Size & placement of regional magnet programs set to decimate non-host, non-rich schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

Yup. Think about everyone who loses here:

-- Highly gifted kids who thrive with really advanced classes won't get them at magnets anymore.
-- Magnets will provide more of a baseline honors/AP experience for the top 15% of students or so.
-- Non-rich schools will go backwards on the number of advanced classes they can offer
-- Better-off families who can manage transportation, even those who would prefer to stay at their home schools with neighborhood kids, will feel compelled to send their kids to a magnet because that's the only place they'll find a variety of challenging classes and a sizable peer group of kids interested in academic success
-- Most poorer students, even very smart ones, won't be able to make the transportation work to the regional magnets so will be the main ones dealing with reduced options at their home schools
-- The student mix at these schools will become poorer, less diverse, fewer students focused on academics, and probably less desirable for teachers and will lose good teachers

Almost all of this could be avoided by making this a smaller increase in the number of students at magnets rather than a huge one. And barring that, most of it could be avoided by changing the program placement so that the schools that lose more top students than they gain are the richer ones who can afford to lose them without crippling their offerings. But Taylor and his team are so darn stubborn that they won't consider the kind of harm they're doing in a way that would enable them to change course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

No, they would screw up Potomac area as well. Churchill currently has enough local students to keep those high-level AP courses. Some of these students got offer from RMIB/Blair SMCS but chose to stay due to various reasons, but now they may want to escape because Churchill is hosting only the humanity magnet in the future in addition to some crappy interest-based program. Churchill has a strong drama club. Now the performing art magnet is assigned to RM (because CO believes RM is under capacity, haha, what a joke).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

No, they would screw up Potomac area as well. Churchill currently has enough local students to keep those high-level AP courses. Some of these students got offer from RMIB/Blair SMCS but chose to stay due to various reasons, but now they may want to escape because Churchill is hosting only the humanity magnet in the future in addition to some crappy interest-based program. Churchill has a strong drama club. Now the performing art magnet is assigned to RM (because CO believes RM is under capacity, haha, what a joke).

I highly doubt kids will be leaving Churchill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

Yup. Think about everyone who loses here:

-- Highly gifted kids who thrive with really advanced classes won't get them at magnets anymore.
-- Magnets will provide more of a baseline honors/AP experience for the top 15% of students or so.
-- Non-rich schools will go backwards on the number of advanced classes they can offer
-- Better-off families who can manage transportation, even those who would prefer to stay at their home schools with neighborhood kids, will feel compelled to send their kids to a magnet because that's the only place they'll find a variety of challenging classes and a sizable peer group of kids interested in academic success
-- Most poorer students, even very smart ones, won't be able to make the transportation work to the regional magnets so will be the main ones dealing with reduced options at their home schools
-- The student mix at these schools will become poorer, less diverse, fewer students focused on academics, and probably less desirable for teachers and will lose good teachers

Almost all of this could be avoided by making this a smaller increase in the number of students at magnets rather than a huge one. And barring that, most of it could be avoided by changing the program placement so that the schools that lose more top students than they gain are the richer ones who can afford to lose them without crippling their offerings. But Taylor and his team are so darn stubborn that they won't consider the kind of harm they're doing in a way that would enable them to change course.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

No, they would screw up Potomac area as well. Churchill currently has enough local students to keep those high-level AP courses. Some of these students got offer from RMIB/Blair SMCS but chose to stay due to various reasons, but now they may want to escape because Churchill is hosting only the humanity magnet in the future in addition to some crappy interest-based program. Churchill has a strong drama club. Now the performing art magnet is assigned to RM (because CO believes RM is under capacity, haha, what a joke).

I highly doubt kids will be leaving Churchill.

Currently Churchill kids are the 2nd (or 3rd?) largest population in Blair SMCS and RMIB. It's just gonna be worse in the future as STEM magnet and IB would be in Wootton and RM in Region 4. It's close enough logistically and both Wootton and RM are good schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

Yup. Think about everyone who loses here:

-- Highly gifted kids who thrive with really advanced classes won't get them at magnets anymore.
-- Magnets will provide more of a baseline honors/AP experience for the top 15% of students or so.
-- Non-rich schools will go backwards on the number of advanced classes they can offer
-- Better-off families who can manage transportation, even those who would prefer to stay at their home schools with neighborhood kids, will feel compelled to send their kids to a magnet because that's the only place they'll find a variety of challenging classes and a sizable peer group of kids interested in academic success
-- Most poorer students, even very smart ones, won't be able to make the transportation work to the regional magnets so will be the main ones dealing with reduced options at their home schools
-- The student mix at these schools will become poorer, less diverse, fewer students focused on academics, and probably less desirable for teachers and will lose good teachers

Almost all of this could be avoided by making this a smaller increase in the number of students at magnets rather than a huge one. And barring that, most of it could be avoided by changing the program placement so that the schools that lose more top students than they gain are the richer ones who can afford to lose them without crippling their offerings. But Taylor and his team are so darn stubborn that they won't consider the kind of harm they're doing in a way that would enable them to change course.

