FCPS Appeals decision are out

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Re:the limited number of spots
I don’t think it’s true, because my child’s center had significantly more AAP 5th graders than 4th or 6th, and they are constantly shifting teachers to different grade levels or from AAP to gen ed to accommodate the populations.

Also, why would enrollment caps make sense when you can just convert a gen ed classroom to an AAP one to handle the advanced learners?

Because the AAP kids could be coming from feeder schools and not part of the center base population. Then you would need two classrooms. You just don't know where the kids will come from so you try and hold the numbers. And the reason that AAP enrollment fluctuates in the different grades is because you can apply into the program at the different grades. Most center schools have a different number in 4th, 5th, or 6th. What you should be comparing is whether the 4 classrooms of 5th grade Level IV in your center school ever went to 5 classrooms and yet maintained the same number of GenEd classrooms. If the answer is no to that question, rest assured there's a cap for each.

6th grade went from 3 to 4 classrooms, while gen ed remained at 3

Which year, which center school? Interesting, but I'm not sure this is repeatable or plausible given the program statistics. Far less kids apply into 6th Level IV AAP services because those kids would have missed out on a lot of Advanced Math. If the child is already getting Advanced Math, then what would be the point of going into AAP center elementary or middle school in 6th grade? You can easily opt for honors classes in middle school and if you're in Advanced Math, you'll track to the same class options as the AAP kids. So the logic doesn't work out, unfortunately. That's part of the problem with an Anonymous forum. Lots of people can post a lot of misinformation so for the parents of really bright kids, it would make sense if we all used our own analytical skills to decipher what makes sense and what doesn't.

[Anonymous]

Last year, Mosby Woods. There were 3 5th grade classes two years ago. Last year, there were 4 6th grade classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last year, Mosby Woods. There were 3 5th grade classes two years ago. Last year, there were 4 6th grade classes.

Wasn't this due to a redistribution of some sort? I heard Lemon Road will also see an increase due to the planned redistribution of the Marshall Road. That may alleviate Mosby Woods.

[Anonymous]

Nope. There were only 80 or so AAP 6th graders, with class sizes around 20 kids. Meanwhile, Gen ed 6th grade had 30 kids per classroom. Clearly they had the capacity to either admit more kids or allocate that extra teacher to 3rd grade and admit more kids there.

[Anonymous]

Anyway, if the main consideration for a cap on AAP students is school capacity and not ability, then here's a simple solution: Admit all of the kids who are advanced or who seem like they could benefit from the program. Put a LLIV in every school. Decide on the number of slots that can be accommodated in the center. Then, lottery off the center spots based on racial and school representation. Kids who are identified as AAP eligible but not picked in the lottery would still be guaranteed LIV courses through their LLIV.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
It doesn't inherently help a basketball team to win games to have players from diverse perspectives. But it demonstrably and undeniably helps students to prepare to change the world to have students around them from diverse perspectives.

Kind of. I doubt Harvard looks for diversity when admitting kids to its math program. Diverse perspectives are highly important for humanities and social studies, but kind of irrelevant in STEM fields. If the main point of TJ is to be an elite STEM school, then I'm not sure that the diverse perspectives help much.

I would agree with you if the point of studying math were just to do math. But given that the point of it, and other STEM fields and of course in theory TJ, is to serve the best interests of humanity, diverse perspectives are a non-negotiable.

Yes but the perspective of the Asian Americans is not taken into account so there is no diverse perspective and there is only the perspectives of the preferred minority groups or the perspectives of the groups with adequate political clout. It is not in the interest of humanity to have Asian Americans be subjected to blatant racial discrimination.

It's not actually discriminatory as much as it is profiling. Asian Americans are by far the most represented in most STEM fields, irrespective of the school or program you're discussing. So, you can't say that it meets the measure of being discriminatory. But certainly many Asian Americans fall out of the student body based on racial profiling of the class and the desire to seek a more "diverse" class in the school or program.

