S/O Building a Rigorous HS Experience Outside the Magnets

[Anonymous]

Hon Phys 9th grade, skip req sci 10th (take Anat/phys eg, then AP DP bio 11th, AP DP chem 12. This works if managing rigor at hon alg 2 in 9 and also AP 9+ social studies track. Get a proven record of managing early APs, avoid lower speed h bio and chem early, ???, profit.

[Anonymous]

Op you’re getting advice about which classes to take but you need to think out of the box. Nowadays you can get tutoring for just about any topic, so have the kid choose and build a customized program around that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The other post about rigor made me think about how we might pool our collective knowledge to help new HS parents support their kids in building a rigorous HS path outside the Magnets.

Right now, it seems like the standard guidance really short-changes kids who are ready for a challenge, particularly in 9th and 10th, with the "Honors for All" model. So, if you were helping a bright kid choose classes for 9th and 10th, what would you advise?

It seems to me from reading previous responses that there is a theme. There are kids/parents who want a challenging curriculum because their student is innately intellectually curious and they want to explore that. Those kids will get joy out of learning on third party platforms, taking one off DE classes, exploring interests independently, etc.

There is a second set of kids/parents who want to maximize rigor that they can put in a college application to get into the highest school possible. Those kids are looking for a different outcome so the answers people are giving about kids that are just intellectually curious aren’t meeting that need.

I views these as two totally different types of students. Sometimes they overlap but certainly not by definition.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of this will be school-dependent, but generally it is good to take a couple AP or IB classes in 9th and 10th. Otherwise they will be bored by the content in Honors.

Some schools now have AP Seminar available as an alternative to Hon English 10. AP Gov in 9th, then APUSH in 10th is a good pathway if your school provides it.

Honors Algebra 2 and Honors Precalc can be tough classes.

AP Computer Science Principles is also good for 9th graders, because it's not hard, it counts as a tech credit, and gives them some experience with an AP exam.

There’s a poster who keeps saying AP CS principles isn’t that hard, yet only 12 pct of students nationwide get 5s on that exam. Setting a 9th grader up for a suboptimal AP score should be done with a lot of careful consideration.

[Anonymous]

I would also ask for AP PE, talk to your counselor. Don't settle for regular PE class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op you’re getting advice about which classes to take but you need to think out of the box. Nowadays you can get tutoring for just about any topic, so have the kid choose and build a customized program around that.

This is indicative of the problem.

Not that thinking outside of the box is bad...at all. Instead, that, in order to help navigate one's DC towards an academic experience that best matches their interests and abilitiies, one needs to think outside of the box that MCPS has created via the marraige of a lack of clear, timely & actionable information with the fundamentally different levels of experience offered across schools/pyramids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of this will be school-dependent, but generally it is good to take a couple AP or IB classes in 9th and 10th. Otherwise they will be bored by the content in Honors.

Some schools now have AP Seminar available as an alternative to Hon English 10. AP Gov in 9th, then APUSH in 10th is a good pathway if your school provides it.

Honors Algebra 2 and Honors Precalc can be tough classes.

AP Computer Science Principles is also good for 9th graders, because it's not hard, it counts as a tech credit, and gives them some experience with an AP exam.

There’s a poster who keeps saying AP CS principles isn’t that hard, yet only 12 pct of students nationwide get 5s on that exam. Setting a 9th grader up for a suboptimal AP score should be done with a lot of careful consideration.

Not that poster, but the hypothesis is similar to that generated by the observation that state exam passing rates in Algebra in 9th are often lower than in 8th. In the latter case, the thought is that those more attuned to the subject tend to take it earlier, and they, then, tend to score higher despite the additional year the others have. Similarly, it is postulated that those taking AP CS Principles may represent those less attuned to the subject, when compared to those taking AP CS A (often without taking Principles), and the relatively low performance on the Principles AP exam reflects that divergence.

I would posit that a major underlying cause is the ridiculous arms race towards establishing a college application profile rife with AP markings and the associated GPA bump. It appears that most top colleges do not accept credit for Principles, anyway, and it is probable that most students better would be served by a paradigm of non-AP survey/introductory courses. Those could be designed without the fetters of adhering to an AP exam that approximates the level of that which used to be termed "Rocks for Jocks" (technical courses developed, under misguided philosophy of its own, to meet college graduation requirements for those not technically inclined). The return, then, of AP courses like AP CS AB, AP French Literature, etc. -- now gone as a result of lower attendance due to the aggressive turn towards loading up on a series of easy-A APs beginning earlier in HS -- more properly would provide college-level educational experiences to well-prepared high-schoolers.

That is a whole-of-nation problem, though, not an MCPS one, and the profit seen by The College Board in offering a more numerous but less meaningful suite of AP courses almost certainly means that we will not see the suggested change.

[Anonymous]

So am I understanding right that if you're not at a magnet, you don't have any options for advanced courses in English and social studies in 9th and 10th grade unless you can access AP classes?

And that there are no AP English classes for 9th graders anywhere, period? And a few schools offer an AP English option for 10th graders and AP social studies options for 9th and 10th graders, but many don't and if they don't you're out of luck? Do we know how many schools offer those AP classes and which ones?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The other post about rigor made me think about how we might pool our collective knowledge to help new HS parents support their kids in building a rigorous HS path outside the Magnets.

