Level IV at Fairview vs White Oaks

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We stayed in Fairview for DD and probably will for DS next year, too. Fairview doesn't have Math/Science Olympic either. Having Level III kids in the class is not an issue - you can't tell which are Level 3 or 4 anyway. The only reason we'd consider WO is if classes were significantly smaller.

Regards if the class are significantly smaller, it is really depends on the number of students they got. My DD last year class split into two classes in the last minute (on the date of open house!) because one more kid sign up and WO got approval from FCPS to open one more class. So they only have 17 in a class instead of 35! We got many new joiners this year but still only have 21 students. While some grade they only have one class which have around 30 kids! For my prediction, it probably will only has one class for 3rd grade AAP next year?

We have a third grader at white oaks this year. With COVID, the numbers were down and the class has 30 kids. I would say compared to our base, Laurel Ridge, the school does not have the sort of warm touch from admin and I won't comment on the teacher beyond saying the AAP curriculum is what it is. If we had local level IV, we would have not moved, but we don't and there's no advanced math until 5th at Laurel Ridge. It is the ONLY Robinson school without local level IV. The class does get a handful from each of the feeders but the bulk are Laurel Ridge kids, it seems. Weirdly, there's like two white oaks kids in the center class.

In some ways, I find the whole AAP thing to be so strange because it is such a big thing in other parts of the county. No one cares here, really. All of the schools are good. Lake Braddock, Robinson and Woodson (our AP pupil placement option) are good. There's no stress or worrying your kid is missing out unless you care about TJ but Lake Braddock as a middle school isn't a big feeder, so you are kind of screwed there, fwiw.

I don’t understand why Laurel Ridge does not have a LLIV program or earlier advanced math. It is like they pride themselves on not being big on AAP to the detriment of that subgroup of kids. It would likely reduce the number of kids in immersion, but the school is huge and big enough to support both.

It's an immersion school. Two classrooms in each grade are immersion and two classrooms aren't so you run into a space issue and the issue that there's only one classroom available for local level IV. The nutty thing is that the school does do advanced math in 5th, but offers it both in English and Spanish. I think those grades do flexible grouping and shuffle between the four or so teachers classrooms. It's logistically complicated and makes no sense -- which is why the centers were created in the first damn place. The problem is that other schools without special programs then jumped at the opportunity to open local level IV to keep high scoring students and make acceleration available to more base kids. Laurel Ridge is also an ED/Autism center so it takes on a lot of kids with special needs (and honestly does a very good job with those students).

Where we are now? The AAP system in this pyramid is sort of broken. You have a center that houses a single class of third graders and feeds to a different 7-12 secondary and the base of 90 percent of the kids in the center. You have a bunch of base schools except for one running local level IV classrooms feeding into the 7-12 school that 90 percent of that single class of AAP center's kids are zoned for.

The only reason people aren't up in arms is that the schools are all uniformly "good" and kids do well generally, there's little poverty, a sprinkle of people of color, and the most important point is NO ONE CARE ABOUT TJ. So, taking all of those things, you basically end up with White Oaks being another Local Level IV disguised as an AAP center.

Fox Mill is a language immerssion program that is starting a Local Level IV next year. We have Advanced Math starting in 3rd grade in Japanese and English. the school has said that the they will be including the JI kids who were accepted into AAP in the Local Level IV program. I suspect that the AAP/JI kids will join the Level IV class for LA and Social Studies, the way that they would have swapped to a different Teacher for LA and Social Studies in the regular class. Advanced Math is already taught in Japanese so that is not much of a hurdle to cross.

The emails that were sent to the parents at Fox Mill made it clear that all ES will have a Local Level IV program in three years, so other schools will have to figure it out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We stayed in Fairview for DD and probably will for DS next year, too. Fairview doesn't have Math/Science Olympic either. Having Level III kids in the class is not an issue - you can't tell which are Level 3 or 4 anyway. The only reason we'd consider WO is if classes were significantly smaller.

