pros and cons of CES?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:First world problems. So we are actually debating declining CES (got the acceptance letter today). I know I'm going to get flamed (WHY WOULD YOU TURN THIS DOWN) but I would really love to hear from other parents who declined, or who at least thought about declining (and now are glad that they didn't), or maybe accepted and then regretted it.

Pros:
DC is consistently a straight-A student and it's clear that they are not being challenged in the home school environment. We haven't been super impressed with the teacher this year, so that could be a factor.
I was an excelling, not-challenged kid all the way through grade school and I was SO UNPREPARED for college, where I actually had to work hard and TRY and actually fail sometimes. You know, like LIFE. I was totally unprepared because I spent years thinking that I was hot $hit.
I am speculating that CES classes may be getting more out of this whole distance learning thing... don't know if that's actually true... and I really suspect we are in for another round of closures this fall.
DC is a smart kid and I want them to get the most out of life that they possibly can. And they EARNED this.

Cons:
It's further away from the house and the logistics get tougher, especially assuming there's a return to evening sports practices and such. The parent who handles the dropoffs and pickups is not excited.
DC2 will be at the home school this year so we'd have two ES's for... what exactly?
DC likes the home school and has developed a great group of friends. We have a community, a bit of a village, that we fear may dry up a little without the consistent interactions. DH moved in ES and wound up with no ES community at all, and blames his socialization issues on the fact that he spent "formative years" not having neighborhood friends (and this was back in the days before driving around to "playdates").
Is there a reason to disrupt things now, when DC could always switch to a magnet middle for 6th?

I am thinking that I might try to talk to the home school principal and find out what Grade 4 might look like... if there's compacted math and some kind of accelerated reading/writing I think that might be a really attractive option. But are we CRAZY for even thinking about declining this? We have not discussed with DC, and not sure that their opinion at age 9 is really going to be a huge consideration.

There are plenty of kids who turn it down. Ours did. Happy at home school with friends. DD has a friend who did go and she's seen her friend a few times and it sounds like she likes the new school but that many of the girls there didn't have the best social situation at their old schools and fit in better at the CES. No regrets.

[Anonymous]

Our kid was like a PP's, happy academically but not so much socially at the CES. With enrichment now at the home school, it would be a no brainer to stay put if we were making the decision now. But I don't think DC regrets it due to the excellent academics. So for us it was a mixed experience, bbut really depends on the kid.

[Anonymous]

I think the CES can be really hard for an anxious kid. At ours they asked kids to say their MAP scores aloud and everyone is high achieving and nosy. DD didn't care even though she had some low scores relatively speaking, but I know this made some of her friends feel very insecure. It was not uncommon for kids to start crying in the middle of class. She hadn't seen this as much at her previous school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the CES can be really hard for an anxious kid. At ours they asked kids to say their MAP scores aloud and everyone is high achieving and nosy. DD didn't care even though she had some low scores relatively speaking, but I know this made some of her friends feel very insecure. It was not uncommon for kids to start crying in the middle of class. She hadn't seen this as much at her previous school.

Wow. We haven’t seen this at all at CCES.
But I also don’t feel lke the cohort and academics are that different from our home school. It’s okay, but its still basically mcps curriculum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the CES can be really hard for an anxious kid. At ours they asked kids to say their MAP scores aloud and everyone is high achieving and nosy. DD didn't care even though she had some low scores relatively speaking, but I know this made some of her friends feel very insecure. It was not uncommon for kids to start crying in the middle of class. She hadn't seen this as much at her previous school.

My anxious kid loved CES. Yes she went from being top of her class at the home school to being surrounded by a lot of smart kids, but I think it made her stronger to face some of those anxiety inducing moments instead of being in the controlled/known environment at the home school

[Anonymous]

Both sets of kids do well. The smartest kids who either aren't admitted to CES or turn it down get to be bigger intellectual fishes at their home school. The kids who go to CES get a new cohort, perhaps more like them, more academic challenge, and a new life-stretching experience.

It's really not a race. If you support your children they will succeed.

[Anonymous]

+1 My DC went to a CES but remained very close to home school friends, including one who got in but decided not to go, and the home school friends remained very happy and challenged.

FWIW, more home school friends got into the MS magnets than CES friends.

[Anonymous]

^^If you have your heart set on a MS magnet I do think at least this year it was easier to get in from the non-CES schools. They tried to include a few from each elementary so if your child is the top at his home school it seems like she or he got in. At the CES, top kids were waitlisted left and right and according to DC's friends some of the non-CES kids scored lower than some CES kids.