To the same point on the McKinsey article's poster and the response, I agree that FCPS is trying to close the achievement gap and that there are two ways to go about it. The immediate tool is by limiting or profiling the applicants to the AAP program and selecting a representative group of Hispanics/AA/White/Asians who may do very well in the Level IV program keeping in mind that it is not truly a gifted/talented program, but works more like an honors program. If you were to think about an ideal class makeup for the Level IV, you could say that a "diverse" group may be White/Asians who fall between the +1 and +2 SD, while for Hispanic/AA it's kids who are in the +1 SD or better. For the White/Asian kids who are clearly in the +2 - +3 SD, they are likely screened out for the service. Is it fair? The answer to that is "it depends." For the White/Asians who are in that category and got rejected, it may not seem fair. For the Hispanic/AA kids who were allowed into the program because the empty seat, they would see it as very fair.

I agree that it would help if FCPS were to provide a adequate summary of the "holistic" review. Having worked in Admissions most of my career, I can tell you that "holistic" refers to a lot more than just scores on a test, GBRS, recommendations or work samples. It certainly refers to a program's "holistic" demographic profile of students. Most people are aware of this when it comes to college admissions because quotas are inherently understood by parents. It seems though that FCPS parents are completely unaware that quotas could also be heavily in play at the elementary school level when program measures are evaluated for closing the achievement gap.

Of course parents are aware - that's pretty much the point of this whole thread. Holistic means test scores, GBRS, work samples, + race. For people comparing this to college admissions, that situation sucks but obviously there are other colleges. Here, a truly gifted Asian could be left out in favor of a lesser qualified student and have no other options for advanced enrichment. Great, you increased diversity, but to the detriment of a deserving child.

You could provide that advanced enrichment for your child by either enrolling them in outside programs (really, what are we talking about--Advanced Math(?), put them in AoPS or something like it, lots of online places too like JHU CTY and other online G/T programs), or doing it at home in a homeschooling environment. The point of closing the achievement gap is to actually close it when it will matter. So if your White/Asian kid is SOL, then take it upon yourself to figure out a different road for your child. Tons of Hispanic/AA parents aren't able to do so for their kids because of the systemic nature of the problem. So give it a rest! There is a national debate on this issue. Don't shake your head and say "we believe in BLM" but then not if it causes some disadvantage to our White/Asian kid because if that is the case then truly we DON'T believe in BLM.

What are you referring to when you say systemic nature of the problem? Seems like that's what needs should be addressed in order to increase diversity. And you are making the assumption that everyone in this situation has the ability to pay for all these outside programs.

You're really reaching now to bring up BLM. These issues are not related.

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"homogeneous group of students who are indistinguishable from one another"

Well you've revealed your bias. You're not going to be able to make a convincing case for your views after that. Randomly tossing in words like "correctly" and "undeniably" isn't going to fool anyone.

I mean, that's what college admissions officers say about TJ and its students

[citation needed]

[Anonymous]

^So you support placing Asian kids in classes that are remedial for them to promote equity? It’s okay for some kids to be denied an education, as long as those kids are white or Asian? How is equity achieved when the kids not being educated in their public schools instead enroll in private?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
It doesn't inherently help a basketball team to win games to have players from diverse perspectives. But it demonstrably and undeniably helps students to prepare to change the world to have students around them from diverse perspectives.

Kind of. I doubt Harvard looks for diversity when admitting kids to its math program. Diverse perspectives are highly important for humanities and social studies, but kind of irrelevant in STEM fields. If the main point of TJ is to be an elite STEM school, then I'm not sure that the diverse perspectives help much.

I would agree with you if the point of studying math were just to do math. But given that the point of it, and other STEM fields and of course in theory TJ, is to serve the best interests of humanity, diverse perspectives are a non-negotiable.

Yes but the perspective of the Asian Americans is not taken into account so there is no diverse perspective and there is only the perspectives of the preferred minority groups or the perspectives of the groups with adequate political clout. It is not in the interest of humanity to have Asian Americans be subjected to blatant racial discrimination.