Regards if the class are significantly smaller, it is really depends on the number of students they got. My DD last year class split into two classes in the last minute (on the date of open house!) because one more kid sign up and WO got approval from FCPS to open one more class. So they only have 17 in a class instead of 35! We got many new joiners this year but still only have 21 students. While some grade they only have one class which have around 30 kids! For my prediction, it probably will only has one class for 3rd grade AAP next year?

We have a third grader at white oaks this year. With COVID, the numbers were down and the class has 30 kids. I would say compared to our base, Laurel Ridge, the school does not have the sort of warm touch from admin and I won't comment on the teacher beyond saying the AAP curriculum is what it is. If we had local level IV, we would have not moved, but we don't and there's no advanced math until 5th at Laurel Ridge. It is the ONLY Robinson school without local level IV. The class does get a handful from each of the feeders but the bulk are Laurel Ridge kids, it seems. Weirdly, there's like two white oaks kids in the center class.

In some ways, I find the whole AAP thing to be so strange because it is such a big thing in other parts of the county. No one cares here, really. All of the schools are good. Lake Braddock, Robinson and Woodson (our AP pupil placement option) are good. There's no stress or worrying your kid is missing out unless you care about TJ but Lake Braddock as a middle school isn't a big feeder, so you are kind of screwed there, fwiw.

I don’t understand why Laurel Ridge does not have a LLIV program or earlier advanced math. It is like they pride themselves on not being big on AAP to the detriment of that subgroup of kids. It would likely reduce the number of kids in immersion, but the school is huge and big enough to support both.

It's an immersion school. Two classrooms in each grade are immersion and two classrooms aren't so you run into a space issue and the issue that there's only one classroom available for local level IV. The nutty thing is that the school does do advanced math in 5th, but offers it both in English and Spanish. I think those grades do flexible grouping and shuffle between the four or so teachers classrooms. It's logistically complicated and makes no sense -- which is why the centers were created in the first damn place. The problem is that other schools without special programs then jumped at the opportunity to open local level IV to keep high scoring students and make acceleration available to more base kids. Laurel Ridge is also an ED/Autism center so it takes on a lot of kids with special needs (and honestly does a very good job with those students).

Where we are now? The AAP system in this pyramid is sort of broken. You have a center that houses a single class of third graders and feeds to a different 7-12 secondary and the base of 90 percent of the kids in the center. You have a bunch of base schools except for one running local level IV classrooms feeding into the 7-12 school that 90 percent of that single class of AAP center's kids are zoned for.

The only reason people aren't up in arms is that the schools are all uniformly "good" and kids do well generally, there's little poverty, a sprinkle of people of color, and the most important point is NO ONE CARE ABOUT TJ. So, taking all of those things, you basically end up with White Oaks being another Local Level IV disguised as an AAP center.

Fox Mill is a language immerssion program that is starting a Local Level IV next year. We have Advanced Math starting in 3rd grade in Japanese and English. the school has said that the they will be including the JI kids who were accepted into AAP in the Local Level IV program. I suspect that the AAP/JI kids will join the Level IV class for LA and Social Studies, the way that they would have swapped to a different Teacher for LA and Social Studies in the regular class. Advanced Math is already taught in Japanese so that is not much of a hurdle to cross.

The emails that were sent to the parents at Fox Mill made it clear that all ES will have a Local Level IV program in three years, so other schools will have to figure it out.

Fox mill isn't an ED center or a center with comprehensive autism services for students outside of its boundary. It also in peak TJ crazy land, so I imagine the principal was pressured to do this -- though I do think it is very impressive to offer Japanese immersion and level IV math services in 3rd grade. They must have a very happy staff because staffing for immersion is a nightmare, fwiw.

I don't know why people around here don't care about TJ. I will say my own home is zoned for Woodson for AP placement and Robinson otherwise and yes, people do not seem nuts about TJ or AAP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's an interesting question PP. The Lake Braddock, Robinson and West Springfield pyramids do not send many to TJ despite being much closer to the school than say Carson.

