Did anyone attend the Choice survey community meeting yesterday?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey, my kids are short and weak. Can they get an extra boost when playing school sponsored sports?

I am short. From what I remember, during PE, I could not get over those damned hurdles no matter how hard I tried. I got an F for that section of my PE class. How come they don't adjust for height and physicality in PE or school sponsored sports? I could never get an A in PE. It affected my overall GPA.

Fortunately there have been improvements in PE since you were in school, and people no longer get As simply for being tall (or Fs simply for being short).

It's still a lot easier for taller people to get over those hurdles than us shorties. We were born with a disadvantage so we should get a "boost" in PE and school athletics for it.

Another PE analogy: The PE class is assessing running ability, defined as who crosses the finish line first. Runner A starts 40 yards from the finish line. Runners B and C start 50 yards from the finish line. Runner D starts 100 yards from the finish line. Runner A crosses the finish line first, and Runner D crosses the finish line last. So Runner A is the best and Runner D is the worst -- right? Wrong. "Who crosses the finish line first" is not an appropriate measure of running ability when the runners start in different places.

MCPS already provides a boost to those who "start further back" by providing smaller class sizes and more services in such schools. What you are saying here is to not only provide the extra boost to have them start at the same place, but make their finish line closer so that they don't have to run as far.

Here's another example:

Case 1:
Kid A comes from an upper/middle class home - parents could be lawyers, earning six figures.
Kid B comes from a lower SES, parents don't speak English, don't have higher than a MS, maybe ES level education.

Should this Kid A be allowed to have lower test scores than Kid B to get into a test in magnet? Absolutely not, right?

Case 2:
But, what if Kid A (from a high SES) is Black or Hispanic and Kid B (low SES) is Asian or White?
Now, should Kid A be allowed to have lower test scores than Kid B to get into a test in magnet?

If they base it purely on race, then case 2 is what they are saying should happen. In what world does this make sense?

This. We're in Silver Spring at a Title 1 school. The class sizes are capped at 21 (I believe?), and our school has all sorts of resource teachers (math/reading/speech) that my friend's kids don't have at their non-Title 1/non-Focus schools.

But, I volunteer at the school often, and I think it is completely unrealistic to expect schools to close the achievement gap on their own. Kids are not educated in a bubble. What happens at home, and how involved the parents are makes such a difference, and you can't hold schools accountable for what goes on outside of school.

Interestingly we have a somewhat large population of African American students who are actually from Africa (Nigeria), who perform very well academically. The parents help their kids with homework, attend school events, practice spelling tests with the kids. Why is this different from other AA students who are not immigrants?

[Anonymous]

How can they have different standards for URM? Isn't that illegal?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is just simply untrue. My DS is short and has been playing basketball since 2nd grade. He works hard, and plays well, but there is no way he can match the taller kids - at least the tall kids who work equally hard). He enjoys the game and has stuck with it, but he has no dreams of pro ball, mostly due to his height.

We all have limits. Yes, provide resources for the kids who need extra help in math/reading, so they can get up to speed. But, don't make up stupid guidelines that a certain number of people of a certain race/background need to be in a certain program. That's just ludicrous. It's like adding in something that says 10% of the varsity bball team needs to be 5'7" or shorter.

Nobody is doing this. To repeat, nobody is doing this. Nobody. Nobody is doing this, nobody is recommending doing this, nobody can legally do it anyway. Nobody. MCPS cannot legally do it.

The Metis report said -- let's make sure that more poor/brown/black kids apply to the HGCs. DCUM reflexively and consistently translates this as -- let's admit unqualified poor/brown/black kids to the HGCs for being poor/brown/black. Why does DCUM does this?

Because we see it happen over and over and over in other situations and in college admissions.

I attended grad school where they offered a program for AA and Latino students to 'increase diversity'. They had 10 out of 120 students who were AA and Latino. They were admitted with lower test scores and lower grades and also offered a free summer program the summer before the program started to acclimate themselves and give them a heads up to the program. Three out of the 10 students left the program and one 1 of the non-diverse students left the program over the next 2 years. What a huge waste of money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How can they have different standards for URM? Isn't that illegal?

