So does the essay even matter? Seems like if you have a high MAP score you get in to all… |
Most people with high scores can write decent essays. Someone tossed out a number that 800 people apply to 100 seats in magnet. When you consider people applying to 2 or 3 magnets, and people declining invites, you end up with a pretty high acceptance rate for applications. |
Really? How does that math work out, exactly? |
It matters more for kids who aren't a slam dunk. |
No, and the criteria they use is public information. It used to be on their website. No idea if it still is, but it's also covered in the program overview that they put on YouTube every year. |
What grade for those scores |
Let's take the 3 most selective magnets - SMCS, IB, and Eco. 100 attendees each, 800 applications each, but each applicant applies to average of 2 programs. That's 300 seats for 1200 kids. Now figure some kids stay at homeschool after getting admitted, so the number of admits is even higher |
The level of competitiveness really varies widely by magnet. Most kids we know applied to all 3. Very few got in first round to any of them and usually the ones we know who got in got in to 2/3 or 3/3.
SMCS at Blair is like Harvard. The yield is crazy. RMIB has good yield too but tons of kids get off the wait list for that because so many of those kids end up going to Blair. Poolesville is similar. Many of those kid are choosing between Poolesville and other magnets. |
Eco is not relevant and is much less selective. Over 1000 applies to IB and over 800 to Blair. Assuming one kid applies to 1.5 programs, you get 1200 kids for 200 seats - 1/6 i.e. more selective than most colleges. Very few stay at their base schools, especially for Blair. There is almost no movement on the WL. |
Last year one of my children applied to SMCS. They got in. It seemed much easier than expected. Many of their peers with lower grades and scores also got in. |
We went to SMCS open house yesterday. Last year 900 applied; they accepted 140 and 127 enrolled. Their yield is above Harvard's. |
I think you do need to differentiate between first round and wait list admissions. The first round is really selective for Poolesville ecology because they are getting basically the same applicant pools as Blair/Poolesville SMCS and RMIB. They do take more off the wait list. |
Did they explain why they took so many more this year? Usually there are only 100 places. |
They said they invited 140 aiming at a smaller class but almost everyone accepted so they ended with a larger class. This surprised me because I thought they sent out 100 in the first round and then added more from the waitlist, as some students declined. This sounded like there was no waitlist but actually there was (he mentioned it). A little bit confusing but there was no opportunity to clarify. |
Where do you find the Fall scores? |