It's not actually discriminatory as much as it is profiling. Asian Americans are by far the most represented in most STEM fields, irrespective of the school or program you're discussing. So, you can't say that it meets the measure of being discriminatory. But certainly many Asian Americans fall out of the student body based on racial profiling of the class and the desire to seek a more "diverse" class in the school or program.

To the same point on the McKinsey article's poster and the response, I agree that FCPS is trying to close the achievement gap and that there are two ways to go about it. The immediate tool is by limiting or profiling the applicants to the AAP program and selecting a representative group of Hispanics/AA/White/Asians who may do very well in the Level IV program keeping in mind that it is not truly a gifted/talented program, but works more like an honors program. If you were to think about an ideal class makeup for the Level IV, you could say that a "diverse" group may be White/Asians who fall between the +1 and +2 SD, while for Hispanic/AA it's kids who are in the +1 SD or better. For the White/Asian kids who are clearly in the +2 - +3 SD, they are likely screened out for the service. Is it fair? The answer to that is "it depends." For the White/Asians who are in that category and got rejected, it may not seem fair. For the Hispanic/AA kids who were allowed into the program because the empty seat, they would see it as very fair.

I agree that it would help if FCPS were to provide a adequate summary of the "holistic" review. Having worked in Admissions most of my career, I can tell you that "holistic" refers to a lot more than just scores on a test, GBRS, recommendations or work samples. It certainly refers to a program's "holistic" demographic profile of students. Most people are aware of this when it comes to college admissions because quotas are inherently understood by parents. It seems though that FCPS parents are completely unaware that quotas could also be heavily in play at the elementary school level when program measures are evaluated for closing the achievement gap.

Of course parents are aware - that's pretty much the point of this whole thread. Holistic means test scores, GBRS, work samples, + race. For people comparing this to college admissions, that situation sucks but obviously there are other colleges. Here, a truly gifted Asian could be left out in favor of a lesser qualified student and have no other options for advanced enrichment. Great, you increased diversity, but to the detriment of a deserving child.

You could provide that advanced enrichment for your child by either enrolling them in outside programs (really, what are we talking about--Advanced Math(?), put them in AoPS or something like it, lots of online places too like JHU CTY and other online G/T programs), or doing it at home in a homeschooling environment. The point of closing the achievement gap is to actually close it when it will matter. So if your White/Asian kid is SOL, then take it upon yourself to figure out a different road for your child. Tons of Hispanic/AA parents aren't able to do so for their kids because of the systemic nature of the problem. So give it a rest! There is a national debate on this issue. Don't shake your head and say "we believe in BLM" but then not if it causes some disadvantage to our White/Asian kid because if that is the case then truly we DON'T believe in BLM.

What are you referring to when you say systemic nature of the problem? Seems like that's what needs should be addressed in order to increase diversity. And you are making the assumption that everyone in this situation has the ability to pay for all these outside programs.

You're really reaching now to bring up BLM. These issues are not related.

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

How was it possible for Asians (many of whom are relatively recent immigrants with no social status or connections and English being a foreign language to them) to overcome the "achievement gap" with similar obstacles and discrimination faced by Hispanics and blacks in America? Don't say only elites cam to US because clearly that is not the case- most Asian immigrants came to US for economic reasons.

Didn't they overcome the gap by working hard and studying hard or maybe even harder? Do you want to try going to S. Korea and try to become one of the top students there when you do not speak Korean? How much extra effort and studying would that take? So mow we want to discourage hard working and hard studying?

US is the laughing stock of the world now because we moved away from merit based system too much in the last several decades among other reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

so you promote kids above their heads and then give them extra resources (which other kids will notice) and then that somehow closes the achievement gap? That seems like a great way to engender resentment and ultimately litigation

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"homogeneous group of students who are indistinguishable from one another"

Well you've revealed your bias. You're not going to be able to make a convincing case for your views after that. Randomly tossing in words like "correctly" and "undeniably" isn't going to fool anyone.

