Your Thoughts on Montgomery County Schools

[Anonymous]

moco skools are declining in quality, better move ova 2 nova

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:moco skools are declining in quality, better move ova 2 nova

NoVa is facing the same issues, they're just a decade behind.

[Anonymous]

NoVa is doing pretty well.

Montgomery County has lost 10K jobs in the past few years while NoVa is grown by significantly more. NoVa's tax base is growing Montgomery County's is declining. NoVa's scores are going up, MCPS scores are going down. Real estate in Bethesda and areas close in to DC may be strong but the rest of the county has not kept pace with appreciation in comparison to NoVa.

NoVa did not take it on themselves to create a new curriculum in house with incompetent staff. They don't have the mess that MCPS has created for themselves. NOVA hasn't decided to shut down AAP and only retain TJ to level the playing field.

MCPS has done nothing but talk about PARCC and how 2.0 is all designed to skyrocket them to the top on PARCC. MCPS has so much riding on PARCC scores at this point that when MCPS bombs this test next year, it will be a mess. NoVa has ignored PARCC. They may fare better or the same on the test but it doesn't matter because they didn't trash their curriculum to prepare for PARCC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the OP - It is all relative - parents and kids who have had a great school experience prior will probably find MCPS lacking. Many who start with MCPS might not know any different/better. It greatly depends on your childs current school size, culture, overall teacher quality and your child's comfort/friends at school. So many variables - within MCPS and between kids. But overall, even in the "good" schools, it is best to expect just an average experience these days - that way you will not be too disappointed .

So the reason I'm happy with our experiences in MCPS is because I'm too ignorant to know better. Thank you for enlightening me.

Maybe not for you, but for some, yes. Some people are lucky and happy with their experience because they are in a better school and have gotten good teachers, or at least decent teachers. But I dont believe this reflects the majority. Many feel like it is not good - but probably the majority feel like it is "just ok" or "fine" - I have heard these comments over and over. We have done both public here and in another state (we were outside Chicago), as well as private. There are major differences between school systems (and private) that are hard to just imagine or even see from a website or brochure - parents or kids need to experience to fully appreciate - that is all I was saying.
And a friend of mine who has a child at my child's MCPS public school says they won't even tour a private school because she "just doesn't want to know."

And your proof of this is what? And not all private schools are created the same you do know that -- don't you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NoVa is doing pretty well.

Montgomery County has lost 10K jobs in the past few years while NoVa is grown by significantly more. NoVa's tax base is growing Montgomery County's is declining. NoVa's scores are going up, MCPS scores are going down. Real estate in Bethesda and areas close in to DC may be strong but the rest of the county has not kept pace with appreciation in comparison to NoVa.

NoVa did not take it on themselves to create a new curriculum in house with incompetent staff. They don't have the mess that MCPS has created for themselves. NOVA hasn't decided to shut down AAP and only retain TJ to level the playing field.

MCPS has done nothing but talk about PARCC and how 2.0 is all designed to skyrocket them to the top on PARCC. MCPS has so much riding on PARCC scores at this point that when MCPS bombs this test next year, it will be a mess. NoVa has ignored PARCC. They may fare better or the same on the test but it doesn't matter because they didn't trash their curriculum to prepare for PARCC.

Read this thread: http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/386926.page

The same things are starting to happen there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've spoken with parents who have older kids about why MCPS was considered good in the past. Based on our poor experience, I don't understand how it could have ever been good. Some parents had an interesting comment that the teaching wasn't better or worse before but the system embraced academic achievement and didn't get in a kid's way if they were motivated to learn. 2.0 is a complete reversal where academic achievement his avoided at all costs and kids are supposed to level off to let all the underperforming kids look equal to them.

This is a common belief on DCUM. That is, the belief that MCPS has a policy to keep high-achieving kids (aka my kids) down in order to make low-achieving kids (aka those other kids) look better. And yet nobody has ever provided the slightest shred of actual evidence that this is MCPS's policy. Either MCPS as an organization is amazing at keeping secrets, or it's not MCPS's policy.

I had an eye opening conversation with my neighbor who has a 5th grader and a 1st grader. The curriculum and standards for the 1st grader are so different and low than when her first child was in 1st grade that they are sending the younger one to private. The older child escaped the new curriculum and dumbing down aspects of this new system - no homework, cover less material, 15 mins of 'teaching and then group work/drills, goofy math 'methods', useless report cards, and general Focus on the Bottom.,

[Anonymous]

OMG I wish these people would just move so they could get away from the terroristic conspiratorial MCPS or to keep down their superhumanly intelligent genius kids.
I wish you God speed, just go away

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the best thing about VA schools is the fact that they have a program for a very sizable chunk of advanced kids to challenge them. MD's program for those at the very top end only fits about 3% of the kids in the county so is very limited.

7/21 23:34 here. Yes, I should have said this. As I think about it, part of the new curriculum won't be fixed. I think the people that run MCPS philosophically believe that no matter how differently prepared kids may be as the walk into a school building, they will be treated the same and have the same materials, approach, and classroom. If your kid can read chapter books in 1st grade and do addition/subtraction, that kid will be bored so the other kids can catch up. If your kid needs help, maybe you can get it if you go pay for expensive testing, maybe not. At the same time, MCPS will prioritize technology, central office overhead, and teacher pay over having smaller class sizes. So teachers will have these huge class sizes of all different abilities. No matter how good some of the teachers may be, they won't be able to spend time with everyone.

