FCPS Has Top Schools with NMSFs, APS Lags

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Arlington posters on his thread who have validated our decision to not live in Arlington. We opted against Arlington in favor of Fairfax because of the lily white nature of its good schools and our feeling that, as Asian-Americans, we would be regarded as "other."

Your narrow minded views on Asians in Fairfax and at TJ are just as we suspected. We are much happier in Fairfax surrounded by a variety of hues.

Hmmm. You obviously aren't talking about W-L, Science Focus, Longbranch, Key, ATS ...(and these are NORTH Arlington schools). I agree the Yorktown pyramid booster is as bad as the McLean booster about demographics, but please don't paint Arlington with a single brush. There is tons of diversity here.

[Anonymous]

The TJ high academic freaks on this thread should pick up a copy of this month's Atlantic magazine: cover story the suicide problem in Palo Alto high schools sounds eerily familiar of the pushy TJ/AAP parents on these threads.

[Anonymous]

I'm not Op but I think this thread was started as a spinoff of the ridiculous APS booster thread touting one subset of one random rating about Arlington ES so you might want to issue your warning over there, too.

[Anonymous]

6th grade DD and I went to one of the DC public HSs (not magnet, not Wilson) for an academic competition for MS DS last month. Over the last few years, she has been in about 1/3-1/2 of the FCPS HSs for academic competitions, arts performances, field trips etc-- including schools like Lee, that are not at the topic of the FCPS food chain. We came in through the metal detectors, walked the halls, went in the bathroom (with "F**k" written in huge letters all over the walls and ceilings) and into the classrooms (where the desks were broken, there were bars on the windows, and she discovered the 9th grade math class was covering the same material she is learning). Her eyes got huge and she looked at me and said-- this school looks so ... defeated... How do kids learn here? It's a good point. And I told her that she was just lucky to live somewhere with great schools. Kids in FCPS & ACS are lucky. Nobody at any school in either system is in an unsafe school where they can't get a great education-- probably better than 90+% of the country. Maybe focus on that, instead of taking out a ruler, pulling down your pants and measuring your ... Test scores.

[Anonymous]

But nothing in the article you linked mentions foreign TJ applicants or students-- it just mentions that TJ is largely Asian AMERICAN (which we all knew) and that the girl at the center of the scandal was Korean American, and that the scandal also made the Korean press.

Was the girl in this article a US citizen? The story refers to her as Korean not Korean-American. Another report on this story said her dad worked in Korea and that the child returned to Korea after the story broke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not Op but I think this thread was started as a spinoff of the ridiculous APS booster thread touting one subset of one random rating about Arlington ES so you might want to issue your warning over there, too.

They aren't the group freaking out about Merit Scholars, AAP and TJ...quite the opposite...talking about diversity, no tutors, coaching or kumon.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:When you were destroyed in the last thread where you brought this up, the relative size of the two school systems is pertinent.

FCPS has 180,000 students. APS has less than 20,000.

Excluding TJ (a magnet school that pulls from all over, including Arlington) that's 289 for the 8 FCPS schools you listed compared to 57 for the two APS schools on the list.

That's one NMSF for every 623 FCPs students and one for every 350 APS student.

So, just stop. You've embarrassed yourself. Try to limit yourself to one ass-kicking a week, mkay? Thanks.

80% of TJ comes from Fairfax so there is no legitimate reason to exclude it. And, even if you did, the top neighborhood high schools in FCPS consistently outperform the Arlington schools, whether it's average SATs, the number of NMSFs, or US News ratings.

Arlington can't even punch, much less punch at its weight.

Of course you exclude TJ. That's like saying Boston's the best city in America cuz of Haaahvard. TJ is, by definition, an outlier.

You can't exclude TJ in this comparison because it's pulling so many Fairfax County students from other high schools. 80% of those FCPS students could be around 580 students from FCPS that received this recognition. It's a significant number. To be accurate you'd have to know exactly which school system each NMSF at TJ came from, but to estimate you could just take the numbers of NMSF times the percentage of TJ students from each county.