I mean, that's what college admissions officers say about TJ and its students

[citation needed]

You can't cite conversations and no admissions officer in their right mind would ever put it in writing.

But yeah, they can't tell the difference between the 150+ applicants every year who all have 4.3+ GPAs, all do Model UN or Debate, all have the same AP profile, all have attempted to start up their own non-profits, and all want to study some flavor of engineering, CS, or pre-med. And if you've been on the ground at TJ at all in the last ten years, you know that this is the reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
It doesn't inherently help a basketball team to win games to have players from diverse perspectives. But it demonstrably and undeniably helps students to prepare to change the world to have students around them from diverse perspectives.

Kind of. I doubt Harvard looks for diversity when admitting kids to its math program. Diverse perspectives are highly important for humanities and social studies, but kind of irrelevant in STEM fields. If the main point of TJ is to be an elite STEM school, then I'm not sure that the diverse perspectives help much.

I would agree with you if the point of studying math were just to do math. But given that the point of it, and other STEM fields and of course in theory TJ, is to serve the best interests of humanity, diverse perspectives are a non-negotiable.

Yes but the perspective of the Asian Americans is not taken into account so there is no diverse perspective and there is only the perspectives of the preferred minority groups or the perspectives of the groups with adequate political clout. It is not in the interest of humanity to have Asian Americans be subjected to blatant racial discrimination.

It's not actually discriminatory as much as it is profiling. Asian Americans are by far the most represented in most STEM fields, irrespective of the school or program you're discussing. So, you can't say that it meets the measure of being discriminatory. But certainly many Asian Americans fall out of the student body based on racial profiling of the class and the desire to seek a more "diverse" class in the school or program.

To the same point on the McKinsey article's poster and the response, I agree that FCPS is trying to close the achievement gap and that there are two ways to go about it. The immediate tool is by limiting or profiling the applicants to the AAP program and selecting a representative group of Hispanics/AA/White/Asians who may do very well in the Level IV program keeping in mind that it is not truly a gifted/talented program, but works more like an honors program. If you were to think about an ideal class makeup for the Level IV, you could say that a "diverse" group may be White/Asians who fall between the +1 and +2 SD, while for Hispanic/AA it's kids who are in the +1 SD or better. For the White/Asian kids who are clearly in the +2 - +3 SD, they are likely screened out for the service. Is it fair? The answer to that is "it depends." For the White/Asians who are in that category and got rejected, it may not seem fair. For the Hispanic/AA kids who were allowed into the program because the empty seat, they would see it as very fair.

I agree that it would help if FCPS were to provide a adequate summary of the "holistic" review. Having worked in Admissions most of my career, I can tell you that "holistic" refers to a lot more than just scores on a test, GBRS, recommendations or work samples. It certainly refers to a program's "holistic" demographic profile of students. Most people are aware of this when it comes to college admissions because quotas are inherently understood by parents. It seems though that FCPS parents are completely unaware that quotas could also be heavily in play at the elementary school level when program measures are evaluated for closing the achievement gap.

Of course parents are aware - that's pretty much the point of this whole thread. Holistic means test scores, GBRS, work samples, + race. For people comparing this to college admissions, that situation sucks but obviously there are other colleges. Here, a truly gifted Asian could be left out in favor of a lesser qualified student and have no other options for advanced enrichment. Great, you increased diversity, but to the detriment of a deserving child.

You could provide that advanced enrichment for your child by either enrolling them in outside programs (really, what are we talking about--Advanced Math(?), put them in AoPS or something like it, lots of online places too like JHU CTY and other online G/T programs), or doing it at home in a homeschooling environment. The point of closing the achievement gap is to actually close it when it will matter. So if your White/Asian kid is SOL, then take it upon yourself to figure out a different road for your child. Tons of Hispanic/AA parents aren't able to do so for their kids because of the systemic nature of the problem. So give it a rest! There is a national debate on this issue. Don't shake your head and say "we believe in BLM" but then not if it causes some disadvantage to our White/Asian kid because if that is the case then truly we DON'T believe in BLM.