No, it happens all the time. Ask anyone who works in admissions to colleges/universities/law schools, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is just simply untrue. My DS is short and has been playing basketball since 2nd grade. He works hard, and plays well, but there is no way he can match the taller kids - at least the tall kids who work equally hard). He enjoys the game and has stuck with it, but he has no dreams of pro ball, mostly due to his height.

We all have limits. Yes, provide resources for the kids who need extra help in math/reading, so they can get up to speed. But, don't make up stupid guidelines that a certain number of people of a certain race/background need to be in a certain program. That's just ludicrous. It's like adding in something that says 10% of the varsity bball team needs to be 5'7" or shorter.

Nobody is doing this. To repeat, nobody is doing this. Nobody. Nobody is doing this, nobody is recommending doing this, nobody can legally do it anyway. Nobody. MCPS cannot legally do it.

The Metis report said -- let's make sure that more poor/brown/black kids apply to the HGCs. DCUM reflexively and consistently translates this as -- let's admit unqualified poor/brown/black kids to the HGCs for being poor/brown/black. Why does DCUM does this?

They want to change the admittance criteria so that the test scores aren't as weighed heavily. The report wasn't just about getting more URM kids to apply.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is just simply untrue. My DS is short and has been playing basketball since 2nd grade. He works hard, and plays well, but there is no way he can match the taller kids - at least the tall kids who work equally hard). He enjoys the game and has stuck with it, but he has no dreams of pro ball, mostly due to his height.

We all have limits. Yes, provide resources for the kids who need extra help in math/reading, so they can get up to speed. But, don't make up stupid guidelines that a certain number of people of a certain race/background need to be in a certain program. That's just ludicrous. It's like adding in something that says 10% of the varsity bball team needs to be 5'7" or shorter.

Nobody is doing this. To repeat, nobody is doing this. Nobody. Nobody is doing this, nobody is recommending doing this, nobody can legally do it anyway. Nobody. MCPS cannot legally do it.

The Metis report said -- let's make sure that more poor/brown/black kids apply to the HGCs. DCUM reflexively and consistently translates this as -- let's admit unqualified poor/brown/black kids to the HGCs for being poor/brown/black. Why does DCUM does this?

They want to change the admittance criteria so that the test scores aren't as weighed heavily. The report wasn't just about getting more URM kids to apply.

So, do they think that going towards are more subjective admittance criteria would be more beneficial? If not grades and test scores, what are they proposing HGC admittance depends on?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The school system has a completely different goal than most of the parents on here. Parents on DCUM are usually success stories in the alleged meritocracy of our education system. They believe the schools should also be meritocracies so their kids can become successful under the same system. But the school system sees its job as providing the best education possible to all students -- not just the best students. If your superstar kid wins and many other students lose, you're still happy. But if 20% of MCPS students win and 80% lose, MCPS is not happy.

Untrue. MCPS sees its job as eliminating the gap. That's all that matters to them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey, my kids are short and weak. Can they get an extra boost when playing school sponsored sports?

I am short. From what I remember, during PE, I could not get over those damned hurdles no matter how hard I tried. I got an F for that section of my PE class. How come they don't adjust for height and physicality in PE or school sponsored sports? I could never get an A in PE. It affected my overall GPA.

Fortunately there have been improvements in PE since you were in school, and people no longer get As simply for being tall (or Fs simply for being short).

It's still a lot easier for taller people to get over those hurdles than us shorties. We were born with a disadvantage so we should get a "boost" in PE and school athletics for it.

Another PE analogy: The PE class is assessing running ability, defined as who crosses the finish line first. Runner A starts 40 yards from the finish line. Runners B and C start 50 yards from the finish line. Runner D starts 100 yards from the finish line. Runner A crosses the finish line first, and Runner D crosses the finish line last. So Runner A is the best and Runner D is the worst -- right? Wrong. "Who crosses the finish line first" is not an appropriate measure of running ability when the runners start in different places.

MCPS already provides a boost to those who "start further back" by providing smaller class sizes and more services in such schools. What you are saying here is to not only provide the extra boost to have them start at the same place, but make their finish line closer so that they don't have to run as far.

Here's another example:

Case 1:
Kid A comes from an upper/middle class home - parents could be lawyers, earning six figures.
Kid B comes from a lower SES, parents don't speak English, don't have higher than a MS, maybe ES level education.