Oh, FFS. Half the applicants -- literally -- were Asian. It's self-selecting and an outlier. Besides, interest in TJ is waning -- applications were down 14% last year.

Do Asians not count in your world? What a strange remark. My guess is a lot of NMSF students are into places like TJ so they would be attracted to "outlier" stem schools whether in APS or FCPS.

Asian Americans from Fairfax "count" but the point is many kids at TJ would not be in base high schools in Fairfax if not for TJ--they wouldn't be in Fairfax (possibly even in the US) at all.

I hear this a lot, and genuinely want to know. How many kids attend TJ for FCPS MSs whose parents don't live in Fairfax County (or this country)? Or who did not come to this country until MS (that, came only to apply for TJ)? DC goes to Carson, which is the biggest TJ feeder, and with the TJ test being this weekend, it's all anyone is talking about right now. It's true a huge percentage of The Carson TJ applicants are Asian. But I have never met one who is not living with their parents (most in a SFH they own)-- and almost all are from Carson feeder ESs. I believe Asian families move to FCPS for AAP and TJ (instead of DC, Montgomery or PG County, or, yes, Arlington). Does anyone have numbers showing that more than a handful of kids are living here without their parents in MS just to apply to TJ? I have always though this is an urban myth. But maybe I'm just not seeing it?

A fair number. Do you not remember this highly-publicized story? It made national news. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-becomes-international-scandal/2015/06/18/4abac970-156a-11e5-89f3-61410da94eb1_story.html

See also cram schools: https://talkinstuff.wordpress.com/2009/07/05/korean-inspired-cram-schools/

There is an entire industry IN KOREA that helps prep kids for this school.

See, neither of these articles have anything to do with foreign TJ applicants or students or in any way imply the things you say they do. I certainly remember the TJ scandal discussed in the first last spring (and was appalled). But nothing in the article you linked mentions foreign TJ applicants or students-- it just mentions that TJ is largely Asian AMERICAN (which we all knew) and that the girl at the center of the scandal was Korean American, and that the scandal also made the Korean press. The second article DOES NOT say that there are school is Asian countries cramming Asian kids to get into TJ. It says that ONE family was so OTT that they sent their Asian American child to stay with family Korea over the summer to cram, because they felt American cram schools weren't tough enough. And that Asian style cram schools are popping up in Fairfax County for the SSAT,SAT, PSAT!, J test and other standardized tests. But these are serving Fairfax County kids, and we all know they are out there.

So once again, is there any actual evidence a significant number of TJ kids are foreign students, here without their parents, just to apply to or attend TJ? Besides "we all know this to be true," or "someone told me that someone told her that they heard of someone who..."

You don't seem to understand...

1) The Washington Post has reported that the ROK embassy publishes the admission requirements on its website. "In South Korea, TJ — yes, a public high school in an American suburb — gets rock-star status. The Korean Embassy has the admissions requirements for TJ on its Web site. Preschools near Korean churches advertise that they can help kids get into TJ. There is an entire subculture of Korean parents who establish residency in Northern Virginia — one parent comes, while the other usually stays behind — with the sole purpose of getting their kid into TJ" https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/genius-girl-a-harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-and-elite-college-mania/2015/06/22/e955be78-1907-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html

2) There is an entire cottage industry in Korea devoted to this.

3) There are group houses of Korean high school students who attend TJ. The school refers to this as the "Korean Heritage Society."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

But nothing in the article you linked mentions foreign TJ applicants or students-- it just mentions that TJ is largely Asian AMERICAN (which we all knew) and that the girl at the center of the scandal was Korean American, and that the scandal also made the Korean press.

Was the girl in this article a US citizen? The story refers to her as Korean not Korean-American. Another report on this story said her dad worked in Korea and that the child returned to Korea after the story broke.

