity of TJ.

Holding math competitions or AIME as the ultimate STEM achievement a student can attain is misguided. People can have many different interests and skills, besides doing hard problems on a time limit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

DP. No. They're saying that applicants who made AMC 10 honor roll in middle school would stand out in TJ applications. If tons of applicants achieved the AMC honor rolls, it wouldn't stand out. Doing well in a largely unknown, fringe math contest also wouldn't stand out. If the contests are used in a portrait of a graduate essay to show interest, ability to self-study, or developing grit, that could be useful.

AMC 8 Honor roll and math counts chapter would also not stand out. Kids who can achieve decent results on those are a dime a dozen. Qualifying for AIME or Mathcounts state would have stood out in the past. Maybe 20-30 eighth graders in the TJ catchment area would reach this. Nowadays, I don't think they care.

You're contradicting yourself.

TJ has 500 students, so you don't need to be top 30 to get in.

There aren't more people qualifying. These contests have limits on attendance and they get harder every year. Qualifying now is far, far more impressive than qualifying 20 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

But we're not talking about what makes a kid "well qualified" for TJ. We're talking about what makes the kid stand out in the applications process or makes TJ admissions overlook the fact that the kid's answer to the essay wasn't really responsive to the essay prompt. You're arguing about what would make a kid TJ material. I'm arguing about what would make a kid be in the top 50 kids who absolutely deserve to be admitted to TJ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I registered my children as 'individuals' this fall, and they both performed exceptionally well - each earning a place on the National Honor Roll. I am wondering if their results from the individual registration can be used in their TJ application.

If they did that without prep classes or parent coaching, and didn't cheat, that's impressive. But it's impossible to prove these things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

DP. No. They're saying that applicants who made AMC 10 honor roll in middle school would stand out in TJ applications. If tons of applicants achieved the AMC honor rolls, it wouldn't stand out. Doing well in a largely unknown, fringe math contest also wouldn't stand out. If the contests are used in a portrait of a graduate essay to show interest, ability to self-study, or developing grit, that could be useful.

AMC 8 Honor roll and math counts chapter would also not stand out. Kids who can achieve decent results on those are a dime a dozen. Qualifying for AIME or Mathcounts state would have stood out in the past. Maybe 20-30 eighth graders in the TJ catchment area would reach this. Nowadays, I don't think they care.

You're contradicting yourself.

TJ has 500 students, so you don't need to be top 30 to get in.

There aren't more people qualifying. These contests have limits on attendance and they get harder every year. Qualifying now is far, far more impressive than qualifying 20 years ago.

I don't disagree with this point. I just don't think the new admissions process, which is based purely on GPA, a fairly trivial "problem solving essay", and some generic portrait of a graduate essays gives any bonus points for AIME qualification. This is a process that has already decided that a kid taking Algebra I in 8th, honors Science, honors Social Studies, and gen ed english with a 4.0 GPA is more qualified than a kid in pre-calc with straight As except one A- in AAP english. The bureaucrats in charge of selection have already decided that generic essays are the best way to pick TJ students. Having "top 30" type qualifications may move the needle in favor of admissions, even if the essays are lacking. AMC 8 honor roll and making your school mathcounts team will not wow the bureaucrats enough to cause them to give bonus points to your essay.

[Anonymous]

If your kid does not get in OP, they would be able to get in during sophomore round where they actually look at these things.

My child made Mathcounts state (only one from that school ever per math teacher), Science Olympiad (#1 at state in 3 events participated), AMC 8 highest at school.

Did not make it to TJ during freshmen round. Dont know if achievements were incorporated into essay. Did the math problem 2 different ways. Strong in language per feedback from teacher and essays could not have been bad but who knows. Made it in sophomore round.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

But we're not talking about what makes a kid "well qualified" for TJ. We're talking about what makes the kid stand out in the applications process or makes TJ admissions overlook the fact that the kid's answer to the essay wasn't really responsive to the essay prompt. You're arguing about what would make a kid TJ material. I'm arguing about what would make a kid be in the top 50 kids who absolutely deserve to be admitted to TJ.

Not sure if you’re the same poster, but up thread the argument was that if a kid didn’t make it to AMC8 honor roll he might not be a good fit for TJ.

You don’t seem to have a good sense of how often this occurs. There’s about 140000 students taking AMC8 and presumably 14000 get to the honor roll from about 4 million 8th graders nationally.