Should this Kid A be allowed to have lower test scores than Kid B to get into a test in magnet? Absolutely not, right?

Case 2:
But, what if Kid A (from a high SES) is Black or Hispanic and Kid B (low SES) is Asian or White?
Now, should Kid A be allowed to have lower test scores than Kid B to get into a test in magnet?

If they base it purely on race, then case 2 is what they are saying should happen. In what world does this make sense?

This. We're in Silver Spring at a Title 1 school. The class sizes are capped at 21 (I believe?), and our school has all sorts of resource teachers (math/reading/speech) that my friend's kids don't have at their non-Title 1/non-Focus schools.

But, I volunteer at the school often, and I think it is completely unrealistic to expect schools to close the achievement gap on their own. Kids are not educated in a bubble. What happens at home, and how involved the parents are makes such a difference, and you can't hold schools accountable for what goes on outside of school.

Interestingly we have a somewhat large population of African American students who are actually from Africa (Nigeria), who perform very well academically. The parents help their kids with homework, attend school events, practice spelling tests with the kids. Why is this different from other AA students who are not immigrants?

PP here.. Yes, exactly.

I have posted this before: my parents are uneducated immigrants who don't speak English. I'm not talking "poorly educated", no college degree, I'm talking barely a MS level education. We were poor, at times on food stamps. I was a latchkey kid, too. Sometimes, I went without breakfast. My parents never attended a PTC, or helped with HW. But, I did well in school because everyday my parents told me to do well in school, asked me if I did my HW.

It starts at home. No amount of government intervention can make up for even the minimal of parental participation, even if it is just asking "did you do your hw".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The school system has a completely different goal than most of the parents on here. Parents on DCUM are usually success stories in the alleged meritocracy of our education system. They believe the schools should also be meritocracies so their kids can become successful under the same system. But the school system sees its job as providing the best education possible to all students -- not just the best students. If your superstar kid wins and many other students lose, you're still happy. But if 20% of MCPS students win and 80% lose, MCPS is not happy.

Untrue. MCPS sees its job as eliminating the gap. That's all that matters to them.

+1

MCPS is not trying to provide the best education to ALL students. And, I completely understand the limitations of a public school system. They need to make sure all kids get up to a certain level each year (which is why my kid's reading group never meets this year, and the below grade level reading groups meet weekly). And, that's fine.

But, over and over, we hear about the achievement gap above all. From the BOE and from MCPS officials.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey, my kids are short and weak. Can they get an extra boost when playing school sponsored sports?

I am short. From what I remember, during PE, I could not get over those damned hurdles no matter how hard I tried. I got an F for that section of my PE class. How come they don't adjust for height and physicality in PE or school sponsored sports? I could never get an A in PE. It affected my overall GPA.

Fortunately there have been improvements in PE since you were in school, and people no longer get As simply for being tall (or Fs simply for being short).

It's still a lot easier for taller people to get over those hurdles than us shorties. We were born with a disadvantage so we should get a "boost" in PE and school athletics for it.

Another PE analogy: The PE class is assessing running ability, defined as who crosses the finish line first. Runner A starts 40 yards from the finish line. Runners B and C start 50 yards from the finish line. Runner D starts 100 yards from the finish line. Runner A crosses the finish line first, and Runner D crosses the finish line last. So Runner A is the best and Runner D is the worst -- right? Wrong. "Who crosses the finish line first" is not an appropriate measure of running ability when the runners start in different places.

To use your analogy, it is the role of MCPS that all kids know how to run and start the race at the same place. But, then it is not MCPS place to have one kid run and another kid bike because he is not a good runner or that he is unfit or he never practiced running or he only wants to watch video games.

So, I see the admission test as the start line which should be the same for everyone. The race is judged based on the fastest time used to finish it, and the winner should have won the race fair and square by his own merit. Not by biking when others are running. It is the role of MCPS to make sure its students are informed about the race, and get the practice and coaches to help the kids before the race.