What are you referring to when you say systemic nature of the problem? Seems like that's what needs should be addressed in order to increase diversity. And you are making the assumption that everyone in this situation has the ability to pay for all these outside programs.

You're really reaching now to bring up BLM. These issues are not related.

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

How was it possible for Asians (many of whom are relatively recent immigrants with no social status or connections and English being a foreign language to them) to overcome the "achievement gap" with similar obstacles and discrimination faced by Hispanics and blacks in America? Don't say only elites cam to US because clearly that is not the case- most Asian immigrants came to US for economic reasons.

Didn't they overcome the gap by working hard and studying hard or maybe even harder? Do you want to try going to S. Korea and try to become one of the top students there when you do not speak Korean? How much extra effort and studying would that take? So mow we want to discourage hard working and hard studying?

US is the laughing stock of the world now because we moved away from merit based system too much in the last several decades among other reasons.

The US is the laughingstock of the world right now because we elected the literal worst human being on the planet to the most powerful position in the world and as a consequence are still dying needlessly of a virus that competently-run countries have contained for some time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
It doesn't inherently help a basketball team to win games to have players from diverse perspectives. But it demonstrably and undeniably helps students to prepare to change the world to have students around them from diverse perspectives.

Kind of. I doubt Harvard looks for diversity when admitting kids to its math program. Diverse perspectives are highly important for humanities and social studies, but kind of irrelevant in STEM fields. If the main point of TJ is to be an elite STEM school, then I'm not sure that the diverse perspectives help much.

I would agree with you if the point of studying math were just to do math. But given that the point of it, and other STEM fields and of course in theory TJ, is to serve the best interests of humanity, diverse perspectives are a non-negotiable.

Yes but the perspective of the Asian Americans is not taken into account so there is no diverse perspective and there is only the perspectives of the preferred minority groups or the perspectives of the groups with adequate political clout. It is not in the interest of humanity to have Asian Americans be subjected to blatant racial discrimination.

It's not actually discriminatory as much as it is profiling. Asian Americans are by far the most represented in most STEM fields, irrespective of the school or program you're discussing. So, you can't say that it meets the measure of being discriminatory. But certainly many Asian Americans fall out of the student body based on racial profiling of the class and the desire to seek a more "diverse" class in the school or program.

To the same point on the McKinsey article's poster and the response, I agree that FCPS is trying to close the achievement gap and that there are two ways to go about it. The immediate tool is by limiting or profiling the applicants to the AAP program and selecting a representative group of Hispanics/AA/White/Asians who may do very well in the Level IV program keeping in mind that it is not truly a gifted/talented program, but works more like an honors program. If you were to think about an ideal class makeup for the Level IV, you could say that a "diverse" group may be White/Asians who fall between the +1 and +2 SD, while for Hispanic/AA it's kids who are in the +1 SD or better. For the White/Asian kids who are clearly in the +2 - +3 SD, they are likely screened out for the service. Is it fair? The answer to that is "it depends." For the White/Asians who are in that category and got rejected, it may not seem fair. For the Hispanic/AA kids who were allowed into the program because the empty seat, they would see it as very fair.

I agree that it would help if FCPS were to provide a adequate summary of the "holistic" review. Having worked in Admissions most of my career, I can tell you that "holistic" refers to a lot more than just scores on a test, GBRS, recommendations or work samples. It certainly refers to a program's "holistic" demographic profile of students. Most people are aware of this when it comes to college admissions because quotas are inherently understood by parents. It seems though that FCPS parents are completely unaware that quotas could also be heavily in play at the elementary school level when program measures are evaluated for closing the achievement gap.