The girl was Korean, not American.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous[b wrote:]NMSF status has nothing to do with the school a kid goes to. These are just smart kids: they would be NMSFs no matter where they went to school. [/b]

+1000 And unless your kid is one of them, how is any of this pertinent to your life?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When you were destroyed in the last thread where you brought this up, the relative size of the two school systems is pertinent.

FCPS has 180,000 students. APS has less than 20,000.

Excluding TJ (a magnet school that pulls from all over, including Arlington) that's 289 for the 8 FCPS schools you listed compared to 57 for the two APS schools on the list.

That's one NMSF for every 623 FCPs students and one for every 350 APS student.

So, just stop. You've embarrassed yourself. Try to limit yourself to one ass-kicking a week, mkay? Thanks.

80% of TJ comes from Fairfax so there is no legitimate reason to exclude it. And, even if you did, the top neighborhood high schools in FCPS consistently outperform the Arlington schools, whether it's average SATs, the number of NMSFs, or US News ratings.

Arlington can't even punch, much less punch at its weight.

Of course you exclude TJ. That's like saying Boston's the best city in America cuz of Haaahvard. TJ is, by definition, an outlier.

You can't exclude TJ in this comparison because it's pulling so many Fairfax County students from other high schools. 80% of those FCPS students could be around 580 students from FCPS that received this recognition. It's a significant number. To be accurate you'd have to know exactly which school system each NMSF at TJ came from, but to estimate you could just take the numbers of NMSF times the percentage of TJ students from each county.

Oh, FFS. Half the applicants -- literally -- were Asian. It's self-selecting and an outlier. Besides, interest in TJ is waning -- applications were down 14% last year.

Do Asians not count in your world? What a strange remark. My guess is a lot of NMSF students are into places like TJ so they would be attracted to "outlier" stem schools whether in APS or FCPS.

Asian Americans from Fairfax "count" but the point is many kids at TJ would not be in base high schools in Fairfax if not for TJ--they wouldn't be in Fairfax (possibly even in the US) at all.

I hear this a lot, and genuinely want to know. How many kids attend TJ for FCPS MSs whose parents don't live in Fairfax County (or this country)? Or who did not come to this country until MS (that, came only to apply for TJ)? DC goes to Carson, which is the biggest TJ feeder, and with the TJ test being this weekend, it's all anyone is talking about right now. It's true a huge percentage of The Carson TJ applicants are Asian. But I have never met one who is not living with their parents (most in a SFH they own)-- and almost all are from Carson feeder ESs. I believe Asian families move to FCPS for AAP and TJ (instead of DC, Montgomery or PG County, or, yes, Arlington). Does anyone have numbers showing that more than a handful of kids are living here without their parents in MS just to apply to TJ? I have always though this is an urban myth. But maybe I'm just not seeing it?

A fair number. Do you not remember this highly-publicized story? It made national news. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-becomes-international-scandal/2015/06/18/4abac970-156a-11e5-89f3-61410da94eb1_story.html

See also cram schools: https://talkinstuff.wordpress.com/2009/07/05/korean-inspired-cram-schools/

There is an entire industry IN KOREA that helps prep kids for this school.

See, neither of these articles have anything to do with foreign TJ applicants or students or in any way imply the things you say they do. I certainly remember the TJ scandal discussed in the first last spring (and was appalled). But nothing in the article you linked mentions foreign TJ applicants or students-- it just mentions that TJ is largely Asian AMERICAN (which we all knew) and that the girl at the center of the scandal was Korean American, and that the scandal also made the Korean press. The second article DOES NOT say that there are school is Asian countries cramming Asian kids to get into TJ. It says that ONE family was so OTT that they sent their Asian American child to stay with family Korea over the summer to cram, because they felt American cram schools weren't tough enough. And that Asian style cram schools are popping up in Fairfax County for the SSAT,SAT, PSAT!, J test and other standardized tests. But these are serving Fairfax County kids, and we all know they are out there.

