To all those complaining about the TJ lottery

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Wow, OP. You need a Valium and to chill. Not really sure why you think a lot of private school parents care about TJ.

No dog in this fight but are we really all pretending that no one cares about TJ? It is literally considered the best high school in the entire United States by many rankings. Not only does it far outperform the precious Big 3 in college admissions, but it's free. It sent 96 kids to Harvard, Princeton, and Yale over the past 3 years. Compare that to Sidwell, which sent 18 kids to those schools over the same time period. Until this thread, I have never ever heard people act like TJ wasn't the obvious best choice for high school.

If private school parents don't care about TJ, they should. There is absolutely no reason to pay exorbitant money for a Big 3 education when the outcome is worse that TJ almost by an order of magnitude. Seriously. Whatever you hope to get out of an elite private education, ultimately college admission is number one. And TJ wipes the floor with the Big 3. In fact, out of curiosity I checked the numbers and for the Big 3 they sent 44 kids to those 3 schools TOTAL over the past 3 years, meaning in that time frame TJ more than doubled that number by itself.

We live in Maryland and have zero interest in moving to Virginia for a public school regardless of which one. The only people who are eligible for TJ are in Fairfax and can afford prep classes while being willing to cheat.

So your constant accusation that we don't care about TJ, and your assumption that we should is flawed. While I am not a fan of any Big 3, your stats are meaningless on the number of students going on to specific colleges. There are over 1,700 kids in TJ which is multiples of the number of kids in any single or group of many privates. They should be sending more to colleges you care about just based on numbers.

Go back to the AAP forum and tell it to someone who cares. This is not a place where everyone is looking for STEM education, cares about TJ, or lives in Fairfax to even apply. We just don't care. Sorry to break it to you.

Imagine posting multiple times in a thread, writing paragraph after paragraph desperately explaining that you don't care about the topic of the thread you clicked on. You scream "Cluster B" like nothing I've ever seen before.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yet still most don’t care and PP fundamentally does not understand why people choose private.

Is it because you have illusions of grandeur about Harvard or at least Dartmouth, but then end up hoping for Tufts or Tulane, only to be told by the guidance counselor to apply to Hamilton or Bowdoin, and then to finally end up at (lol) Franklin & Marshall?

Or do you shell out $200K over four years with the express intention of getting your kid into Franklin and Marshall?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I’m in a STEM profession. I am not interested in my kid getting a STEM focused education in high school. I want my kid to get a good broad based humanities education. If DC is interested in STEM, plenty of time for that in college.

I could care less about the ivies or the brand name. I want my kid to go to the college that is the best fit for him.

You are fixated by the ivies it seems from your post.

I was "fixated" on Ivies because data on matriculation is easily accessible via PolarisList. LOL at the idea of DC privates providing a rigorous humanities education. Did you mean replacing the humanities with introductory level sociological woke brainwashing? Because congrats on your choice if so. You could just plop your kid in front of the Vox youtube page instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Wow, OP. You need a Valium and to chill. Not really sure why you think a lot of private school parents care about TJ.

No dog in this fight but are we really all pretending that no one cares about TJ? It is literally considered the best high school in the entire United States by many rankings. Not only does it far outperform the precious Big 3 in college admissions, but it's free. It sent 96 kids to Harvard, Princeton, and Yale over the past 3 years. Compare that to Sidwell, which sent 18 kids to those schools over the same time period. Until this thread, I have never ever heard people act like TJ wasn't the obvious best choice for high school.

If private school parents don't care about TJ, they should. There is absolutely no reason to pay exorbitant money for a Big 3 education when the outcome is worse that TJ almost by an order of magnitude. Seriously. Whatever you hope to get out of an elite private education, ultimately college admission is number one. And TJ wipes the floor with the Big 3. In fact, out of curiosity I checked the numbers and for the Big 3 they sent 44 kids to those 3 schools TOTAL over the past 3 years, meaning in that time frame TJ more than doubled that number by itself.

We live in Maryland and have zero interest in moving to Virginia for a public school regardless of which one. The only people who are eligible for TJ are in Fairfax and can afford prep classes while being willing to cheat.

