Positive review for Poolesville SMACS program

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In terms of pure Magnet program ranking, Poolesville is #58 in Magnet Rankings whereas Blair was #173. Compare that to TJ in Virginia which is #1.

https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools...ankings/magnet-school-rankings

The rankings you are referencing evaluate the entire High School, not the programs in isolation based on the school's overall average on standardized tests. Blair has 3200 students and a 400 person magnet program. When it ever competes with Poolesville or TJ, #1 on that silly list, it most often comes out on top. Blair's program has a higher percentage of NMSF, a higher SAT average, wins more math and science competitions, and includes members of the US math and science olympiad.

You can easily pick out the emotion ("envy", "silly"), versus posting hard data. There are several claims made here without citations? I'm also dubious about anyone saying these are examples of Blair HS achievements, given the Magnet program pulls 400 students from across all of DCC? A few months back someone posted a claim that Blair scored higher on SATs, but that claim turned out to be false. It referenced an old SAT report and the number picked was only for "white males", which sort of tells you everything about the person who posted the information.

Poolesville, on the other hand, is an academically stronger school overall. The data supports this statement. 84.8% of it's students are college-ready (versus Blair's 62.9%), with a substantially lower dropout rate (≤5.0% compared to Blair's 8.8%).

https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/04757.pdf
https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/04152.pdf

DP. You're a clueless idiot. Blair's program has higher percentages of NMSF than any school in the county, has higher SAT average (around 1565), and produces more math and science scholars than any schools in the country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regeneron_Science_Talent_Search

I never knew Blair SMAC's SAT average was really 1565? If it was true, that would be an incredible feat. Please post the link as proof. Here's mine for the entire school, and the SMACs breakout was omitted:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/education/daily/graphics/montgomerySAT_090905.html

To all the other parents on this thread, this is why the pro-Blair crowd is not very truthful. It's like when MCPS issued a press release claiming that MCPS Class of 2014 achieved test scores higher than that are possible on the SAT?

"The Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) Class of 2014 earned a combined average SAT score of 1650, a two-point increase over the previous year and significantly higher than graduates from across the state of Maryland and the nation."
"African American graduates in MCPS scored an average of 1403 on the exam"
https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/press/index.aspx?page=showrelease&id=3607

"the range of possible scores on the SAT is 400–1600"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both the Poolesville and Blair SMACs are HS choice Magnet programs. Both offer classes that are not offered in other HS curriculum (especially advanced math). Both are non-lottery applications. However, both no longer use a Nationally-recognized test to qualify applicants, since MAP is only an indicator of "grade-level" progress and the course offerings are somewhat static, so it's not really a G-T program per-se, although most G-T kids are "grade-level" advanced, so there is significant overlap.

A factor that some college admissions boards may take note of are the national school rankings. College admissions boards don't normally take the time to examine each HS individually, so will rely upon past performance of students they received as well as well-known national rankings as indicators of success. For the latter, US News is probably the most widely-known national school ranking system, however, GreatSchools, Niche, Patch, etc. all are roughly comparable.

When schools went virtual, the makers of the CogAT test would not allow it to be given online so MCPS had no choice but to cancel it that year. Afterward, they decided to extend that pause to 3 years so they can evaluate whether it was necessary. These days similar tests like SATs have fallen in disfavor with many colleges since they don't provide any new information aside from who took the expensive prep course to improve their scores.

*Shrug* I'm not the one trying to get into a good college, but if you think it's good for your kid(s), okay by me.

These tests don't really tell us anything we didn't already know but act as a gatekeeper for less affluent schools where kids don't typically take CogAT prep classes

And you think parents aren’t prepping for MAP now instead? Getting rid of COGAT a mistake.

Exactly! Also, studying/prepping for MAP is way easier than cogat, especially for the super rich.

Not really I mean learning a ton of math is harder than learning the test format. Also, my sense is the CogAT was more heavily weighted and mostly just kept out poor kids who were talented but didn't prep.

Other way around hun, but it's a good attempt to fool everyone.

Although the Verbal portion might somewhat favor kids who's parents speak English well or prep their kids, the Quantitative and Non-Verbal Battery were designed to help balance out kids who might not have access to tutoring and prep resources. That would be easy to determine by a CogAT screener (ex. a B profile, with verbal as the outlyer).

If anything, I think by dropping CogAT and adopting MAP, MCPS royally screwed kids with fewer access to resources, since MAP favors the preppers! Such an irony this happened under McKnight's watch!

Nope. Both (quant and nv) on coager are coachable. Verbal too. I think it even still had analogies, the most coachable of old sat sections. Raven matrices is definitely coachable. It's all ripe for test prep.