Finally, I know Fairfax county has cheaper teacher aids to help out in the classroom, but I doubt the union/MCPS would ever go for this. They would rather by tablets and dump them in the classroom without training, then spend dollars trying to give kids individual attention.

Spot-on assessment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is supposed to rank quite high within the nation as a school system. If that is indeed true then I shudder at what kinds of schools are in the US.

I would really rank it very low. I was educated in a 3rd world country and the education I received in my home country was superior by far.

Which country?

I'm not doubting your assessment of your own education. But was your education the education that is available to every child in the country, or were there special circumstances? I find it difficult to believe that the education available to every child in a third-world country is better than MCPS, and that's the appropriate standard of comparison. However, there might be third-world countries where this is the case.

I don't know. I understand most 3rd world countries have textbooks these days, whereas MCPS has done away with them in favor of website print-outs and worksheets, supplemented by whatever notes your DC takes.

[Anonymous]

All public schools suck except where Asians and whites go. And even then , their parents do the heavy lifting.

McLean , w&l , Langley , oakton, Churchill , Whitman , Walter Johnson , quince orchard , poolesville , Wooton, Sherwood , Damascus .

That's about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is supposed to rank quite high within the nation as a school system. If that is indeed true then I shudder at what kinds of schools are in the US.

I would really rank it very low. I was educated in a 3rd world country and the education I received in my home country was superior by far.

Which country?

I'm not doubting your assessment of your own education. But was your education the education that is available to every child in the country, or were there special circumstances? I find it difficult to believe that the education available to every child in a third-world country is better than MCPS, and that's the appropriate standard of comparison. However, there might be third-world countries where this is the case.

I don't know. I understand most 3rd world countries have textbooks these days, whereas MCPS has done away with them in favor of website print-outs and worksheets, supplemented by whatever notes your DC takes.

That's what it takes to be a good school system? Having textbooks?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've spoken with parents who have older kids about why MCPS was considered good in the past. Based on our poor experience, I don't understand how it could have ever been good. Some parents had an interesting comment that the teaching wasn't better or worse before but the system embraced academic achievement and didn't get in a kid's way if they were motivated to learn. 2.0 is a complete reversal where academic achievement his avoided at all costs and kids are supposed to level off to let all the underperforming kids look equal to them.

This is a common belief on DCUM. That is, the belief that MCPS has a policy to keep high-achieving kids (aka my kids) down in order to make low-achieving kids (aka those other kids) look better. And yet nobody has ever provided the slightest shred of actual evidence that this is MCPS's policy. Either MCPS as an organization is amazing at keeping secrets, or it's not MCPS's policy.

I had an eye opening conversation with my neighbor who has a 5th grader and a 1st grader. The curriculum and standards for the 1st grader are so different and low than when her first child was in 1st grade that they are sending the younger one to private. The older child escaped the new curriculum and dumbing down aspects of this new system - no homework, cover less material, 15 mins of 'teaching and then group work/drills, goofy math 'methods', useless report cards, and general Focus on the Bottom.,

So your neighbor has a fifth grader, and heard bad things about Curriculum 2.0, and therefore sent her first-grader to private school? What is your neighbor's first-hand experience with Curriculum 2.0? What is your first-hand experience with Curriculum 2.0?

Here is my first-hand experience with Curriculum 2.0 with my younger child, compared to the previous curriculum for my older child: less homework (a good thing, in my opinion), more social studies, more science, more writing, better math, report cards that are no worse than the previous report cards, and a comment from my younger child's outstanding and experienced first-grade teacher that Curriculum 2.0 benefits the more advanced students but may not be so good for the less-advanced ones.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To the OP - It is all relative - parents and kids who have had a great school experience prior will probably find MCPS lacking. Many who start with MCPS might not know any different/better. It greatly depends on your childs current school size, culture, overall teacher quality and your child's comfort/friends at school. So many variables - within MCPS and between kids. But overall, even in the "good" schools, it is best to expect just an average experience these days - that way you will not be too disappointed .

Highly educated foreign nationals may find the overall standards of US schools lagging far behind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the OP - It is all relative - parents and kids who have had a great school experience prior will probably find MCPS lacking. Many who start with MCPS might not know any different/better. It greatly depends on your childs current school size, culture, overall teacher quality and your child's comfort/friends at school. So many variables - within MCPS and between kids. But overall, even in the "good" schools, it is best to expect just an average experience these days - that way you will not be too disappointed .

Highly educated foreign nationals may find the overall standards of US schools lagging far behind.

Then they have three choices:

1. Not come to the US.
2. Find and pay for a private school they approve of.
3. Make do with the US public school system.

Depending on the country, of course, highly-educated foreign nationals may also find the overall standards of their own country's schools lagging far behind.

[Anonymous]

So your neighbor has a fifth grader, and heard bad things about Curriculum 2.0, and therefore sent her first-grader to private school? What is your neighbor's first-hand experience with Curriculum 2.0? What is your first-hand experience with Curriculum 2.0?

Not the PP but why should the neighbor suffer through experiencing MCPS/2.0 first hand? Do you eat at restaurants with terrible Yelp reviews even though the owner claims its wonderful? No, you would go a restaurant with a better reputation and have a far more likely chance of getting food than experiencing the bad one for yourself.

If the neighbor can afford private and her neighbors are sharing bad things about MCPS - which seems to be confirmed not only here but in the Post, any GT list, special needs list, petitions on change.org, and a whole lot of others - it would be smart to go private.