So once again, is there any actual evidence a significant number of TJ kids are foreign students, here without their parents, just to apply to or attend TJ? Besides "we all know this to be true," or "someone told me that someone told her that they heard of someone who..."

You don't seem to understand...

1) The Washington Post has reported that the ROK embassy publishes the admission requirements on its website. "In South Korea, TJ — yes, a public high school in an American suburb — gets rock-star status. The Korean Embassy has the admissions requirements for TJ on its Web site. Preschools near Korean churches advertise that they can help kids get into TJ. There is an entire subculture of Korean parents who establish residency in Northern Virginia — one parent comes, while the other usually stays behind — with the sole purpose of getting their kid into TJ" https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/genius-girl-a-harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-and-elite-college-mania/2015/06/22/e955be78-1907-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html

2) There is an entire cottage industry in Korea devoted to this.

3) There are group houses of Korean high school students who attend TJ. The school refers to this as the "Korean Heritage Society."

The WaPo article doesn't have numbers. Are you saying that 10 Korean students go to TJ, or 100? Is half the school Korean, not Korean American?

[Anonymous]

What's really telling is how the top neighborhood schools in FCPS outperform the APS schools even though so many more of the top Fairfax students go to TJ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous[b wrote:]NMSF status has nothing to do with the school a kid goes to. These are just smart kids: they would be NMSFs no matter where they went to school. [/b]

+1000 And unless your kid is one of them, how is any of this pertinent to your life?

Two of my kids are among them and I was one, too.

I am just commenting that it is really no reflection on the quality of the schools. My kids were in FCPS, but I went to a very blue collar school, which made no claims of being "tops" in anything, and yet had four NMSFs out of a class of 300 or so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's really telling is how the top neighborhood schools in FCPS outperform the APS schools even though so many more of the top Fairfax students go to TJ.

Some do, many don't. But by all means if you're going to compare "top" to all, I could see how you might fool yourself into believing that. And outperform in what sense?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When you were destroyed in the last thread where you brought this up, the relative size of the two school systems is pertinent.

FCPS has 180,000 students. APS has less than 20,000.

Excluding TJ (a magnet school that pulls from all over, including Arlington) that's 289 for the 8 FCPS schools you listed compared to 57 for the two APS schools on the list.

That's one NMSF for every 623 FCPs students and one for every 350 APS student.

So, just stop. You've embarrassed yourself. Try to limit yourself to one ass-kicking a week, mkay? Thanks.

80% of TJ comes from Fairfax so there is no legitimate reason to exclude it. And, even if you did, the top neighborhood high schools in FCPS consistently outperform the Arlington schools, whether it's average SATs, the number of NMSFs, or US News ratings.

Arlington can't even punch, much less punch at its weight.

Of course you exclude TJ. That's like saying Boston's the best city in America cuz of Haaahvard. TJ is, by definition, an outlier.

You can't exclude TJ in this comparison because it's pulling so many Fairfax County students from other high schools. 80% of those FCPS students could be around 580 students from FCPS that received this recognition. It's a significant number. To be accurate you'd have to know exactly which school system each NMSF at TJ came from, but to estimate you could just take the numbers of NMSF times the percentage of TJ students from each county.

Oh, FFS. Half the applicants -- literally -- were Asian. It's self-selecting and an outlier. Besides, interest in TJ is waning -- applications were down 14% last year.

Do Asians not count in your world? What a strange remark. My guess is a lot of NMSF students are into places like TJ so they would be attracted to "outlier" stem schools whether in APS or FCPS.

Asian Americans from Fairfax "count" but the point is many kids at TJ would not be in base high schools in Fairfax if not for TJ--they wouldn't be in Fairfax (possibly even in the US) at all.

