When I went to a W school in the 90s, the accelerated path was 11th graders took Calculus AB then took BC in 12th grader. When I glanced at the slides yesterday, it looks like that path is still there. Anything above that, students went to Montgomery College for the math courses back then. |
The Board doesn’t decide this. MCPS gets to do what it wants here. There are two pathways, make it abundantly clear to MCPS that the community doesn’t support this or get the Board to pass a new resolution requiring actual acceleration. The petition as framed is meaningless… |
| I think the petition is really well done. I think it expresses the concerns the community has about this change, and the lack of thought and transparency that should have been part of such a big change. MCPS is systematically dismantling ALL programming for advanced students in elementary school and cramming it down people’s throats without input from the community or acknowledging how badly the last change they made went. I am absolutely furious and know many others who are as well. |
You can safely say "ALL programs for advanced students in all levels". |
MC has a lot of rules for doing advanced classes and told me no for my child. They wanted her to start back to Calc 1, saying that the Calc in MCPS may not be good enough. No way. They were really nasty about it. |
The point of a petition is to make it clear to the board that the community doesn't support this. Figuring out how to implement the community's wishes is part of the board's job. |
Math 6 = 6th grade math, on track to start algebra in 9th Accel Math 6/AMP 6+ = 6th & half of 7th grade math (with the other half of 7th+8th taken in 7th grade), on track to start algebra in 8th-- for strong kids in grade-level 5th grade math or kids who did compacted 5/6 who could use a slowdown/reinforcement Grade 6 Pre-Alg = 7th & 8th grade math (with 6th grade math completed in grade 5 as part of compacted math), on track to start algebra in 7th |
This was back then in the 90s and really less then five students per year that I knew about that went that route. Like honestly sometimes maybe one or two students. And those students were like top tier. Like getting 1600 on their SATs without taking a prep course, having high prestigous jobs now, etc. Also I forgot to mention that I think AP Stat was an option as well back then. But you'll see that a lot of schools aren't accepting AP scores for credits anymore. They really got cheapened when schools found out that was a factor in high school ratings and tried to get as many students as possible to take the exams. Like some schools won't give credit for AP scores anymore. At the most they'll let students take an advanced level of the course instead. ie instead of giving them credit for Math 101 and going to the next math course of Math 201, they'll place them in Math 105 and put them on track to take Math 205, the next year. Which makes it even more sad when looking at the low college ready proficiency rates that some schools at MCPS has for their AP or IB scores. |
Except this is the "old" way. It is not clear this is at all what's going to happen in the "new" proposal. |
I took APs in the 80s, and my kids have taken them recently. I don't think what you're saying is true. Many colleges (fancy private ones) never gave credit for APs. I got zero credit for all my fives. Big schools still give lots of credit for 4s/5s -- my niece went into Berkeley as a sophomore with her credits. I also don't think the APs have gotten easier, comparing what i took to what my kids take. It's true that a lot more kids take them. I think it's also true that kids are going in more prepared. We didn't have things like Heimler's Videos on youtube to prepare us -- if you had a good teacher, you were prepared and could get that 5, and if you had a not great teacher, you basically weren't prepared and would probably get a 3. Now, every kid can be prepared if they want to put in the extra time, because there are good teachers posting their lessons online for free and sample tests posted online etc. So there's a lot more opportunity to actually learn the content. So I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with the dumbing down of English curricula in supposedly honors classes -- that's where I think kids are really being cheated with today's system. |
This was from the update GEC sent yesterday. What you can do: 1) Reach out to Board of Education members and central office staff to share your feedback. Key email addresses are below. Graciela_Rivera-oven@mcpsmd.org, Brenda_Wolff@mcpsmd.org, Rita_M_Montoya@mcpsmd.org, Karla_Silvestre@mcpsmd.org, Laura_M_Stewart@mcpsmd.org, Julie_Yang@mcpsmd.org, natalie_zimmerman@mcpsmd.org, Anuva_C_Maloo@mcpsmd.org, thomas_w_taylor@mcpsmd.org, Niki_T_Porter@mcpsmd.org, stephanie_d_brant@mcpsmd.org, sheila_j_berlinger@mcpsmd.org, kristie_l_clark@mcpsmd.org 2) Request a meeting with your principal to understand how cluster grouping will be implemented at your school and what the school will do to ensure consistent daily accelerated and enriched instruction in math and ELA. Given that principals are responsible for forming classes, it will be essential to understand how your principal will approach this. |
Sometimes I have seen groups put together forms that make this easy to do for a lot of people to do quickly. Is the GEC group going to do that? Also someone upthread mentioned a listserv how do we get on that? |
I emailed gifted@mccpta.org to join |
Petitions get ignored, individual e-mails are better as long . Also please make sure you send to boe@mcpsmd.org-- there is a Board staffer there who compiles the information to share with the Board and will reply to you (probably using AI, but still.) If it goes directly to Board members I don't think it will get added to the tally of "X number of parents wrote to the Board this week opposing this." |
Here's how to signup: https://www.mccpta.org/mccpta-elists MCCPTA committee elists are open to everyone. You can request to join by sending an email to the addresses listed below. You will then receive an email asking for your name, school name, and which list you are interested in. Please respond to this email to be added to the elist. CULTURAL ARTS: cultural-arts+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io CURRICULUM: curriculum+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io DIVERSITY EQUITY INCLUSION: diversity-equity-inclusion+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io ESOL: esol+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io GIFTED EDUCATION: gifted-education+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io GREEN SCHOOLS: green-schools+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io HEALTH & SAFETY: health-and-safety+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io MEMBERSHIP & ENGAGEMENT: membership+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io REFLECTIONS: reflections+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io SAFE ROUTES TO SCHOOL: safe-routes+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io SAFE TECH: safe-tech+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io SPECIAL EDUCATION: special-education+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io SUBSTANCE USE PREVENTION: substance-use-prevention+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io SUSTAINABILITY: sustainability+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io TITLE 1 FOCUS PTAS: title1-focus-ptas+subscribe@mccpta.groups.io |