Right now, it seems like the standard guidance really short-changes kids who are ready for a challenge, particularly in 9th and 10th, with the "Honors for All" model. So, if you were helping a bright kid choose classes for 9th and 10th, what would you advise?

Just stop.

All MCPS HS's have rigorous classes.
It is not "honors for all" many kids take regular classes and gee wiz they also go to college and do well in life.

If you want "rigorous" your kid must be qualified to take higher math and science. AP's and Honors.

Why is this a hard concept?

My kids did math at min 2 years a head of their peers from 3rd grade on. Is your kid that advanced? Doubt it.

Another MCPS parent who thinks their gifted kid is Young Sheldon. Idiot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The problem is that schools aren't set up for a small group of students to take an alternative path.

A few years ago, our school allowed (by petition) for students to skip honors bio and go straight to AP bio. Same for Chem, I think, but that was less popular.

They did this for a couple of years, and then the AP-arm's race took over and every kid aspiring to a top university tried to join this path (because if they didn't, they thought they would be 'behind' their peers on college applications).

Such a practice worked fine for a small group of kids who could succeed without the prereq. But when lots of kids wanted to do it, it simultanously created a lot of kids not doing well and also watered down the experience for the kids who wanted to the more rigorous experience. (It's fine and dandy to say teachers shouldn't slow things down to accommodate less prepared kids, but it doesn't really work that way.)

After a couple of years of allowing this, the school ultimately went back to enforcing the prerequisite strictly. Over the last 5 years, I've never heard of a kid successfully skipping the honors prereq.

If schools can figure out an objective way to really assess kids for skipping prereqs (maybe a placement test), a more rigorous pathway would really open. But so far, they've never done this effectively-- at least at our school.

The way this has worked out REALLY well in my opinion is on the physics track. AP Physics 1 is a great and more rigorous alternative to honors physics. It would be great if bio and chem had a similar class--much more rigorous than the honors version, but not skipping straight to the advanced AP version of the science class.

Who keeps telling this lie about AP Physics 1. Unless you’re in a magnet program, AP Physics 1 is not more rigorous. And because half the kids haven’t gotten to Pre-Cal it’s impossible for it to be. It’s Algebra based. Both AP Physics 1 and AP Pre-Cal should be stopped since most colleges are not giving credit for either. This is how we get 9th graders trying to take AP classes. And while some scientist do think Physics should be taken first, this course is not more rigorous as kids Algebra skills are not deep enough for it to be.

Have you looked at the questions for AP Physics 1. They are at a much higher level than Honors Physics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So am I understanding right that if you're not at a magnet, you don't have any options for advanced courses in English and social studies in 9th and 10th grade unless you can access AP classes?

And that there are no AP English classes for 9th graders anywhere, period? And a few schools offer an AP English option for 10th graders and AP social studies options for 9th and 10th graders, but many don't and if they don't you're out of luck? Do we know how many schools offer those AP classes and which ones?

This is correct for English. No options for advanced English unless you are in a Humanities or IB magnet (not just a school that has an IB program).

For social studies, I think most schools do allow freshmen to take either APUSH or AP NSL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The other post about rigor made me think about how we might pool our collective knowledge to help new HS parents support their kids in building a rigorous HS path outside the Magnets.

Right now, it seems like the standard guidance really short-changes kids who are ready for a challenge, particularly in 9th and 10th, with the "Honors for All" model. So, if you were helping a bright kid choose classes for 9th and 10th, what would you advise?

Just stop.

All MCPS HS's have rigorous classes.
It is not "honors for all" many kids take regular classes and gee wiz they also go to college and do well in life.

If you want "rigorous" your kid must be qualified to take higher math and science. AP's and Honors.

Why is this a hard concept?

My kids did math at min 2 years a head of their peers from 3rd grade on. Is your kid that advanced? Doubt it.

Another MCPS parent who thinks their gifted kid is Young Sheldon. Idiot.

You are incorrect. At best, your information is outdated. Unless you have a current 9th or 10th grader, or are teaching in an MCPS high school, you are operating on old/bad information. You are very confident, and very wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a magnet parent, I cannot understand why MCPS does not make the magnet curriculum, syllabus, textbooks, resources, tests, reviews and projects available on the MCPS website?

It is not as if everyone will rush to copy it. Only kids who are interested can pick and choose. Why not?

How did that benefit MCPS?

How does having smart and well prepared students (without doing the work) not benefit MCPS? How does having a crop of high achieving students not improve MCPS and MoCo?

[Anonymous]

Work backwards from HS courses. Some of the groundwork for HS courses are done in MS. My kid could take AP Spanish in 10th grade since she took Spanish 1, 2, 3 in MS. The MS and HS, both were magnet track. So, how could a kid get access to magnet level FL in MS if it is not being offered in his school.

That is the reason that the curricullum, materials, textbooks should be made available to all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So am I understanding right that if you're not at a magnet, you don't have any options for advanced courses in English and social studies in 9th and 10th grade unless you can access AP classes?

And that there are no AP English classes for 9th graders anywhere, period? And a few schools offer an AP English option for 10th graders and AP social studies options for 9th and 10th graders, but many don't and if they don't you're out of luck? Do we know how many schools offer those AP classes and which ones?

You are correct. You will have "honors" English in 9th and 10th grade, but that is the course everyone takes, and it's not even really on level. Certainly not above level.