+1 Great analysis and spot on

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

Yup. Think about everyone who loses here:

-- Highly gifted kids who thrive with really advanced classes won't get them at magnets anymore.
-- Magnets will provide more of a baseline honors/AP experience for the top 15% of students or so.
-- Non-rich schools will go backwards on the number of advanced classes they can offer
-- Better-off families who can manage transportation, even those who would prefer to stay at their home schools with neighborhood kids, will feel compelled to send their kids to a magnet because that's the only place they'll find a variety of challenging classes and a sizable peer group of kids interested in academic success
-- Most poorer students, even very smart ones, won't be able to make the transportation work to the regional magnets so will be the main ones dealing with reduced options at their home schools
-- The student mix at these schools will become poorer, less diverse, fewer students focused on academics, and probably less desirable for teachers and will lose good teachers

Almost all of this could be avoided by making this a smaller increase in the number of students at magnets rather than a huge one. And barring that, most of it could be avoided by changing the program placement so that the schools that lose more top students than they gain are the richer ones who can afford to lose them without crippling their offerings. But Taylor and his team are so darn stubborn that they won't consider the kind of harm they're doing in a way that would enable them to change course.

Couldn't agree with you more! Expanding 1-2 programs would make more sense. Piloting a region would make more sense. Reducing the number of regions or number of programs would make more sense. There are so many viable paths that could have made the regional program at least partially successful or start with a good shape. Instead, CO insists on running into a doomed failure and dragging everyone with them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, there’s a whole thread right now worrying that the regional magnets will be watered down because they will allegedly admit students by a lottery of only moderately qualified applicants: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1317129.page

And yet this thread claims there will be a major brain drain from the other schools.

So both of these worries can’t be true.

No, they actually go hand in hand. If the regional programs were only enrolling the top 2-3% of kids, there would still be plenty of kids at home schools who are interested in and can succeed in advanced classes. But since they're set to instead enroll the top 10-15% of kids, that simultaneously leads both to a less rigorous experience in the magnet programs than there currently is, and a less rigorous experience at the home schools who have lost the top 10-15% of their students.

This. MCPS has managed to screw everyone who doesn’t live in Potomac on this one. It’s actually fairly impressive.

No, they would screw up Potomac area as well. Churchill currently has enough local students to keep those high-level AP courses. Some of these students got offer from RMIB/Blair SMCS but chose to stay due to various reasons, but now they may want to escape because Churchill is hosting only the humanity magnet in the future in addition to some crappy interest-based program. Churchill has a strong drama club. Now the performing art magnet is assigned to RM (because CO believes RM is under capacity, haha, what a joke).

I highly doubt kids will be leaving Churchill.

Currently Churchill kids are the 2nd (or 3rd?) largest population in Blair SMCS and RMIB. It's just gonna be worse in the future as STEM magnet and IB would be in Wootton and RM in Region 4. It's close enough logistically and both Wootton and RM are good schools.

They are leaving for high quality selective programs. Why bother when it's a lottery?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why would any parent send their kids to a watered down “magnet”. Won’t happen. Look at what they tried to do the IB programs at Watkins mill and Kennedy.

They'll go if the host school offers better opportunities than the home school and they can swing the commute.

We are zoned for Einstein. I have hope that Einstein will be a good place for my DC, especially since it will be a relatively smaller school. DC is pretty average academically and will probably be well served with standard MCPS courses available at every high school. But BCC and Blair definitely offer a wider variety of courses, and there are public buses to both of these schools with stops near our home. Whitman would probably be too difficult, nor is it the environment I'd want for DC especially away from all their friends.

For kids who don't want STEM, Einstein is perfect.

I really hate for this rumor to get traction. My Einstein grad is in college for engineering, his good friend who also graduated from Einstein is studying chemistry in college, and a third friend is majoring in physics at UMD. This is flat-out incorrect, apparently driven by that one poster who is annoyed that Einstein doesn’t offer multivariable calculus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It appears that MCPS is planning on 60 out-of-bounds students per grade for each of the three core academic criteria-based programs (SMCS, IB, and humanities.) if they draw roughly equally from each school, that would be around 45-60 high-achieving kids per grade leaving each school, or roughly 10-15% of the most advanced kids in each grade, which is a very big number. (And if some of the kids at rich schools with strong local offerings opt out, it'll be an even larger share of the kids at the other schools who leave ). Schools who host one of those programs will "receive" 60 advanced and motivated kids from out of bounds in return, of course, but those who don't won't.