So your constant accusation that we don't care about TJ, and your assumption that we should is flawed. While I am not a fan of any Big 3, your stats are meaningless on the number of students going on to specific colleges. There are over 1,700 kids in TJ which is multiples of the number of kids in any single or group of many privates. They should be sending more to colleges you care about just based on numbers.

Go back to the AAP forum and tell it to someone who cares. This is not a place where everyone is looking for STEM education, cares about TJ, or lives in Fairfax to even apply. We just don't care. Sorry to break it to you.

Imagine posting multiple times in a thread, writing paragraph after paragraph desperately explaining that you don't care about the topic of the thread you clicked on. You scream "Cluster B" like nothing I've ever seen before.

Uh no it’s more like people have no idea what OP is talking about and how it’s relevant in the private school forum. That is why I clicked on this thread.

[Anonymous]

What’s TJ doing? Taking everyone that got a 99% on the entrance exam and holding a lotto?

Or did they bump the bar down to 90% or 95% and then create a special diverse class of admits, like mcps did?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I’m in a STEM profession. I am not interested in my kid getting a STEM focused education in high school. I want my kid to get a good broad based humanities education. If DC is interested in STEM, plenty of time for that in college.

I could care less about the ivies or the brand name. I want my kid to go to the college that is the best fit for him.

You are fixated by the ivies it seems from your post.

I was "fixated" on Ivies because data on matriculation is easily accessible via PolarisList. LOL at the idea of DC privates providing a rigorous humanities education. Did you mean replacing the humanities with introductory level sociological woke brainwashing? Because congrats on your choice if so. You could just plop your kid in front of the Vox youtube page instead.

Boy you have a major chip on your shoulder as obvious from your post. I suggest you get help for your issues with this and your insecurities.

[Anonymous]

School Lottery Loses on Appeal


https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/daily/...ent%20to%20the%20Constitution.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1998/...f-11df-4ca2-93ea-9ffd38e49625/

[Anonymous]

There is a good chance that the best student in every race will not make it to TJ with the proposed merit lottery system. It would be great injustice to the best student.

For example, if two students applied for admission with one has a 3.52 GPA with Algebra 1 and the second student with 3.95 GPA with Algebra 1. What would happen if the second student was not picked in the lottery and the second student is from African American race? Great injustice to the second student and the lottery system fails to address the diversity issue.    

 My suggestion is


 How about having different admission tests per region and restricting each region with 70students? AAP Students with GPA 3.5 and non-AAP students with GPA 3.0 with application fee $250 (free for free or reduced school meal). So that the best students will make it to TJ while improving diversity per region. Also, add TJ boot camps and TJ Prep club afterhours every week in all the Middle schools. The application fee may be utilized for improving the base school’s faculty.  

Lottery would not help 
LAWSUIT CALLS NEW ARLINGTON SCHOOL LOTTERY UNFAIR TO WHITE CHILDREN 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1998/03/28/lawsuit-calls-new-arlington-school-lottery-unfair-to-white-children/6de2b1cf-11df-4ca2-93ea-9ffd38e49625/ 

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Boy you have a major chip on your shoulder as obvious from your post. I suggest you get help for your issues with this and your insecurities.

Disregarding this deeply childish post, what do you actually think the humanities are? In the modern parlance, they can really only be understood as the establishment of a canon of ideas and works that perpetuate Western cultural hegemony. Otherwise the study of literature and the arts literally makes no sense. "Decolonizing" the humanities renders the field totally incoherent. It makes teaching them a whole lot easier though, I bet. You only need a Soc 101 course instead of a M.A. or Ph.D. in a complex subfield.

Take it from someone who went to an Ivy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Righteous indignation aside, what does this have to do with independent schools?

Hilarious. Suddenly TJ admissions magically aren't related to the topic of this board. As if private schools in DC aren't structured around TJ admissions. Grow up.

Huh? I live in Maryland, so maybe I'm clueless. I didn't think that that VA residents made up such a significant portion of DC privates -- enough that DC schools are structured around TJ admissions. Maybe I'm misinformed. But I'll take your advice and try to "grow up". Thanks for the helpful tip.