Those higher scoring CES kids did get off the wait list later.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the CES can be really hard for an anxious kid. At ours they asked kids to say their MAP scores aloud and everyone is high achieving and nosy. DD didn't care even though she had some low scores relatively speaking, but I know this made some of her friends feel very insecure. It was not uncommon for kids to start crying in the middle of class. She hadn't seen this as much at her previous school.

I think it’s super-important to say which school you’re referring to when you say something like this. This would be frowned upon in any educational setting.

We never, ever had anything like that at Pine Crest, although to be fair that was a couple of years ago. I’d want to know if something like this were really happening in a school I was considering sending my kid to.

But by not mentioning the school by name, you leave yourself open to being written off as one of the anti-CES trolls who lurk on these boards. Please let these prospective parents know specifically which CES is so high-pressure that they require students to announce their MAP scores to the class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^^If you have your heart set on a MS magnet I do think at least this year it was easier to get in from the non-CES schools. They tried to include a few from each elementary so if your child is the top at his home school it seems like she or he got in. At the CES, top kids were waitlisted left and right and according to DC's friends some of the non-CES kids scored lower than some CES kids.

Those higher scoring CES kids did get off the wait list later.

They compared CES kids to other kids from their home elementary, not the CES class, and were looking at the cohort available in their home MS. CES does not change whether or not you get into MS magnets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^If you have your heart set on a MS magnet I do think at least this year it was easier to get in from the non-CES schools. They tried to include a few from each elementary so if your child is the top at his home school it seems like she or he got in. At the CES, top kids were waitlisted left and right and according to DC's friends some of the non-CES kids scored lower than some CES kids.

Those higher scoring CES kids did get off the wait list later.

They compared CES kids to other kids from their home elementary, not the CES class, and were looking at the cohort available in their home MS. CES does not change whether or not you get into MS magnets.

There was a long discussion about this on the MS admission thread months ago and I don't think the answer was ever clear, as the MCPS material was ambiguous. At any rate, I think it's safe to say that the MS admisions is pretty much a crap-shoot whether you're coming from the CES or the home ES, and also that the fact that the CES program is only 2 years, and only a very small minority (less than 10%?) of the CES kids go on to the the MS magnets, means that kids who go to the CES will be changing social groups twice in a three year period. I have an outrageously extroverted child and my child is feeling a little stressed by the fact that they won't be with all their CES friends next year in MS. I think for a kid that has trouble making friends, that can be really tough. If your home MS is zone for your CES, I think that helps a lot and would be a big factor in my decision, if I was on the fence. It seems like most of the kids at our CES are going to one of the two MS that are zoned for the areas closest to the CES. Our MS is farther awy, and I think there are only 3 boys and 1 girl zoned for our MS from our CES. I do think the social issues are one of the big reasons why someone might turn down an invite (in addition to all the logistical issues with busing and multiple pickups, etc.) It was also kind of a bummer for me that I could do things like the Halloween parade at both my kids' schools, plus it wasn't well coordinated with events at other schools in our home cluster -- for instance, the back-to-school night at the CES was the same night as our MS, so I had two kids in new schools and couldn't attend both back to school nights. Not tragic, but kind of a pain and it happened with a number of different events.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^If you have your heart set on a MS magnet I do think at least this year it was easier to get in from the non-CES schools. They tried to include a few from each elementary so if your child is the top at his home school it seems like she or he got in. At the CES, top kids were waitlisted left and right and according to DC's friends some of the non-CES kids scored lower than some CES kids.

Those higher scoring CES kids did get off the wait list later.

They compared CES kids to other kids from their home elementary, not the CES class, and were looking at the cohort available in their home MS. CES does not change whether or not you get into MS magnets.

There was a long discussion about this on the MS admission thread months ago and I don't think the answer was ever clear, as the MCPS material was ambiguous. At any rate, I think it's safe to say that the MS admisions is pretty much a crap-shoot whether you're coming from the CES or the home ES, and also that the fact that the CES program is only 2 years, and only a very small minority (less than 10%?) of the CES kids go on to the the MS magnets, means that kids who go to the CES will be changing social groups twice in a three year period. I have an outrageously extroverted child and my child is feeling a little stressed by the fact that they won't be with all their CES friends next year in MS. I think for a kid that has trouble making friends, that can be really tough. If your home MS is zone for your CES, I think that helps a lot and would be a big factor in my decision, if I was on the fence. It seems like most of the kids at our CES are going to one of the two MS that are zoned for the areas closest to the CES. Our MS is farther awy, and I think there are only 3 boys and 1 girl zoned for our MS from our CES. I do think the social issues are one of the big reasons why someone might turn down an invite (in addition to all the logistical issues with busing and multiple pickups, etc.) It was also kind of a bummer for me that I could do things like the Halloween parade at both my kids' schools, plus it wasn't well coordinated with events at other schools in our home cluster -- for instance, the back-to-school night at the CES was the same night as our MS, so I had two kids in new schools and couldn't attend both back to school nights. Not tragic, but kind of a pain and it happened with a number of different events.