The controversy is not with the lottery consortia or language immersion program. That is basically luck of the draw. But MCPS wants to change the criteria of selection for a magnet programs that are for highly gifted children, because many URMs are unable to compete. Well, HGC admisssions test is taken by kids in 3rd grade. If MCPS has not done an adequate job of educating these kids in 3-4 years, then it is the fault of MCPS. If these kids are not informed about the test, it is also the fault of MCPS. Maybe the people in charge of informing this population about FARMS and ESOL, be in charge of informing about these programs, because every single URM knows about FARMS and ESOL, and avail of these free programs.

By changing the admissions criteria and not basing it on performance, MCPS is being very racist. Do they think that URMs are unable to compete because they do not have the intelligence?

INstead of trying to close the achievement gap in the magnet programs that require admissions test (HGC and magnet MS and HS) and is a very small fraction of overall MCPS population, and has been put in place for a group of kids with special academic needs, why not try to close the achievement gap in all the schools by educating everyone well?

If these kids cannot do well in PARCC and MSA and are not at grade level, they are the candidates for the toughest specialized academic programs? MCPS should give them extra coaching and tutoring not to get into the magnet programs but actually to be able to do well in a regular school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This is just simply untrue. My DS is short and has been playing basketball since 2nd grade. He works hard, and plays well, but there is no way he can match the taller kids - at least the tall kids who work equally hard). He enjoys the game and has stuck with it, but he has no dreams of pro ball, mostly due to his height.

We all have limits. Yes, provide resources for the kids who need extra help in math/reading, so they can get up to speed. But, don't make up stupid guidelines that a certain number of people of a certain race/background need to be in a certain program. That's just ludicrous. It's like adding in something that says 10% of the varsity bball team needs to be 5'7" or shorter.

Nobody is doing this. To repeat, nobody is doing this. Nobody. Nobody is doing this, nobody is recommending doing this, nobody can legally do it anyway. Nobody. MCPS cannot legally do it.

The Metis report said -- let's make sure that more poor/brown/black kids apply to the HGCs. DCUM reflexively and consistently translates this as -- let's admit unqualified poor/brown/black kids to the HGCs for being poor/brown/black. Why does DCUM does this?

Because we see it happen over and over and over in other situations and in college admissions.

I attended grad school where they offered a program for AA and Latino students to 'increase diversity'. They had 10 out of 120 students who were AA and Latino. They were admitted with lower test scores and lower grades and also offered a free summer program the summer before the program started to acclimate themselves and give them a heads up to the program. Three out of the 10 students left the program and one 1 of the non-diverse students left the program over the next 2 years. What a huge waste of money.

It would be illegal for MCPS to do this.
It would be illegal for MCPS to do this.
It would be illegal for MCPS to do this.
It would be illegal for MCPS to do this.
It would be illegal for MCPS to do this.

Is that enough repetitions to make the point?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

To use your analogy, it is the role of MCPS that all kids know how to run and start the race at the same place. But, then it is not MCPS place to have one kid run and another kid bike because he is not a good runner or that he is unfit or he never practiced running or he only wants to watch video games.

Yes, ideally, all kids in MCPS would know how to run AND would start the race at the same place. But we know that they don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

By changing the admissions criteria and not basing it on performance, MCPS is being very racist. Do they think that URMs are unable to compete because they do not have the intelligence?

Race matters in society. Acknowledging this fact does not make MCPS racist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

So, do they think that going towards are more subjective admittance criteria would be more beneficial? If not grades and test scores, what are they proposing HGC admittance depends on?

A bad criterion is a bad criterion, whether it's a "subjective" criterion or an "objective" one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To use your analogy, it is the role of MCPS that all kids know how to run and start the race at the same place. But, then it is not MCPS place to have one kid run and another kid bike because he is not a good runner or that he is unfit or he never practiced running or he only wants to watch video games.

Yes, ideally, all kids in MCPS would know how to run AND would start the race at the same place. But we know that they don't.

but, it is not and should not be the job of MCPS to be their parents, to ensure the kids care about their school work, do their hw, etc. Unless MCPS takes every URM kid and parents them, they will never start at the same place.

Life is unfair. Most of us don't come from wealthy families. But, lower income kids whose parents still care about their education can succeed just as equally, no matter the color of their skin.

BTW, I've posted this before, not all URM kids are low income and start far behind in the race. I hope MCPS realizes this when making any changes to the entrance criteria.