I hear this a lot, and genuinely want to know. How many kids attend TJ for FCPS MSs whose parents don't live in Fairfax County (or this country)? Or who did not come to this country until MS (that, came only to apply for TJ)? DC goes to Carson, which is the biggest TJ feeder, and with the TJ test being this weekend, it's all anyone is talking about right now. It's true a huge percentage of The Carson TJ applicants are Asian. But I have never met one who is not living with their parents (most in a SFH they own)-- and almost all are from Carson feeder ESs. I believe Asian families move to FCPS for AAP and TJ (instead of DC, Montgomery or PG County, or, yes, Arlington). Does anyone have numbers showing that more than a handful of kids are living here without their parents in MS just to apply to TJ? I have always though this is an urban myth. But maybe I'm just not seeing it?

A fair number. Do you not remember this highly-publicized story? It made national news. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-becomes-international-scandal/2015/06/18/4abac970-156a-11e5-89f3-61410da94eb1_story.html

See also cram schools: https://talkinstuff.wordpress.com/2009/07/05/korean-inspired-cram-schools/

There is an entire industry IN KOREA that helps prep kids for this school.

See, neither of these articles have anything to do with foreign TJ applicants or students or in any way imply the things you say they do. I certainly remember the TJ scandal discussed in the first last spring (and was appalled). But nothing in the article you linked mentions foreign TJ applicants or students-- it just mentions that TJ is largely Asian AMERICAN (which we all knew) and that the girl at the center of the scandal was Korean American, and that the scandal also made the Korean press. The second article DOES NOT say that there are school is Asian countries cramming Asian kids to get into TJ. It says that ONE family was so OTT that they sent their Asian American child to stay with family Korea over the summer to cram, because they felt American cram schools weren't tough enough. And that Asian style cram schools are popping up in Fairfax County for the SSAT,SAT, PSAT!, J test and other standardized tests. But these are serving Fairfax County kids, and we all know they are out there.

So once again, is there any actual evidence a significant number of TJ kids are foreign students, here without their parents, just to apply to or attend TJ? Besides "we all know this to be true," or "someone told me that someone told her that they heard of someone who..."

You don't seem to understand...

1) The Washington Post has reported that the ROK embassy publishes the admission requirements on its website. "In South Korea, TJ — yes, a public high school in an American suburb — gets rock-star status. The Korean Embassy has the admissions requirements for TJ on its Web site. Preschools near Korean churches advertise that they can help kids get into TJ. There is an entire subculture of Korean parents who establish residency in Northern Virginia — one parent comes, while the other usually stays behind — with the sole purpose of getting their kid into TJ" https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/genius-girl-a-harvard-stanford-admissions-hoax-and-elite-college-mania/2015/06/22/e955be78-1907-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html

2) There is an entire cottage industry in Korea devoted to this.

3) There are group houses of Korean high school students who attend TJ. The school refers to this as the "Korean Heritage Society."

The WaPo article doesn't have numbers. Are you saying that 10 Korean students go to TJ, or 100? Is half the school Korean, not Korean American?

I don't think anyone knows. They don't check immigration status at the door. The point is it's a magnet that pulls from far beyond NoVa.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you to the Arlington posters on his thread who have validated our decision to not live in Arlington. We opted against Arlington in favor of Fairfax because of the lily white nature of its good schools and our feeling that, as Asian-Americans, we would be regarded as "other."

Your narrow minded views on Asians in Fairfax and at TJ are just as we suspected. We are much happier in Fairfax surrounded by a variety of hues.

No one said they aren't welcome, didn't earn their spots, etc., just that people (of any hue) who move into Fairfax just before TJ admissions year solely to apply to TJ and with the intention of leaving again if they don't get in can't claim that their success at TJ is proof of the quality of the FCPS system as a whole, only of the quality of TJ. I don't think twice about the Asian students or their parents at my child's APS elementary school, let along make assumptions about why they're there, they're simply his friends/classmates and his parents.