FCPS has about 15000 students per grade so if the ratio is the same then on average about 50 students make the honor roll. That’s rare enough to be considered outstanding for TJ admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

But we're not talking about what makes a kid "well qualified" for TJ. We're talking about what makes the kid stand out in the applications process or makes TJ admissions overlook the fact that the kid's answer to the essay wasn't really responsive to the essay prompt. You're arguing about what would make a kid TJ material. I'm arguing about what would make a kid be in the top 50 kids who absolutely deserve to be admitted to TJ.

Not sure if you’re the same poster, but up thread the argument was that if a kid didn’t make it to AMC8 honor roll he might not be a good fit for TJ.

You don’t seem to have a good sense of how often this occurs. There’s about 140000 students taking AMC8 and presumably 14000 get to the honor roll from about 4 million 8th graders nationally.

FCPS has about 15000 students per grade so if the ratio is the same then on average about 50 students make the honor roll. That’s rare enough to be considered outstanding for TJ admissions.

Quoted PP here. I'm not the same poster who suggested that everyone admitted to TJ should be making AMC 8 honor roll. I am, however, the poster who suggested that a lot of the top kids stop bothering with AMC 8 once they're at AIME level. I totally agree that AMC 8 honor roll kids would be among the top 100 kids in math admitted to TJ out of each cohort. That being said, only having AMC 8 honor roll and not having some sort of AMC 10 or Mathcounts achievement, or even fringe/lesser contests like MOEMS, CML, Noetic, Math Kangaroo, would make the kid look like they were a lucky guesser or heavily prepped rather than being a true math talent. Even in the old system that rewarded accomplishments, I doubt that AMC honor roll in isolation would have much of an impact on admissions.

You're still overlooking the main point, though, which is that TJ changed the admissions process to give no weight to significant achievements. The achievement would need to be HUGE for them to either award bonus points beyond what the essay would normally merit or to bypass their process altogether. I'm not sure that they even care about admitting kids with elite achievements, like qualifying for USAJMO or Mathcounts nationals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

But we're not talking about what makes a kid "well qualified" for TJ. We're talking about what makes the kid stand out in the applications process or makes TJ admissions overlook the fact that the kid's answer to the essay wasn't really responsive to the essay prompt. You're arguing about what would make a kid TJ material. I'm arguing about what would make a kid be in the top 50 kids who absolutely deserve to be admitted to TJ.

Not sure if you’re the same poster, but up thread the argument was that if a kid didn’t make it to AMC8 honor roll he might not be a good fit for TJ.

You don’t seem to have a good sense of how often this occurs. There’s about 140000 students taking AMC8 and presumably 14000 get to the honor roll from about 4 million 8th graders nationally.

FCPS has about 15000 students per grade so if the ratio is the same then on average about 50 students make the honor roll. That’s rare enough to be considered outstanding for TJ admissions.

Quoted PP here. I'm not the same poster who suggested that everyone admitted to TJ should be making AMC 8 honor roll. I am, however, the poster who suggested that a lot of the top kids stop bothering with AMC 8 once they're at AIME level. I totally agree that AMC 8 honor roll kids would be among the top 100 kids in math admitted to TJ out of each cohort. That being said, only having AMC 8 honor roll and not having some sort of AMC 10 or Mathcounts achievement, or even fringe/lesser contests like MOEMS, CML, Noetic, Math Kangaroo, would make the kid look like they were a lucky guesser or heavily prepped rather than being a true math talent. Even in the old system that rewarded accomplishments, I doubt that AMC honor roll in isolation would have much of an impact on admissions.

You're still overlooking the main point, though, which is that TJ changed the admissions process to give no weight to significant achievements. The achievement would need to be HUGE for them to either award bonus points beyond what the essay would normally merit or to bypass their process altogether. I'm not sure that they even care about admitting kids with elite achievements, like qualifying for USAJMO or Mathcounts nationals.

Many of the very top math kids don't care about these silly contests because they are more focused on real math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid can try to weave this in to one of the essays, but the key is not to force it. First and foremost, the kid should make sure that they are actually answering the essay prompt. If the prompt is about being an ethical and global citizen, the answer should not be about doing well in a math competition. If the prompt is about being a goal-directed and resilient individual, the answer still shouldn’t just be that the kid did well in a math competition. But if the kid overcame an obstacle and/or set a goal to do well in the competition, then the accomplishment can be slipped-in on that prompt. But even then, the essay shouldn’t just list this as an accomplishment; instead, it should focus on the kid and say something about the kid’s personality and how it maps on to the attributes they are looking for, perhaps noting that this was the end result of the kid’s overcoming an obstacle or achieving a goal. At the end of the day, the priority should be to write an essay that 1) says something about the kid and why they would fit into TJ; and 2) why TJ would benefit from having them attend (in other words, what would the kid add to the TJ community and its learning environment). The accomplishments can support those themes, but they need to serve the essay’s overall goal of responding to the prompts.

