TJ parents - would your kid do it again? Best tips for success for a positive experience?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dont colleges know that a 4.0 (w) from TJ is equivalent to a 4.5 or so from a non -TJ HS?

Maybe at UVA, but some young admissions assistant in another state won't necessarily know.

If you don’t know what TJ (and Stuyvesant, and Bronx Science, and Masterman, and so on) is/are, you are not making decisions in a college admissions office of any significance.

If you go over to the private school forum, they think all their schools are extra special too. I made the comment because another TJ parent found some of the big California universities didn't seem to know much about the rigor of TJ's curriculum. Some international universities we visited didn't know TJ from Podunk High.

I bet the CA admissions people know all about Lowell, Whitney and Harvard Westlake though.

I was actually surprised at how many people in other states seem to know about TJ. People from California, Illinois, Texas and New Jersey knew about the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You would be surprised but everyone knows TJ that is making these types of decisions.

Universities with many thousands of applicants don't always have their most qualified readers doing the first read. Some of them are part-timers or 22 year old new grads.

https://prepmaven.com/blog/applying/how-colleges-read-your-application-a-4-step-process/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm no sure.

If your kid is likely to win national science fairs or international math competitions, go for it.

If your kid is just really smart, they might be better off being at the top of their base high school. Life will be more relaxed for the whole family.

At TJ my kid was a NMSF but was one of about 150. While she would have been at star elsewhere, she was middle of the pack at TJ.

Yeah this is something we realized. For one kid TJ is absolutely the best place, but for our 2nd kid base HS is a much better fit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm no sure.

If your kid is likely to win national science fairs or international math competitions, go for it.

If your kid is just really smart, they might be better off being at the top of their base high school. Life will be more relaxed for the whole family.

At TJ my kid was a NMSF but was one of about 150. While she would have been at star elsewhere, she was middle of the pack at TJ.

Yeah this is something we realized. For one kid TJ is absolutely the best place, but for our 2nd kid base HS is a much better fit.

Even for kids where TJ isn't the right fit, it can be good to have had later in life. Even if the kid isn't at a top college, the study habits you have to develop there make that mid-tier college a breeze, which sets you up well for a normal white collar UMC life after college. Believe it or not, that's good enough for most people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm no sure.

If your kid is likely to win national science fairs or international math competitions, go for it.

If your kid is just really smart, they might be better off being at the top of their base high school. Life will be more relaxed for the whole family.

At TJ my kid was a NMSF but was one of about 150. While she would have been at star elsewhere, she was middle of the pack at TJ.

Yeah this is something we realized. For one kid TJ is absolutely the best place, but for our 2nd kid base HS is a much better fit.

Even for kids where TJ isn't the right fit, it can be good to have had later in life. Even if the kid isn't at a top college, the study habits you have to develop there make that mid-tier college a breeze, which sets you up well for a normal white collar UMC life after college. Believe it or not, that's good enough for most people.

Maybe college should be for doing college level work. Having students breezing through college because their high school was harder than college is perverse. Signed, a recovering TJ parent.

[Anonymous]

It seems you're relishing responding to your own forum posts, posing as multiple anonymous posters.

[Anonymous]

I have two kids there. It is not a perfect place. See the discussion on here about the math department. But both love it. They love their classmates, they love the fast paced instruction, they love the challenge for the most part. They love the exposure to so many things you can’t get a class in at your base school. Marine bio. Astronomy Prototyping. AI. DNA.

[Anonymous]

My kids got As in Spanish at TJ. Don’t get the hype about that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids got As in Spanish at TJ. Don’t get the hype about that.

Did they start with Spanish 1? I’ve heard it’s wicked hard because of a big disconnect with how much base schools teacher in 1 or 2 levels so coming in not at the start is super hard.

[Anonymous]

My kids came into Spanish 2.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids got As in Spanish at TJ. Don’t get the hype about that.

Did they start with Spanish 1? I’ve heard it’s wicked hard because of a big disconnect with how much base schools teacher in 1 or 2 levels so coming in not at the start is super hard.

Yes, TJ Spanish 2 is at the level as base school Spanish 3+. With base school Spanish, AP level would be 5th or 6th year of language, where as at TJ it is 4th year. Also TJ AP spanish has college level rigor built in, similar to all other courses, so it is indepth compared to base school AP Spanish.

[Anonymous]

French too becoming very tough recently and on par with Spanish now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dont colleges know that a 4.0 (w) from TJ is equivalent to a 4.5 or so from a non -TJ HS?

I've yet to meet a college that cares about anything except your unweighted GPA.

Much of the TJ class manages to keep the unweighted GPA above 3.0, there may be fewer than 5 to 10% that go below that. college admissions dont compare TJ to non-TJ, instead they compare one TJ applicant to another TJ applicant. So it is better to be in the top half of the class to begin with and stay there.

This is not exactly true, especially for schools like TJ that are known quantities for most of these top schools. They will take a 4.3 TJ kid ahead of a 4.3 kid from any base school all else being equal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dont colleges know that a 4.0 (w) from TJ is equivalent to a 4.5 or so from a non -TJ HS?

Maybe at UVA, but some young admissions assistant in another state won't necessarily know.

If you don’t know what TJ (and Stuyvesant, and Bronx Science, and Masterman, and so on) is/are, you are not making decisions in a college admissions office of any significance.

If you go over to the private school forum, they think all their schools are extra special too. I made the comment because another TJ parent found some of the big California universities didn't seem to know much about the rigor of TJ's curriculum. Some international universities we visited didn't know TJ from Podunk High.

I bet the CA admissions people know all about Lowell, Whitney and Harvard Westlake though.

If this happened (which I find unlikely), the people they were speaking to were not decision-makers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You would be surprised but everyone knows TJ that is making these types of decisions.

Universities with many thousands of applicants don't always have their most qualified readers doing the first read. Some of them are part-timers or 22 year old new grads.

https://prepmaven.com/blog/applying/how-colleges-read-your-application-a-4-step-process/

This is correct, and those individuals are mostly charged with getting the obvious "no" candidates out of the way at each particular school. Every school receives thousands of applications per year that are non-serious, and that's what this level of reader is charged with eliminating so that the people who make the real money can handle the real applicant pool.