The richest schools may be able to handle losing that many motivated kids interested in advanced classes (although none of them will have to because they all get one or more of these programs anyway), but it will be a real blow to most ordinary schools which don't have huge numbers of kids taking advanced classes to begin with. Sure, they may have a few bright kids coming to whatever other programs they're hosting, at least at the start, but if those schools can't field a reasonable number of challenging classes for those kids, loving the arts (or whatever) isn't going to be enough for a kid to choose that school over one where they can take advanced classes.

The list of schools that look likely to be hit by this appear to be: Einstein, Northwood, Blake, Paint Branch, Woodward, Rockville, Magruder, Quince Orchard, Clarksburg, Damascus, and Northwest.

Basically, it seems to me that there are two pathways here: 1) almost half of MCPS schools are seriously harmed by losing a large chunk of top students to attractive academic programs at other schools; and/or 2) the regional pathways are such a disaster that no one wants to leave and so local schools are safe. (Or, frankly, it could be a combination of the two, which could be even worse for some schools-- if a program in your region is successful and draws top kids from your school, while the programs at your school are a flop and don't draw many kids in, you're even worse off.)

Am I wrong here, or is this what other folks think too?

I’m in the current NEC.
Blake won’t have a problem. Even though PB is a good school most white parents are scared of sending their kids there. They fight tooth and nail to get into Blake.
Sherwood is joining our region but all the Olney parents will stay at Sherwood.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It appears that MCPS is planning on 60 out-of-bounds students per grade for each of the three core academic criteria-based programs (SMCS, IB, and humanities.) if they draw roughly equally from each school, that would be around 45-60 high-achieving kids per grade leaving each school, or roughly 10-15% of the most advanced kids in each grade, which is a very big number. (And if some of the kids at rich schools with strong local offerings opt out, it'll be an even larger share of the kids at the other schools who leave ). Schools who host one of those programs will "receive" 60 advanced and motivated kids from out of bounds in return, of course, but those who don't won't.

The richest schools may be able to handle losing that many motivated kids interested in advanced classes (although none of them will have to because they all get one or more of these programs anyway), but it will be a real blow to most ordinary schools which don't have huge numbers of kids taking advanced classes to begin with. Sure, they may have a few bright kids coming to whatever other programs they're hosting, at least at the start, but if those schools can't field a reasonable number of challenging classes for those kids, loving the arts (or whatever) isn't going to be enough for a kid to choose that school over one where they can take advanced classes.

The list of schools that look likely to be hit by this appear to be: Einstein, Northwood, Blake, Paint Branch, Woodward, Rockville, Magruder, Quince Orchard, Clarksburg, Damascus, and Northwest.

Basically, it seems to me that there are two pathways here: 1) almost half of MCPS schools are seriously harmed by losing a large chunk of top students to attractive academic programs at other schools; and/or 2) the regional pathways are such a disaster that no one wants to leave and so local schools are safe. (Or, frankly, it could be a combination of the two, which could be even worse for some schools-- if a program in your region is successful and draws top kids from your school, while the programs at your school are a flop and don't draw many kids in, you're even worse off.)

Am I wrong here, or is this what other folks think too?

Yes, lots of people have been sharing these concerns from the beginning. In a way, this has already been happening in the DCC with Kennedy losing students to the other DCC schools.

I don't know who the genius was in Central Office who thought to themselves "What Whitman HS really needs is a bunch more well resourced, highly motivated kids."

Right, and Kennedy IB isn't very popular.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It appears that MCPS is planning on 60 out-of-bounds students per grade for each of the three core academic criteria-based programs (SMCS, IB, and humanities.) if they draw roughly equally from each school, that would be around 45-60 high-achieving kids per grade leaving each school, or roughly 10-15% of the most advanced kids in each grade, which is a very big number. (And if some of the kids at rich schools with strong local offerings opt out, it'll be an even larger share of the kids at the other schools who leave ). Schools who host one of those programs will "receive" 60 advanced and motivated kids from out of bounds in return, of course, but those who don't won't.