Of course parents are aware - that's pretty much the point of this whole thread. Holistic means test scores, GBRS, work samples, + race. For people comparing this to college admissions, that situation sucks but obviously there are other colleges. Here, a truly gifted Asian could be left out in favor of a lesser qualified student and have no other options for advanced enrichment. Great, you increased diversity, but to the detriment of a deserving child.

You could provide that advanced enrichment for your child by either enrolling them in outside programs (really, what are we talking about--Advanced Math(?), put them in AoPS or something like it, lots of online places too like JHU CTY and other online G/T programs), or doing it at home in a homeschooling environment. The point of closing the achievement gap is to actually close it when it will matter. So if your White/Asian kid is SOL, then take it upon yourself to figure out a different road for your child. Tons of Hispanic/AA parents aren't able to do so for their kids because of the systemic nature of the problem. So give it a rest! There is a national debate on this issue. Don't shake your head and say "we believe in BLM" but then not if it causes some disadvantage to our White/Asian kid because if that is the case then truly we DON'T believe in BLM.

What are you referring to when you say systemic nature of the problem? Seems like that's what needs should be addressed in order to increase diversity. And you are making the assumption that everyone in this situation has the ability to pay for all these outside programs.

You're really reaching now to bring up BLM. These issues are not related.

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

Using BLM to justify racial profiling against Asians is ridiculous. You're trying to solve racism against one group by using racism against another group. You want to admit unqualified students and then provide remedial instruction so that they can keep up. Meanwhile the qualified students languish at lower levels. Someone else mentioned this in another post, but what you're advocating is achieving equity by pulling down one group, instead of pushing up the other group. Let's all meet in the middle? As for holding everyone to the same standard? If you lower standards for someone, they are going to continue meeting that lower standard. They will never close the gap this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
It doesn't inherently help a basketball team to win games to have players from diverse perspectives. But it demonstrably and undeniably helps students to prepare to change the world to have students around them from diverse perspectives.

Kind of. I doubt Harvard looks for diversity when admitting kids to its math program. Diverse perspectives are highly important for humanities and social studies, but kind of irrelevant in STEM fields. If the main point of TJ is to be an elite STEM school, then I'm not sure that the diverse perspectives help much.

I would agree with you if the point of studying math were just to do math. But given that the point of it, and other STEM fields and of course in theory TJ, is to serve the best interests of humanity, diverse perspectives are a non-negotiable.

Yes but the perspective of the Asian Americans is not taken into account so there is no diverse perspective and there is only the perspectives of the preferred minority groups or the perspectives of the groups with adequate political clout. It is not in the interest of humanity to have Asian Americans be subjected to blatant racial discrimination.

It's not actually discriminatory as much as it is profiling. Asian Americans are by far the most represented in most STEM fields, irrespective of the school or program you're discussing. So, you can't say that it meets the measure of being discriminatory. But certainly many Asian Americans fall out of the student body based on racial profiling of the class and the desire to seek a more "diverse" class in the school or program.

To the same point on the McKinsey article's poster and the response, I agree that FCPS is trying to close the achievement gap and that there are two ways to go about it. The immediate tool is by limiting or profiling the applicants to the AAP program and selecting a representative group of Hispanics/AA/White/Asians who may do very well in the Level IV program keeping in mind that it is not truly a gifted/talented program, but works more like an honors program. If you were to think about an ideal class makeup for the Level IV, you could say that a "diverse" group may be White/Asians who fall between the +1 and +2 SD, while for Hispanic/AA it's kids who are in the +1 SD or better. For the White/Asian kids who are clearly in the +2 - +3 SD, they are likely screened out for the service. Is it fair? The answer to that is "it depends." For the White/Asians who are in that category and got rejected, it may not seem fair. For the Hispanic/AA kids who were allowed into the program because the empty seat, they would see it as very fair.

