Wouldn't it be easier for your child to stand out in an average/low rated school vs a high rated?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Highly rated is misleading. See this thread - http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/686371.page

And specifically this, re Great Schools-
"his is also why other schools in the area have dropped in the Great Schools ranking. They recently adjusted the ranking methodology to factor how minorities fair at the school. McLean HS is a good example - as the GS ranking is now 7/10. Funny how in US News and other rankings claim schools like these are among the top 1% of High School's in the NATION (that's out of roughly 32,000 PUBLIC High Schools) based on test scores etc and then Great Schools says "Meh, you're a 7/10" because a small portion of the student body under performs the majority (though I'm certain some will take offense to putting it that bluntly). Great Schools also ranks based on state/region which not everyone realizes - so they mistakenly think a 9/10 school in Montana is the same effectively as a 9/10 school in Northern Virginia. As someone who has taught at pubic schools in MD and VA I find the Great Schools rating rather misleading to the uninformed. "


and this: "All Arlington schools are quite good in a bigger sense. Compare, for example, Great Falls HS in Montana vs Wakefield. Great Falls has a 7 to Wakefield's 3. Wakefield students are 80ish% proficient on state tests, which is below the state average and therefore a negative to the overall score. Great Falls students are 48% proficient which is sadly, above the state average, so this boosts GS score. All down the list, GF students are above the state average (which is abysmal!) but this boosts the overall score. Students at Wakefield are doing far better overall by this measure, but bc they are slightly below the state average they get a bad score. Yes, Yorktown has better scores than Wakefield. But lets keep some perspective here."

A lot of this seems contrived. Maybe educational standards in Montana are low, but objectively Wakefield’s SAT and SOL scores are below average in Virginia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Highly rated is misleading. See this thread - http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/686371.page

And specifically this, re Great Schools-
"his is also why other schools in the area have dropped in the Great Schools ranking. They recently adjusted the ranking methodology to factor how minorities fair at the school. McLean HS is a good example - as the GS ranking is now 7/10. Funny how in US News and other rankings claim schools like these are among the top 1% of High School's in the NATION (that's out of roughly 32,000 PUBLIC High Schools) based on test scores etc and then Great Schools says "Meh, you're a 7/10" because a small portion of the student body under performs the majority (though I'm certain some will take offense to putting it that bluntly). Great Schools also ranks based on state/region which not everyone realizes - so they mistakenly think a 9/10 school in Montana is the same effectively as a 9/10 school in Northern Virginia. As someone who has taught at pubic schools in MD and VA I find the Great Schools rating rather misleading to the uninformed. "


and this: "All Arlington schools are quite good in a bigger sense. Compare, for example, Great Falls HS in Montana vs Wakefield. Great Falls has a 7 to Wakefield's 3. Wakefield students are 80ish% proficient on state tests, which is below the state average and therefore a negative to the overall score. Great Falls students are 48% proficient which is sadly, above the state average, so this boosts GS score. All down the list, GF students are above the state average (which is abysmal!) but this boosts the overall score. Students at Wakefield are doing far better overall by this measure, but bc they are slightly below the state average they get a bad score. Yes, Yorktown has better scores than Wakefield. But lets keep some perspective here."

Your analysis doesn't hold up...you cannot compare passrates across state lines unless they use the same test (such as common core PARCC test). I believe MT is a common core state, and those tests are substantially harder than VA SOLs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that Wilson HS in the district has similar Ivy admit rate to McLean HS. Not sure what to make of that.

You could always start with a source. In any event, Wilson isn't in NoVa. It's essentially the flagship public school in DCPS, with over 40% of the students transferring from their base schools.

If you want to post the full set of college destinations for Wilson students, I'll chase down McLean's.

McLean 2016 posted at 20:14 here: http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/100/567859.page

And this is what Wilson provides to colleges, but it doesn't list admits or numbers per school matriculation, just the names of schools 2016 kids are attending:

http://www.wilsonhs.org/ourpages/auto/2011/4/15/39942607/Wilsonprofile2016-17webreduced.pdf

What stands out to me is the $31million in scholarships across 270 seniors attending 4-year colleges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Working hard enough to be at the tippy-top academically has a lot to do with personality. Few students want to shine, to that degree, and be noticed.

Yep. My kids are all introverts. They do well in school, but aren't the kind of kids to be noticed because they just don't really care about recognition and putting themselves "out there." It's not worth it to them. Can't say I blame them, as I've always been the same way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are at a highly rated elementary school. my children are average and my 9 year old feels like she's "not one of the smart kids." In hindsight, a lower rated school would have been better for us. I want my children to do their best, they don't have to be the best, and while average would horrify some of the parents in our school, we are perfectly fine with that. This is a great question OP. DH and I are conflicted about whether we should move.

+100
Average is just fine with us too. We made the unfortunate mistake of living in a neighborhood zoned for an AAP elementary school. If you have average kids, I don't recommend this route. At any other ("normal") school, they would have shined (shone?).

[Anonymous]

I used to live in Montana and common core or whatever, the schools are far less ambitious than even the worst school in NOVA. A GS rating is absolutely not the same thing across districts.