I agree. If a kid were to force it and somewhat clumsily weave a major achievement into the essays, like making USAJMO, Mathcounts nationals, Science Olympiad nationals, or even AMC 10 top 1% honor roll, it still may likely help the kid. For everything else, they really need to answer the portrait of a graduate essay question being asked. They're likely to still be impressed by great results at known math or science competitions if the results are well integrated into an essay that is responsive to the question. I doubt it's worth even trying to insert fringe contest results or somewhat mediocre achievements into the essay, unless they somehow are a perfect illustration of whatever trait the essays is requesting.

If anything, I would think that using Noetic Math contest results in absence of other math competition results would backfire. It's a largely unknown contest that gives out a lot of awards and is relatively easy. If your kid is portraying themselves as a math whiz who is into math contests, but they don't have good results from the two most known and most major middle school contests, it would not speak highly of your kid's abilities.

OK that's a bit extreme.

Only about 40 kids from NoVa qualify for Mathcounts State. Far fewer USAJMO (even ignoring they were talking about 7th grade achievements for TJ admissions.)
Thats plenty impressive for showing a math whiz who puts in sustained effort, even if you consider 80% of TJ as being non-math specialists who pursue other less-mathy sciences. (A lot of the other sciences still have people who excel at math)

Someone who qualified for their school mathcounts cohort of 12 students (especially doing so in 7th grade) and scored at least around median at Chapter, is well qualified for TJ.

But we're not talking about what makes a kid "well qualified" for TJ. We're talking about what makes the kid stand out in the applications process or makes TJ admissions overlook the fact that the kid's answer to the essay wasn't really responsive to the essay prompt. You're arguing about what would make a kid TJ material. I'm arguing about what would make a kid be in the top 50 kids who absolutely deserve to be admitted to TJ.

Not sure if you’re the same poster, but up thread the argument was that if a kid didn’t make it to AMC8 honor roll he might not be a good fit for TJ.

You don’t seem to have a good sense of how often this occurs. There’s about 140000 students taking AMC8 and presumably 14000 get to the honor roll from about 4 million 8th graders nationally.

FCPS has about 15000 students per grade so if the ratio is the same then on average about 50 students make the honor roll. That’s rare enough to be considered outstanding for TJ admissions.

Quoted PP here. I'm not the same poster who suggested that everyone admitted to TJ should be making AMC 8 honor roll. I am, however, the poster who suggested that a lot of the top kids stop bothering with AMC 8 once they're at AIME level. I totally agree that AMC 8 honor roll kids would be among the top 100 kids in math admitted to TJ out of each cohort. That being said, only having AMC 8 honor roll and not having some sort of AMC 10 or Mathcounts achievement, or even fringe/lesser contests like MOEMS, CML, Noetic, Math Kangaroo, would make the kid look like they were a lucky guesser or heavily prepped rather than being a true math talent. Even in the old system that rewarded accomplishments, I doubt that AMC honor roll in isolation would have much of an impact on admissions.

You're still overlooking the main point, though, which is that TJ changed the admissions process to give no weight to significant achievements. The achievement would need to be HUGE for them to either award bonus points beyond what the essay would normally merit or to bypass their process altogether. I'm not sure that they even care about admitting kids with elite achievements, like qualifying for USAJMO or Mathcounts nationals.

Many of the very top math kids don't care about these silly contests because they are more focused on real math.

I wouldn’t discount the achievement of making the honor roll, but I agree there are other areas of math, science, or engineering where a student can excel.

I’d say the student has a good chance of admission if it’s weaved into the essay and it comes through in their voice to show internal drive as opposed to “my tiger mom made me do it”.

In the end competition math is just one manifestation of being both passionate and good at math. Some honors in AMC show the good ar math part, but the the passion still needs to come through.

[Anonymous]

The fun part about this whole conversation is that literally none of the people arguing about it have ANY IDEA WHATSOEVER about:

1) The significance given to exceptional accomplishments in the prior TJ admissions process, or;

2) The significance given to exceptional accomplishments in the current TJ admissions process.

