Yet another magnet thread. What are the personalities of the students at various magnets?

[Anonymous]

What are the typical professions of these graduates? Do they tend to remain close friends 20-39 years after graduating?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

How could you know how many white applicants there were?

The data has been shared publicly. I think it was obtained through a FOIRA request by MCCPTA a year or so back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

I know just go to the AoPS center and Gaithersburg and you can meet next year's SMCS students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You can prep at home with workbooks or what ever you choose to use. They also had free tutoring the past two years. So, stop making excuses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

How could you know how many white applicants there were?

The data has been shared publicly. I think it was obtained through a FOIRA request by MCCPTA a year or so back.

Link please. Also which year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You can prep at home with workbooks or what ever you choose to use. They also had free tutoring the past two years. So, stop making excuses.

Or you could not “prep” at all and just work hard in middle school and get in, like my kids and their friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

Seems to be a lot less than 35 this past year.

Link? We know so many white kids who applied and Asian and other race kids who applied, none got in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

How could you know how many white applicants there were?

The data has been shared publicly. I think it was obtained through a FOIRA request by MCCPTA a year or so back.

Link please. Also which year?

Go to the MCCPTA group on Facebook and look through their posts last year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

Seems to be a lot less than 35 this past year.

Link? We know so many white kids who applied and Asian and other race kids who applied, none got in.

The stats show that roughly 1 in 8 are accepted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Definitely wouldn’t characterize the magnet as predominantly UMC. MC yes, not UMC. But you prove the point here - assuming you are white and UMC yourself, your kid attended TPMS magnet and then CAP. That’s the common path for liberal TKPK upper middle class white kids.

Given that everyone thinks they are MC and no one thinks they are UMC or wealthy, we may not be using the same metric. But the point is that both CAP and Blair magnet draw from the same socioeconomic groups, contra the PP above. Lovely kids in both cohorts, but solidly professional class if you prefer that terminology.

Given the obvious cultural and racial differences it’s far fetched to claim they are the “same socioeconomic groups” even as you try to claim they are the same economically, which is debatable.

The groups are really different.
CAP draws almost exclusively from the DCC, while SMCS has kids a much wider area of the county making it much more difficult to get an invite. The kids applying to CAP are not competing against the Asian American students who live in the western suburbs.

They are both diverse in their own ways. As others have pointed out SMCS has a lot of 1st and 2nd generation immigrant children, mostly from Asia and Russia/Eastern Europe, but also Africa. CAP has fewer children of immigrants maybe because it's a communications/English heavy program? The stereotype is a white UMC Takoma Park child. I can think of exceptions including some children of immigrants in CAP but many more who fit that mold. As PP said earlier they are both full of nice and high achieving kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What are the typical professions of these graduates? Do they tend to remain close friends 20-39 years after graduating?

I don't know about the other magnets but Blair has an active alumni network. I've never seen that for other public high school programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Reality is they apply and don't get in.

The statistics beg to differ. There were something like 250 white applicants and roughly 35 got in the other year. This was not much different than the average which was roughly 100 got in out of 800 applicants.

Seems to be a lot less than 35 this past year.

Link? We know so many white kids who applied and Asian and other race kids who applied, none got in.

The stats show that roughly 1 in 8 are accepted.

They must be concentrated in certain parts of the county because I heard there were 6-10 or more from certain middle schools but 0 or 1 from others.

[Anonymous]

In the Choice report they refer to Blair science math as a "magnet" but they say CAP is an "application" program. What is the difference?

[Anonymous]

Page 82
https://www2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/siteassets/district/info/choice/choicestudyreport-version2-20160307.pdf

Wheaton and Kennedy LTI are also application programs not magnets

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In the Choice report they refer to Blair science math as a "magnet" but they say CAP is an "application" program. What is the difference?

MCPS now prefers to call all these programs "criteria based."

https://www2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/specialprograms/admissions/

The magnets draw students from well beyond the school's service area, while CAP, LTI, etc are more limited to DCC students.