I honestly have no clue why. In terms of demographics, the area is uniformly middle/upper middle class with most parents holding a college degree. It does have a military bent, so that may explain it since TJ's requirements do not map well to other schools.

But truthfully, I think parents are just very content. The school peer groups are great and as the other poster mentioned, AAP for Robinson isn't a big deal. My own child attends white oaks and my other child qualified this year but we will keep him at the base school in local level IV. I'd rather have him in his local school. I think a lot of other parents feel this way fwiw.

I think that for a lot of parents in these pyramids, TJ just isn't a huge "must get in and do lots of prep for." It's almost a point of pride in Burke/surrounding areas that it is a "normal area with normal soccer mom families." Of course it is NOVA, so that's not true, but about as true as you'll get for an area full of people with advanced degrees. I used to teach MS in one of these pyramids, and had a lot of kids say they weren't interested in a STEM career, so they saw no need to go to TJ. I don't think TJ is seen as a status symbol like it is in some other pyramids.

Interesting. We moved here from DC, and having experienced a community with kids all in different schools, we wanted nothing but the ability to keep them in neighborhood schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's an interesting question PP. The Lake Braddock, Robinson and West Springfield pyramids do not send many to TJ despite being much closer to the school than say Carson.

I honestly have no clue why. In terms of demographics, the area is uniformly middle/upper middle class with most parents holding a college degree. It does have a military bent, so that may explain it since TJ's requirements do not map well to other schools.

But truthfully, I think parents are just very content. The school peer groups are great and as the other poster mentioned, AAP for Robinson isn't a big deal. My own child attends white oaks and my other child qualified this year but we will keep him at the base school in local level IV. I'd rather have him in his local school. I think a lot of other parents feel this way fwiw.

I think that for a lot of parents in these pyramids, TJ just isn't a huge "must get in and do lots of prep for." It's almost a point of pride in Burke/surrounding areas that it is a "normal area with normal soccer mom families." Of course it is NOVA, so that's not true, but about as true as you'll get for an area full of people with advanced degrees. I used to teach MS in one of these pyramids, and had a lot of kids say they weren't interested in a STEM career, so they saw no need to go to TJ. I don't think TJ is seen as a status symbol like it is in some other pyramids.

We're in the Robinson pyramid. 2 of my kids are very STEM-focused but we don't view TJ as a necessary or even desirable step in their career paths. It's not worth it, for the environment, the stress, the commute, or the education considering everything they'd have to sacrifice and put up with in return. If one were intent on it, we'd probably be okay with the idea but we're definitely not encouraging or facilitating it. We also have 2 other kids; one wants to join the military and the other wants to be a ballet-dancing zoologist who writes books on the weekends. I think if we were a TJ-or-bust family, we wouldn't have moved here honestly. There are other middle schools that are more known as TJ-feeders so we probably would have focused on those instead. I'm pretty sure we're a fairly typical Robinson family in that regard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We stayed in Fairview for DD and probably will for DS next year, too. Fairview doesn't have Math/Science Olympic either. Having Level III kids in the class is not an issue - you can't tell which are Level 3 or 4 anyway. The only reason we'd consider WO is if classes were significantly smaller.

Regards if the class are significantly smaller, it is really depends on the number of students they got. My DD last year class split into two classes in the last minute (on the date of open house!) because one more kid sign up and WO got approval from FCPS to open one more class. So they only have 17 in a class instead of 35! We got many new joiners this year but still only have 21 students. While some grade they only have one class which have around 30 kids! For my prediction, it probably will only has one class for 3rd grade AAP next year?

