Wow -- look at the college placement of my cousin's DD school in SFL....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP here. The vast najority of the students at this public school are not minorities (unless they are Asian, which doesn't help in the admissions process), so they ido not benefit from affirmative action, as several of the students on the OP's relative's school did.

Shame on you, PP.

[Anonymous]

If these posts don't clearly demonstrate the East Coast elitism that exists here in DC nothing does.

[Anonymous]

I don't think these kids referenced on the OP is getting a pass simply because they are minorities. They obviously have been well educated at their FL school; some were accepted by 2 and 3 Ives. I don't believe the Ives will accept an applicant based on race only-- there must have been viable academic substance to these kids who were accept to the Ives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think these kids referenced on the OP is getting a pass simply because they are minorities. They obviously have been well educated at their FL school; some were accepted by 2 and 3 Ives. I don't believe the Ives will accept an applicant based on race only-- there must have been viable academic substance to these kids who were accept to the Ives.

Exactly. Shall we count how many of the white kids in PP's school got in because of athletics or legacies?

[Anonymous]

And don't forget the affirmative action you get for being male.

[Anonymous]

People seem to think that because you live in DC that you have the smartest students and best schools. How many people move in and out of the DC area all the time? These parents that have lived in DC and were "smart" then did not become less smart after leaving DC and then give birth to dumb children just because they relocate somewhere else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP here. The vast najority of the students at this public school are not minorities (unless they are Asian, which doesn't help in the admissions process), so they ido not benefit from affirmative action, as several of the students on the OP's relative's school did.

Shame on you, PP.

Bakke 2.0?

[Anonymous]

Is this an established school or one of those "segregation academies" that are common there?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How does it stack up against DC's top schools? Good return on the dollar.

Well, St. Albans had 20% go Ivy this year, and 30% last year -- percentage-wise, that Florida school with 355 seniors would need 70 kids in the senior class going to the Ivies to match that. Not saying Ivy admissions is the only metric for college admissions -- it clearly is not -- but that seemed to be what that school was highlighting with the photos of the kids on the link to the website.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How does it stack up against DC's top schools? Good return on the dollar.

Well, St. Albans had 20% go Ivy this year, and 30% last year -- percentage-wise, that Florida school with 355 seniors would need 70 kids in the senior class going to the Ivies to match that. Not saying Ivy admissions is the only metric for college admissions -- it clearly is not -- but that seemed to be what that school was highlighting with the photos of the kids on the link to the website.

The 10% National Merit Semifinalist percentage is good -- it is above most independent schools in this area with the exception of Sidwell, NCS, and GDS. Sounds like a pretty strong cohort at that school, but you can't look at numerators (number admitted to Ivies or NMSFs) without denominators (class size) or you're not really getting a full picture.

[Anonymous]

Edited (meant STA rather than NCS, and some years GDS does not have 10% NMSFs):

The 10% National Merit Semifinalist percentage is good -- it is above most independent schools in this area with the exception of Sidwell, St. Albans, and, some years, GDS and NCS. Sounds like a pretty strong cohort at that school, but you can't look at numerators (number admitted to Ivies or NMSFs) without denominators (class size) or you're not really getting a full picture.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The website looks completely fake. Read through the links, its very odd and stilted with many dead ends. The name of the school is referred to differently on different places. The college grad placements look completely fake and no school does this by the way. I wonder who is behind this and why.

[Anonymous]

Actually the bottom number is meaningless.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:... St. Albans had 20% go Ivy this year, and 30% last year ...

I hate to risk taking this thread off-track, but I don't want to let this rough assertion stand unchallenged, since that may lead others on DCUM to quote (or misquote) it as gospel. While the percentages quoted (20% for class of 2013, and 30% for class of 2012) are certainly possible, I suspect they might be slightly (and surely inadvertently) inaccurate.

STA posts a partial list of common college destinations for the past 5 years on its website (http://www.stalbansschool.org/page.aspx?pid=2722). That list identifies 67 grads going to 6 of the 8 Ivy colleges, out of a class of roughly 78 grads per year (390 grads over 5 years). Taken at face value, that suggests 17% Ivy attendance each year. Given how strong a school STA is though, it's reasonable to assume some STA grads also chose the other 2 Ivy colleges not listed (Brown and Cornell). Since the cut-off for the list is 6 grads attending, there must be 0-5 grads attending Brown and Cornell. So the possible average Ivy% for STA grads in the past 5 years ranges from 17.1-19.7%, with a midpoint at 18%.

So to be clear, it is mathematically possible PP is correct that 20% of the 2013 class, and 30% of the 2012 class, are attending Ivy colleges. However, if that's accurate, then only an average of 8% of STA grads from the prior three years attended Ivy league colleges. Given how consistently strong a school STA is, I think it is unlikely STA's Ivy% over 2009-13 looked like this: 8%, 8%, 8%, 30%, 20%.

Sorry to go on about this; I'm sure some will mock me for wasting the time to do these calculations. However, I've seen many situations on DCUM over the years where someone will make a claim that goes untested, and then that inaccurate claim gets repeated over and over as gospel truth. I don't want to see that happen here.

I have a lot of respect for STA, so none of this is meant as criticism. 18% Ivy attendance year-after-year is an amazing statistic, and I'd hate to see it cheapened by other posters who might inaccurately mischaracterize PP's 20%/30% numbers. I also don't mean to criticize the PP I quoted, because she probably was just speaking loosely and not meaning for her numbers to be taken literally. (And of course it's also possible PP was entirely correct that the 2012-13 numbers are 30%/20%, and the 2009-11 numbers actually are 8%.)

Anyway, sorry again to clog the thread. Thanks for being forgiving of my obsessiveness about details.

Sam2

[Anonymous]

Also, FWIW, I don't think OP's Florida school should be taken lightly. It looks like a very strong school with roughly 10% NMSFs. That's better than many (but not all) DC/MD/VA schools. I believe Florida does have a lower NMSF cut-off score than DC/MD/VA, but 10% is a great number regardless. Also, the Florida school's SAT scores look very solid.

Sam2