I have all these logistics issues, too, but can say that at our upcounty regional CES and MS magnet, it seemed that a very large number of the CES kids got into at least one magnet MS for this year. Certainly well over 10%. I felt that MCPS was pretty clear about the criteria and that they used home elementary economics and home middle school cohort as reference points.

While I also felt less community involvement with the CES school, I realized that was more about me than DC, at least for us. Switching up friends is hard. I really would encourage anyone going to a CES to make the effort to maintain any close early elementary friendships through those two years - it is a lot more fun to make new friends if old friends are still part of their life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the CES can be really hard for an anxious kid. At ours they asked kids to say their MAP scores aloud and everyone is high achieving and nosy. DD didn't care even though she had some low scores relatively speaking, but I know this made some of her friends feel very insecure. It was not uncommon for kids to start crying in the middle of class. She hadn't seen this as much at her previous school.

I think it’s super-important to say which school you’re referring to when you say something like this. This would be frowned upon in any educational setting.

We never, ever had anything like that at Pine Crest, although to be fair that was a couple of years ago. I’d want to know if something like this were really happening in a school I was considering sending my kid to.

But by not mentioning the school by name, you leave yourself open to being written off as one of the anti-CES trolls who lurk on these boards. Please let these prospective parents know specifically which CES is so high-pressure that they require students to announce their MAP scores to the class.

Yes, this was not at all our experience at Drew. Supportive environment, teachers, and kids, and my anxious kid was more comfortable there than at home school. My kid hadn't really "clicked" with many other students at home school, but had a good social group at Drew and now is at a magnet middle with several Drew friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:First world problems. So we are actually debating declining CES (got the acceptance letter today). I know I'm going to get flamed (WHY WOULD YOU TURN THIS DOWN) but I would really love to hear from other parents who declined, or who at least thought about declining (and now are glad that they didn't), or maybe accepted and then regretted it.

Pros:
DC is consistently a straight-A student and it's clear that they are not being challenged in the home school environment. We haven't been super impressed with the teacher this year, so that could be a factor.
I was an excelling, not-challenged kid all the way through grade school and I was SO UNPREPARED for college, where I actually had to work hard and TRY and actually fail sometimes. You know, like LIFE. I was totally unprepared because I spent years thinking that I was hot $hit.
I am speculating that CES classes may be getting more out of this whole distance learning thing... don't know if that's actually true... and I really suspect we are in for another round of closures this fall.
DC is a smart kid and I want them to get the most out of life that they possibly can. And they EARNED this.

Cons:
It's further away from the house and the logistics get tougher, especially assuming there's a return to evening sports practices and such. The parent who handles the dropoffs and pickups is not excited.
DC2 will be at the home school this year so we'd have two ES's for... what exactly?
DC likes the home school and has developed a great group of friends. We have a community, a bit of a village, that we fear may dry up a little without the consistent interactions. DH moved in ES and wound up with no ES community at all, and blames his socialization issues on the fact that he spent "formative years" not having neighborhood friends (and this was back in the days before driving around to "playdates").
Is there a reason to disrupt things now, when DC could always switch to a magnet middle for 6th?

I am thinking that I might try to talk to the home school principal and find out what Grade 4 might look like... if there's compacted math and some kind of accelerated reading/writing I think that might be a really attractive option. But are we CRAZY for even thinking about declining this? We have not discussed with DC, and not sure that their opinion at age 9 is really going to be a huge consideration.

I would not do the program based on your list of cons, which is actually a lot of pros for the homeschool. 4th grade was okay, a lot of reading (50 pages a night) and projects. 5th grade is horrible. It's just more homework. If your kids wants to relax or do a sport, they don't have the time to do it. If your kid just wants to do school then it's fine. We had to learn the hard way and if 4th grade had been like 5th, then we wouldn't have continued. Even with homeschooling now, DC has more work than her middle school brother.

[Anonymous]

^^^ For us, 5th has been significantly less work than 4th. But DC seemed to mature and find a better work groove this year. Now the online schooling work during the pandemic has been pretty light - maybe 2.5 hours total a day, including class zoom meeting time. A sounds like the workload varies depending in the school and, to some extent, the child. There are certainly some kids in DC’s class who are going far beyond expectations right now and probably spending a lot more time on classwork, but it is because they want to and is not expected or required by the teacher.