We have a third grader at white oaks this year. With COVID, the numbers were down and the class has 30 kids. I would say compared to our base, Laurel Ridge, the school does not have the sort of warm touch from admin and I won't comment on the teacher beyond saying the AAP curriculum is what it is. If we had local level IV, we would have not moved, but we don't and there's no advanced math until 5th at Laurel Ridge. It is the ONLY Robinson school without local level IV. The class does get a handful from each of the feeders but the bulk are Laurel Ridge kids, it seems. Weirdly, there's like two white oaks kids in the center class.

In some ways, I find the whole AAP thing to be so strange because it is such a big thing in other parts of the county. No one cares here, really. All of the schools are good. Lake Braddock, Robinson and Woodson (our AP pupil placement option) are good. There's no stress or worrying your kid is missing out unless you care about TJ but Lake Braddock as a middle school isn't a big feeder, so you are kind of screwed there, fwiw.

I don’t understand why Laurel Ridge does not have a LLIV program or earlier advanced math. It is like they pride themselves on not being big on AAP to the detriment of that subgroup of kids. It would likely reduce the number of kids in immersion, but the school is huge and big enough to support both.

It's an immersion school. Two classrooms in each grade are immersion and two classrooms aren't so you run into a space issue and the issue that there's only one classroom available for local level IV. The nutty thing is that the school does do advanced math in 5th, but offers it both in English and Spanish. I think those grades do flexible grouping and shuffle between the four or so teachers classrooms. It's logistically complicated and makes no sense -- which is why the centers were created in the first damn place. The problem is that other schools without special programs then jumped at the opportunity to open local level IV to keep high scoring students and make acceleration available to more base kids. Laurel Ridge is also an ED/Autism center so it takes on a lot of kids with special needs (and honestly does a very good job with those students).

Where we are now? The AAP system in this pyramid is sort of broken. You have a center that houses a single class of third graders and feeds to a different 7-12 secondary and the base of 90 percent of the kids in the center. You have a bunch of base schools except for one running local level IV classrooms feeding into the 7-12 school that 90 percent of that single class of AAP center's kids are zoned for.

The only reason people aren't up in arms is that the schools are all uniformly "good" and kids do well generally, there's little poverty, a sprinkle of people of color, and the most important point is NO ONE CARE ABOUT TJ. So, taking all of those things, you basically end up with White Oaks being another Local Level IV disguised as an AAP center.

Fox Mill is a language immerssion program that is starting a Local Level IV next year. We have Advanced Math starting in 3rd grade in Japanese and English. the school has said that the they will be including the JI kids who were accepted into AAP in the Local Level IV program. I suspect that the AAP/JI kids will join the Level IV class for LA and Social Studies, the way that they would have swapped to a different Teacher for LA and Social Studies in the regular class. Advanced Math is already taught in Japanese so that is not much of a hurdle to cross.

The emails that were sent to the parents at Fox Mill made it clear that all ES will have a Local Level IV program in three years, so other schools will have to figure it out.

Fox mill isn't an ED center or a center with comprehensive autism services for students outside of its boundary. It also in peak TJ crazy land, so I imagine the principal was pressured to do this -- though I do think it is very impressive to offer Japanese immersion and level IV math services in 3rd grade. They must have a very happy staff because staffing for immersion is a nightmare, fwiw.

I don't know why people around here don't care about TJ. I will say my own home is zoned for Woodson for AP placement and Robinson otherwise and yes, people do not seem nuts about TJ or AAP.

I understand that the schools are different. I don't think that the ED center of Autism Services really effect that ability of the school to have Local Level IV. My take away from the process is that all schools are going to have a Local Level IV in three years, Fox Mill sure did not seem interested in adding a Local Level IV program. The Teachers I had spoken with seemed dismissive of AAP. I got the distinct impression that they added Advanced Math for JI a few years back because they were losing too many JI kids to Oak Hill for AAP. I could be 100% wrong but that was my impression. I have no idea about immersion staffing being problematic, they seem to have the same team of Teachers for ages and everyone in the program is highly enthusiastic. It has been a great experience. Perhaps it will be an opportunity to develop a program that will work for other schools.