Many DC private schools literally provide percentage of kids who attend TJ as part of their routine statistics

The K-8 privates post lists of where all their students go. This includes McLean, Langley, etc. I live in Virginia and send my kids to private school and have zero interest in TJ. I don’t know anyone at my school who wants to send their kids there.

I am not pro or con the idea of a TJ lottery but am probably more pro because I do think standardized tests are biased and I don’t think adding black kids to the school will ruin it (I actually think that notion is ridiculous). However, much like many far left people, you are alienating people who would agree with your premise by being an asshole to them. So well done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Wow, OP. You need a Valium and to chill. Not really sure why you think a lot of private school parents care about TJ.

No dog in this fight but are we really all pretending that no one cares about TJ? It is literally considered the best high school in the entire United States by many rankings. Not only does it far outperform the precious Big 3 in college admissions, but it's free. It sent 96 kids to Harvard, Princeton, and Yale over the past 3 years. Compare that to Sidwell, which sent 18 kids to those schools over the same time period. Until this thread, I have never ever heard people act like TJ wasn't the obvious best choice for high school.

If private school parents don't care about TJ, they should. There is absolutely no reason to pay exorbitant money for a Big 3 education when the outcome is worse that TJ almost by an order of magnitude. Seriously. Whatever you hope to get out of an elite private education, ultimately college admission is number one. And TJ wipes the floor with the Big 3. In fact, out of curiosity I checked the numbers and for the Big 3 they sent 44 kids to those 3 schools TOTAL over the past 3 years, meaning in that time frame TJ more than doubled that number by itself.

TJ may send a lot of kids to Ivies but many (I’d say most but someone will just jump on that and fight with me about it) parents do not send their kids to private school in order to get them into an Ivy. I live in VA and would never send my kids to TJ. So yeah, parents in VA who send their kids to private school often (I’d say mainly but...) don’t care about TJ at all. Additionally, many parents who send their kids to public school in VA wouldn’t send their kids to TJ. It’s a very specific kind of school, and the fact that it sends lots of kids to great colleges isn’t reason enough to automatically want to send your kids there. Do you really not get that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Heads up to all those calling this off topic and low key asking for it to get deleted: I am not OP but I am fascinated by this thread. I also work for a moderate circulation DC paper. If this thread gets deleted I will write an article about white fragility using this thread getting deleted as an example

Just let it ride and deal with it, you fragile wasp creeps.

Oooohhhh, scary! Halloween has come early to DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't have any skin in the game, my kids have no desire to attend TJ.

I'm 100% for diversity in colleges, as this is a stepping stone for many under-privilege kids. But any high school can get you into college, leave TJ for the most academic-minded kids. Not to mention, FCPS already has AAP as another option.

"No."

TJ will be 35 percent AA and there's nothing you can do about it. Is that a problem for you? Arent black children as capable as white and asians? Don't they deserve the benefits of the best possible school? Worried your blonde hair blue eyed daughter might date a black teen? What's wrong?

If not enough black students are being admitted under the current RACE BLIND admissions, then as a whole, no, academically they are not as capable. The solution should be to fix the WHY. Why are these students not performing as well? Is it really because they can't afford test prep? (I suspect it's more complicated than that but let's start there) Then give them equal opportunity to test prep and see what happens. The answer should be to bring them up to the level of others rather than lowering others to a lesser standard. But nobody wants to do that because it takes a lot more time, money and effort to do so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I live in MD and had to look up this TJ. Why is this relevant to the private school forum and why would any private school parents care about a public school lottery?

When the genius students don't get a spot in the lottery, many of them might come to DC private schools. That will potentially affect class rankings. My kid's year there were 145 NMSFs and they didn't even mention commended students.

[Anonymous]

Eliminating the test entrance requirements actually qualifies more kids all around—not just AA kids so I don’t see how having a lottery will magically create ethnic diversity. My kids went to a NOVA K-8 and everyone there takes either Algebra 1 or Geometry in 8th and tons of kids have a 3.5 or higher. Now they are all qualified for TJ?

If it’s in such high demand it would seem like a better move to create a second TJ campus in DC.