And that's why some parents love CogAT. They can use $$$ on prep to give their kids an advantage while proclaiming it's not preppable to discourage others. It's just one more gatekeeper and doesn't provide any new insights into a student than those they have without it.

[Anonymous]

My kid was in PHS SMCS. We feel he got the best education in MD there and excelled there. His career trajectory has been excellent and being from PHS opened up many doors for him.

I am sure that many people who are debating how good one school is compared to another are the ones whose kids did not reach their full potential in their schools, but somehow they want to claim some reflected glory.

These are people who want to find winners and losers. You can come from the worst HS, but if you are doing very well in education, career, social life, mental health - then you are winner.

You can graduate from the best school but was the worst performing student who squandered the opportunities, what difference it makes in your life?

People who are endlessly debating here should ask what are their own kid's accomplishments? Even Harvard (actually, especially Harvard) have students who are struggling and failing and they amount to not much careerwise later on.

[Anonymous]

Wonder what is the motivation of posters bashing up magnet programs on this board? Are they from central office? Or just people with hidden agenda?

Yes, magnet programs are being diluted, degraded and dismantled around the country. MCPS is no different. Parents just need to find alternate solutions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wonder what is the motivation of posters bashing up magnet programs on this board? Are they from central office? Or just people with hidden agenda?

Yes, magnet programs are being diluted, degraded and dismantled around the country. MCPS is no different. Parents just need to find alternate solutions.

Maybe CO or people with an agenda.

I have a kid at Blair SMCS now and one who graduated a few years ago and it seems stronger than ever now so have to disagree about dilution. I think that's just a story bitter parents like to tell themselves since it's harder to game admissions now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wonder what is the motivation of posters bashing up magnet programs on this board? Are they from central office? Or just people with hidden agenda?

Yes, magnet programs are being diluted, degraded and dismantled around the country. MCPS is no different. Parents just need to find alternate solutions.

Maybe CO or people with an agenda.

I have a kid at Blair SMCS now and one who graduated a few years ago and it seems stronger than ever now so have to disagree about dilution. I think that's just a story bitter parents like to tell themselves since it's harder to game admissions now.

Magnet Admission at Blair is already gamed.

Another poster said there were 400 in the Blair magnet? The letter MCPS sent to all the colleges says the Magnet program consists of only 100 students.

"Each year after careful screening of over 750 applicants from sixteen of the twenty-five high schools in Montgomery County, about 100 students are accepted for admission into the ninth grade."
https://mbhs.edu/departments/magnet/ParentResources/MagnetProfile.pdf

That means that the other 300 are local admits just riding the coattails of the 100 real Magnet students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both the Poolesville and Blair SMACs are HS choice Magnet programs. Both offer classes that are not offered in other HS curriculum (especially advanced math). Both are non-lottery applications. However, both no longer use a Nationally-recognized test to qualify applicants, since MAP is only an indicator of "grade-level" progress and the course offerings are somewhat static, so it's not really a G-T program per-se, although most G-T kids are "grade-level" advanced, so there is significant overlap.

A factor that some college admissions boards may take note of are the national school rankings. College admissions boards don't normally take the time to examine each HS individually, so will rely upon past performance of students they received as well as well-known national rankings as indicators of success. For the latter, US News is probably the most widely-known national school ranking system, however, GreatSchools, Niche, Patch, etc. all are roughly comparable.

When schools went virtual, the makers of the CogAT test would not allow it to be given online so MCPS had no choice but to cancel it that year. Afterward, they decided to extend that pause to 3 years so they can evaluate whether it was necessary. These days similar tests like SATs have fallen in disfavor with many colleges since they don't provide any new information aside from who took the expensive prep course to improve their scores.

*Shrug* I'm not the one trying to get into a good college, but if you think it's good for your kid(s), okay by me.

These tests don't really tell us anything we didn't already know but act as a gatekeeper for less affluent schools where kids don't typically take CogAT prep classes

And you think parents aren’t prepping for MAP now instead? Getting rid of COGAT a mistake.

Exactly! Also, studying/prepping for MAP is way easier than cogat, especially for the super rich.

Not really I mean learning a ton of math is harder than learning the test format. Also, my sense is the CogAT was more heavily weighted and mostly just kept out poor kids who were talented but didn't prep.

Other way around hun, but it's a good attempt to fool everyone.

Although the Verbal portion might somewhat favor kids who's parents speak English well or prep their kids, the Quantitative and Non-Verbal Battery were designed to help balance out kids who might not have access to tutoring and prep resources. That would be easy to determine by a CogAT screener (ex. a B profile, with verbal as the outlyer).

If anything, I think by dropping CogAT and adopting MAP, MCPS royally screwed kids with fewer access to resources, since MAP favors the preppers! Such an irony this happened under McKnight's watch!