[Anonymous]

NP- I don’t think the Montana analogy is a stretch at all.
When we were looking to move out of state, I started comparing SAT scores and AP pass rates between Wakefield and the new “9” school to which we would be zoned in the Midwest.
The stats were very similar.
It was very eye opening about how much veiled racism plays a part in these discussions, and how much hand wringing I was doing over nothing. My kids would have been fine st Wakefield.
They would likeky have been fine at Langley as well, but I truly am weary of affluent teenagers. My husband went to an extremely wealthy high school. Pitfalls galore.
I’m not concerned that only 12 kids are going to UVA. THats a ridiculous concern.

[Anonymous]

Your kid will be fine at a "low performing school" all all FCPS there is at least one section of mostly AP/IB so your kid will always be surrounded by motivated kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP- I don’t think the Montana analogy is a stretch at all.
When we were looking to move out of state, I started comparing SAT scores and AP pass rates between Wakefield and the new “9” school to which we would be zoned in the Midwest.
The stats were very similar.
It was very eye opening about how much veiled racism plays a part in these discussions, and how much hand wringing I was doing over nothing. My kids would have been fine st Wakefield.
They would likeky have been fine at Langley as well, but I truly am weary of affluent teenagers. My husband went to an extremely wealthy high school. Pitfalls galore.
I’m not concerned that only 12 kids are going to UVA. THats a ridiculous concern.

Wakefield ranks 226th out of 290 high schools in Virginia based on SOL performance: https://www.schooldigger.com/go/VA/schools/0027000111/school.aspx

It has a Great Schools rating of 3. Average SAT scores were below the state average, and there were no National Merit Semifinalists in the Class of 2018.

There are many schools in the Midwest much better than this.

[Anonymous]

Keep in mind that the cut-off score for NMSF is much higher in Virginia than in most states.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Keep in mind that the cut-off score for NMSF is much higher in Virginia than in most states.

And completely inconsequential to future success in life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP- I don’t think the Montana analogy is a stretch at all.
When we were looking to move out of state, I started comparing SAT scores and AP pass rates between Wakefield and the new “9” school to which we would be zoned in the Midwest.
The stats were very similar.
It was very eye opening about how much veiled racism plays a part in these discussions, and how much hand wringing I was doing over nothing. My kids would have been fine st Wakefield.
They would likeky have been fine at Langley as well, but I truly am weary of affluent teenagers. My husband went to an extremely wealthy high school. Pitfalls galore.
I’m not concerned that only 12 kids are going to UVA. THats a ridiculous concern.

Wakefield ranks 226th out of 290 high schools in Virginia based on SOL performance: https://www.schooldigger.com/go/VA/schools/0027000111/school.aspx

It has a Great Schools rating of 3. Average SAT scores were below the state average, and there were no National Merit Semifinalists in the Class of 2018.

There are many schools in the Midwest much better than this.

Not really. They just don’t have large immigrant/ELL populations. If you compare course offerings, extra curriculars, and faculty- I’m sure Wakefield is on par.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP- I don’t think the Montana analogy is a stretch at all.
When we were looking to move out of state, I started comparing SAT scores and AP pass rates between Wakefield and the new “9” school to which we would be zoned in the Midwest.
The stats were very similar.
It was very eye opening about how much veiled racism plays a part in these discussions, and how much hand wringing I was doing over nothing. My kids would have been fine st Wakefield.
They would likeky have been fine at Langley as well, but I truly am weary of affluent teenagers. My husband went to an extremely wealthy high school. Pitfalls galore.
I’m not concerned that only 12 kids are going to UVA. THats a ridiculous concern.

Wakefield ranks 226th out of 290 high schools in Virginia based on SOL performance: https://www.schooldigger.com/go/VA/schools/0027000111/school.aspx

It has a Great Schools rating of 3. Average SAT scores were below the state average, and there were no National Merit Semifinalists in the Class of 2018.

There are many schools in the Midwest much better than this.

But it's not the school's fault. It's not something that they are or are not doing. It's the parents who live in the boundary but won't send their high achieving kids to school there. They transfer to W-L and probably Arl Tech now, or lottery into HB, or go private. If those students stayed at Wakefield, the stats would change. But getting a large enough cohort of high achieving kids to enroll there when there are so many other options in APS is a heavy lift. Just like at the elementary level. Are you going to send your kid to the neighborhood "3" school when they could go to a "9" or even a "6" via lottery? Not many have yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP- I don’t think the Montana analogy is a stretch at all.
When we were looking to move out of state, I started comparing SAT scores and AP pass rates between Wakefield and the new “9” school to which we would be zoned in the Midwest.
The stats were very similar.
It was very eye opening about how much veiled racism plays a part in these discussions, and how much hand wringing I was doing over nothing. My kids would have been fine st Wakefield.
They would likeky have been fine at Langley as well, but I truly am weary of affluent teenagers. My husband went to an extremely wealthy high school. Pitfalls galore.
I’m not concerned that only 12 kids are going to UVA. THats a ridiculous concern.

your analysis betrays your claim! You relied on the SAT to compare schools in two different states.... that's exactly what I said -- you can only make state to state comparisons if you are using the same test in each state (such as PARCC common core tests or SAT or ACT tests). You can't just say "well 48% of the MT kids passed their state standardized tests and 85% of the Wakefield Kids passed the SOLs, so the Wakefield kids MUST be smarter." Doesn't work that way... and you implicitly agreed.

[Anonymous]

I was thinking the same about my kids. We can’t decide between two schools.