The richest schools may be able to handle losing that many motivated kids interested in advanced classes (although none of them will have to because they all get one or more of these programs anyway), but it will be a real blow to most ordinary schools which don't have huge numbers of kids taking advanced classes to begin with. Sure, they may have a few bright kids coming to whatever other programs they're hosting, at least at the start, but if those schools can't field a reasonable number of challenging classes for those kids, loving the arts (or whatever) isn't going to be enough for a kid to choose that school over one where they can take advanced classes.

The list of schools that look likely to be hit by this appear to be: Einstein, Northwood, Blake, Paint Branch, Woodward, Rockville, Magruder, Quince Orchard, Clarksburg, Damascus, and Northwest.

Basically, it seems to me that there are two pathways here: 1) almost half of MCPS schools are seriously harmed by losing a large chunk of top students to attractive academic programs at other schools; and/or 2) the regional pathways are such a disaster that no one wants to leave and so local schools are safe. (Or, frankly, it could be a combination of the two, which could be even worse for some schools-- if a program in your region is successful and draws top kids from your school, while the programs at your school are a flop and don't draw many kids in, you're even worse off.)

Am I wrong here, or is this what other folks think too?

Yes, lots of people have been sharing these concerns from the beginning. In a way, this has already been happening in the DCC with Kennedy losing students to the other DCC schools.

I don't know who the genius was in Central Office who thought to themselves "What Whitman HS really needs is a bunch more well resourced, highly motivated kids."

Right, and Kennedy IB isn't very popular.

There's handful of white kids from Whitman that are at Kennedy IB. I'm not sure why on Earth their parents think it's worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why would any parent send their kids to a watered down “magnet”. Won’t happen. Look at what they tried to do the IB programs at Watkins mill and Kennedy.

If the watered-down magnet offers much better classes than the home school does, then parents who can swing the logistics and have kids who want to get into selective colleges will almost feel like they have to send their kids to the magnets to get classes they can't get at the home school and have a peer group of academically focused and motivated kids.

How do you know they will be watered down?

Even the bare bones curriculum outlines that MCPS presented are watered down versions of the current programs. When they find the smaller cohorts do not have enough students to participate successfully in the current curriculum, they will water it down even more.

I think you are double-counting. The "bare bones" curriculum currently outline already includes the "watering down" for smaller cohorts. The further watering down would happen if the parents at more successful kids opt out of the magnet programs, further reducing the academic preparedness and ability of the magnet cohorts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why would any parent send their kids to a watered down “magnet”. Won’t happen. Look at what they tried to do the IB programs at Watkins mill and Kennedy.

If the watered-down magnet offers much better classes than the home school does, then parents who can swing the logistics and have kids who want to get into selective colleges will almost feel like they have to send their kids to the magnets to get classes they can't get at the home school and have a peer group of academically focused and motivated kids.

How do you know they will be watered down?

As an example, WJ is designated as a Humanities school under the new model. And yet, WJ is eliminating the APEX program as of next school year, which is arguably the only thing resembling a Humanities program at WJ. They are "replacing it" with the AP Capstone, which is already offered at WJ and most high schools. The AP Capstone is not a program, but a diploma designation for students who choose to take two particular AP courses, plus four other AP courses. So the Humanities program at WJ is nothing new, it's watered down from the current APEX, and it's certainly not a Humanities program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why would any parent send their kids to a watered down “magnet”. Won’t happen. Look at what they tried to do the IB programs at Watkins mill and Kennedy.

If the watered-down magnet offers much better classes than the home school does, then parents who can swing the logistics and have kids who want to get into selective colleges will almost feel like they have to send their kids to the magnets to get classes they can't get at the home school and have a peer group of academically focused and motivated kids.

How do you know they will be watered down?

Even the bare bones curriculum outlines that MCPS presented are watered down versions of the current programs. When they find the smaller cohorts do not have enough students to participate successfully in the current curriculum, they will water it down even more.

I think you are double-counting. The "bare bones" curriculum currently outline already includes the "watering down" for smaller cohorts. The further watering down would happen if the parents at more successful kids opt out of the magnet programs, further reducing the academic preparedness and ability of the magnet cohorts.

Top students opt out of attending future magnet -> smaller or less-capable magnet cohort -> further watering down -> poor performance/non-attractive/close-out.
Top students opt in -> smaller cohort than current ones -> relatively OK quality -> more appealing to top student in the region -> draining resource for local HSs.

So both have significant side effects. Why not piloting a 3rd sub-county-wide magnet program, or splitting RMIB coverage into 2-3 regions (similar to Blair vs. Poolsville) to assure the quality and balance between centralized vs. local resource and needs? For those CTE-driven programs, I see bigger problems as there is no survey to what region wants what CTE program.