Nope. Both (quant and nv) on coager are coachable. Verbal too. I think it even still had analogies, the most coachable of old sat sections. Raven matrices is definitely coachable. It's all ripe for test prep.

Please string together sentences with proper grammar, spelling, punctuation and the correct analogies for the corresponding exams, then someone might take you seriously. Honestly, you aren't even credible writing something like this. If nothing else, it's evidence that coaching doesn't work, or that at least you weren't the beneficiary of any.

[Anonymous]

100 x 4 = 400. One hundred students per grade, so 400 magnet students total at Blair……… not 300 local admits riding coattails…. c’mon man

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wonder what is the motivation of posters bashing up magnet programs on this board? Are they from central office? Or just people with hidden agenda?

Yes, magnet programs are being diluted, degraded and dismantled around the country. MCPS is no different. Parents just need to find alternate solutions.

Maybe CO or people with an agenda.

I have a kid at Blair SMCS now and one who graduated a few years ago and it seems stronger than ever now so have to disagree about dilution. I think that's just a story bitter parents like to tell themselves since it's harder to game admissions now.

Magnet Admission at Blair is already gamed.

Another poster said there were 400 in the Blair magnet? The letter MCPS sent to all the colleges says the Magnet program consists of only 100 students.

"Each year after careful screening of over 750 applicants from sixteen of the twenty-five high schools in Montgomery County, about 100 students are accepted for admission into the ninth grade."
https://mbhs.edu/departments/magnet/ParentResources/MagnetProfile.pdf

That means that the other 300 are local admits just riding the coattails of the 100 real Magnet students.

No it doesn't. There are only hundred students per grade and four grades in total.

[Anonymous]

Hmm. if it's 400 total across all grades, and local Blair students have to compete along with everyone else into the Magnet program, then I admit I was wrong.

[Anonymous]

Blair smac sends 5 times more students to mit than PHS smac. That says it all!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In terms of pure Magnet program ranking, Poolesville is #58 in Magnet Rankings whereas Blair was #173. Compare that to TJ in Virginia which is #1.

https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools...ankings/magnet-school-rankings

The rankings you are referencing evaluate the entire High School, not the programs in isolation based on the school's overall average on standardized tests. Blair has 3200 students and a 400 person magnet program. When it ever competes with Poolesville or TJ, #1 on that silly list, it most often comes out on top. Blair's program has a higher percentage of NMSF, a higher SAT average, wins more math and science competitions, and includes members of the US math and science olympiad.

You can easily pick out the emotion ("envy", "silly"), versus posting hard data. There are several claims made here without citations? I'm also dubious about anyone saying these are examples of Blair HS achievements, given the Magnet program pulls 400 students from across all of DCC? A few months back someone posted a claim that Blair scored higher on SATs, but that claim turned out to be false. It referenced an old SAT report and the number picked was only for "white males", which sort of tells you everything about the person who posted the information.

Poolesville, on the other hand, is an academically stronger school overall. The data supports this statement. 84.8% of it's students are college-ready (versus Blair's 62.9%), with a substantially lower dropout rate (≤5.0% compared to Blair's 8.8%).

https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/04757.pdf
https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/04152.pdf

DP. You're a clueless idiot. Blair's program has higher percentages of NMSF than any school in the county, has higher SAT average (around 1565), and produces more math and science scholars than any schools in the country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regeneron_Science_Talent_Search

I never knew Blair SMAC's SAT average was really 1565? If it was true, that would be an incredible feat. Please post the link as proof. Here's mine for the entire school, and the SMACs breakout was omitted:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/education/daily/graphics/montgomerySAT_090905.html

To all the other parents on this thread, this is why the pro-Blair crowd is not very truthful. It's like when MCPS issued a press release claiming that MCPS Class of 2014 achieved test scores higher than that are possible on the SAT?

"The Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) Class of 2014 earned a combined average SAT score of 1650, a two-point increase over the previous year and significantly higher than graduates from across the state of Maryland and the nation."
"African American graduates in MCPS scored an average of 1403 on the exam"
https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/press/index.aspx?page=showrelease&id=3607

"the range of possible scores on the SAT is 400–1600"

Between 2005 and 2016 the SAT was scored out of 2400, not 1600.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Blair smac sends 5 times more students to mit than PHS smac. That says it all!

I have to agree. The caliber of students at poolesville is no where near the same as Blair, I believe a good part of this reason is the teachers at poolesville smacs are pretty terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hmm. if it's 400 total across all grades, and local Blair students have to compete along with everyone else into the Magnet program, then I admit I was wrong.

Just to be clear, this was also in the link you posted if you went further down. 430 magnet kids in a school of nearly 3200.

[Anonymous]

Blair also Consistently has more NMSF than any other schools (which always amuses me as English is doubled).