You're just speculating based on your own narratives. You genuinely have no clue whether the success of your preferred demographic in the old process is more attributable to those significant accomplishments, or if they're simply more likely to track with kids who are strong test takers generally. And you will NEVER know!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

They might not be on the honor roll because they didn’t take it but I would think that every kid at TJ should be on the honor roll if they took the exam. DS is in 6th grade and took a practice exam for the AMC 8. He scored 18 out of 25 on it. I have no idea how he will do on the exam when he takes it in a few weeks but I would not be surprised if he does well on it. He is normally in the 95th or 99th percentile of the kids participating in math competitions. The kids who want to go to TJ because they love STEM are likely to be the kids who do well on things like the AMC8. That is kind of who the school is meant to serve.

Getting honor roll for AMC8 is very hard - there's fewer than 3000 in the entire country. There's no way all 500 kids in NOVA are "good" enough to get it. I believe there are about 20 NOVA kids each year getting on the AMC8 honor roll.

I love my DS and I think he is pretty smart but he is a 6th grader whose score on his first practice test was 1 question away from the honor roll for the test that he took. While I get that is a practice test at home, it does not make me think that the AMC 8 is super challenging for kids who enjoy math and have been taking math competitions for a while. I would not think of enrolling him in the AMC 10 but I know that there are parents of kids his age who do just that. Some of those parents have posted here. Maybe if he does well enough on the AMC 8 this year we will try the AMC 10 next year.

Take a look at the break down of who is taking tests like the Noetic and the like, you will see certain states are well over represented in the honor roll. So yes, I can see that there would be a large number of kids in the NoVA area taking the AMC 8 in ES and earning honor roll.

I don’t think it should be a stretch for kids applying to TJ be able to score high enough to earn honor roll on the AMC 8, especially if they were to take it in 8th grade. If your kid is not able to score on the honor roll on the AMC 8 as an 8th grader, then TJ might not be the best fit.

It’s getting even more ridiculous.

Ok, we get it, your kid is a genius, although I’m guessing you’re not even in remotely in the vicinity of TJ.

Holding math competitions or AIME as the ultimate STEM achievement a student can attain is misguided. People can have many different interests and skills, besides doing hard problems on a time limit.

DS is a 6th grader in FCPS. I have no clue if he will apply to TJ or not, I actually would be surprised if he did because it would be an hour commute. Either way, it will be his choice when he is in 8th grade.

And no, I don’t think it is ridiculous to suggest that kids applying to TJ, a top rated STEM program in the country, should be able to score in the top 5% of an 8th grade level math test. They are 8th graders, a good number who are in the top 1.5% of their class at their MS. They have been taking honors math and earning A’s. If that does not translate into a 19 out of 25 on a math test then there is an issue.

I am not suggesting that everyone take the AMC8, I understand that it is a choice to participate, but you are outraged at the suggestion that the top STEM students in FCPS would not be able to score competitively on an 8th grade math exam when they are in 8th grade. I am not talking about the AMC 10 or AIME or the like. I am discussing an 8th grade level math test, taken by 8th graders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"National Honor Roll Medal: The top 10% of all participants in the nation will receive 'National Honor Roll' medals. "

Not standout for TJ.
AMC 8/10 Honor Roll or Mathcounts Chapter/State would be more TJ level.

This is ridiculous, are you saying 500 students at TJ are all AMC8/10 honor roll in middle school?

They might not be on the honor roll because they didn’t take it but I would think that every kid at TJ should be on the honor roll if they took the exam. DS is in 6th grade and took a practice exam for the AMC 8. He scored 18 out of 25 on it. I have no idea how he will do on the exam when he takes it in a few weeks but I would not be surprised if he does well on it. He is normally in the 95th or 99th percentile of the kids participating in math competitions. The kids who want to go to TJ because they love STEM are likely to be the kids who do well on things like the AMC8. That is kind of who the school is meant to serve.

Getting honor roll for AMC8 is very hard - there's fewer than 3000 in the entire country. There's no way all 500 kids in NOVA are "good" enough to get it. I believe there are about 20 NOVA kids each year getting on the AMC8 honor roll.

It really isn't. One of the reasons it's so easy to make honor roll is that a lot of the top kids stop bothering with AMC 8 as soon as they reach AIME levels. My kid made the honor roll in early elementary, but as soon as he started AIME qualifying on the AMC 10 in 6th grade, he didn't see the point of continuing to do the AMC 8. I know a lot of other top kids in the same boat.

This is ridiculous.

It's not "easy". Your brilliant kid qualified for the AIME in 6th. Congrats!
You know who didn't qualify? Most of the 2000 TJ students in 9th-12th!

That's been true since TJ was created.