I agree that it would help if FCPS were to provide a adequate summary of the "holistic" review. Having worked in Admissions most of my career, I can tell you that "holistic" refers to a lot more than just scores on a test, GBRS, recommendations or work samples. It certainly refers to a program's "holistic" demographic profile of students. Most people are aware of this when it comes to college admissions because quotas are inherently understood by parents. It seems though that FCPS parents are completely unaware that quotas could also be heavily in play at the elementary school level when program measures are evaluated for closing the achievement gap.

Of course parents are aware - that's pretty much the point of this whole thread. Holistic means test scores, GBRS, work samples, + race. For people comparing this to college admissions, that situation sucks but obviously there are other colleges. Here, a truly gifted Asian could be left out in favor of a lesser qualified student and have no other options for advanced enrichment. Great, you increased diversity, but to the detriment of a deserving child.

You could provide that advanced enrichment for your child by either enrolling them in outside programs (really, what are we talking about--Advanced Math(?), put them in AoPS or something like it, lots of online places too like JHU CTY and other online G/T programs), or doing it at home in a homeschooling environment. The point of closing the achievement gap is to actually close it when it will matter. So if your White/Asian kid is SOL, then take it upon yourself to figure out a different road for your child. Tons of Hispanic/AA parents aren't able to do so for their kids because of the systemic nature of the problem. So give it a rest! There is a national debate on this issue. Don't shake your head and say "we believe in BLM" but then not if it causes some disadvantage to our White/Asian kid because if that is the case then truly we DON'T believe in BLM.

What are you referring to when you say systemic nature of the problem? Seems like that's what needs should be addressed in order to increase diversity. And you are making the assumption that everyone in this situation has the ability to pay for all these outside programs.

You're really reaching now to bring up BLM. These issues are not related.

I think it is related. The discourse on BLM may have originated with police brutality but the larger context of what is being debated is the systemic nature of racism that has caused massive inequity in American life. It applies to education moreso than anything else because that is the trajectory you draw for the men and women of Hispanic/AA origin. It starts at a very young age and by giving these individuals a healthy "equity" boost throughout their education life to retain for the future trajectory in closing the achievement (and income) gap. For the posters who question what happens when the H/AA kid start flailing in AAP, the appropriate response would be to provide MORE support to those kids to get through the course content. That is what closing the achievement gap is all about. I'm sure we have all seen the graphic for the difference between equality and equity. (You can Google it if you haven't.) But what is being discussed here broadly especially by parents whose kids didn't make it to the AAP program is the notion of equality. What FCPS is trying to attain is equity. In an admissions scenario (where space is limited), the two are mutually exclusive. Equity means you're giving the underdog a leg up. Equality means the underdog will always be an underdog because you're going to hold that individual to the same standard as everyone else. You'll never be able to close the achievement gap if you employ a strategy of "equality for all."

How was it possible for Asians (many of whom are relatively recent immigrants with no social status or connections and English being a foreign language to them) to overcome the "achievement gap" with similar obstacles and discrimination faced by Hispanics and blacks in America? Don't say only elites cam to US because clearly that is not the case- most Asian immigrants came to US for economic reasons.

Didn't they overcome the gap by working hard and studying hard or maybe even harder? Do you want to try going to S. Korea and try to become one of the top students there when you do not speak Korean? How much extra effort and studying would that take? So mow we want to discourage hard working and hard studying?

US is the laughing stock of the world now because we moved away from merit based system too much in the last several decades among other reasons.

The US is the laughingstock of the world right now because we elected the literal worst human being on the planet to the most powerful position in the world and as a consequence are still dying needlessly of a virus that competently-run countries have contained for some time.

You just gave a good example of how US has been/is moving away from merit based system. DT got into UPenn using the "side entrance" and would not have attended UPenn were it not for "non-merit based system" at work. I am sure DT received preferential/special treatment he did not deserve based on merit in myriad of other ways ultimately going all the way to the WH.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the post with 140 wisc score and rejection. Do you know a good education attorney that I can contact for consultation?

Just curious as to what a good education attorney could do for a case like this?

DP. I think the weight given to the GBRS should be challenged. Teachers are humans and some are biased.