The only way to have equity is to drag down the top performers

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Equal opportunity does not lead to equal outcomes. There is no vast amount of untapped talent. Throwing resources at low performers won't significantly lift them. If equity is the goal, the only way to get there is to handicap the very top performers. This is exactly what MCPS is doing.

Who pissed in your cornflakes?

MCPS when it decided to destroy its gifted offerings.

Such rhetoric hurts your credibility. It suggests you don't have well-justified complaints when you refuse to state them.

Gifted kids thrive when they are able to be academically challenged in a cohort of their peers. MCPS in implementing things like “honors for all” or getting rid of ELC is making it so gifted students no longer have that opportunity. Period, end stop.

Exactly, so we need to create more opportunities for the gifted kids like mine who get no support and schools don't have enough AP and other classes for them to thrive in. So, does it make sense to spend that kind of money for a few hundred kids, when many other kids have zero opportunities, not even a stem club at their school?

DP. Whatever you think of the proposed changes, I think this is an accurate description of the stakes. Do you serve the very top performers very well or do you serve a broader group but with less acceleration. There's arguments both ways, but destroying education for gifted students isn't one of the possibilities.

Tell that to all of the 4th grade students who scored a 99th percentile on their MAP but didn’t make the lottery into the CES and their schools have chosen to do model 1 of the “new” ELA program (they may get enrichment, they may not).

That sounds like an argument against the CES model. Maybe that was intended.

As it stands now the CES model, based in a lottery based on MAP and not a true cognitive assessment is not serving the needs of the students who could most benefit — back pre-Covid when it was truly focused on gifted it was better equipped to serve those needs. ELC was established to make up for not enough seats at the CES… and now that’s gone.

So what do you want to see now? Create reading groups across the classes in a grade at all elementary schools?

Yes. That would be a huge start.

I'm good with reading groups. I wouldn't want to see entire classes grouped that way, but you can create reading groups in a way that allows mobility between groups during the year.

Problem is with how CKLA works, there are no books. And when a teacher is dealing with 15 students who cannot read, 10 who can but are still struggling, they’re not going to have time to meet with the 5 advanced readers. Ask me how I know.

Having ELC be its own, contained class meant they were a priority and could really focus on advanced learning. The cohort is so, so important.

As long as you're in the "right" one at the beginning of the year.

4th grade is too early to start segregating kids. The harms outweigh the benefits.

+10000

Why aren't more people talking about this?

Because, for some, segregation is the goal. And everyone likes to think their kid will be one of the chosen ones.

Some of us know that our kids wouldn’t be chosen if DCUM was the one admitting. They’d exclude the Black and Brown kids on general principle as well as any child with a disability.

Even a colleague at my school was incensed that my child made the cut and his son did not despite knowing that my kid had done engineering from 3rd grade onward and won an award for coding an app. He felt certain that my kid took his kid’s spot because he couldn’t conceive that a child of color could be gifted.

Must have been DEI

Test scores provide a reliable baseline for standards of achievement.

Unless you're a minority.

Minorities are unable to take standardized tests?

Are you saying you're ignorant of the research on this topic?

Are you saying that minorities are unable to compete on standardized tests?

You’re the one who brought up DEI.

Yes, they're often at a significant disadvantage relative to their current skills and future performance.

Actually they’ve shown that standardized tests generally predict performance irrespective of income and race. In other words, a kid scoring 1200 on the SAT will perform about the same in college whether it’s a rich white kind or a poor black kid.

Except it is most likely that the poor black kid got 1200 without any tutoring while the rich white kid only got there because of $$$ spent on tutoring. Scoring the same on the SAT is then not an equitable assessment of skill or future promise.

And the Asian kid who got 1590 without spending $$$s on tutoring is wondering, "And I guess I am not considered gifted and deserving of that college or magnet admission because everyone who looks like me gets this score"

And he'll probably end up living in a van down by the river...

Well, he/she won't because the family prioritizes education.

[Anonymous]

I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

If the budget constraints are real, which they aren't as MCPS is one of the highest funded school systems, then these magnet classes and all the extra stuff that they provide to the W and richer schools should be cut first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

Exactly. My kids don't have enough math classes to graduate. MCPS hasn't come up with a solution. They bus some kids to other schools but told us we have to drive mid-day or go to MC (again with us driving) and logistically they couldn't make MC even work with the schedule they showed us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

Call us back when MCPS actually makes a good faith attempt at identifying gifted students rather than focusing on a single MAP test score.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

If the budget constraints are real, which they aren't as MCPS is one of the highest funded school systems, then these magnet classes and all the extra stuff that they provide to the W and richer schools should be cut first.

Also one of the highest cost-burdened school systems. Difficult demographics, area cost of living for employees requiring higher salaries, aging facilities from many years of underfunding vs. capital need increasing operational cost, etc. You know -- constraints.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

Call us back when MCPS actually makes a good faith attempt at identifying gifted students rather than focusing on a single MAP test score.

Non sequitur. Each is its own inequity. Access has to be similar just as identification has to be robust.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

If the budget constraints are real, which they aren't as MCPS is one of the highest funded school systems, then these magnet classes and all the extra stuff that they provide to the W and richer schools should be cut first.

Also one of the highest cost-burdened school systems. Difficult demographics, area cost of living for employees requiring higher salaries, aging facilities from many years of underfunding vs. capital need increasing operational cost, etc. You know -- constraints.

No, financial mismanagement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

We are very far from reaching the maximum resources that we could be investing in public education.

If we start with implementing the BMIT, the pie will get dramatically bigger immediately.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

Exactly. My kids don't have enough math classes to graduate. MCPS hasn't come up with a solution. They bus some kids to other schools but told us we have to drive mid-day or go to MC (again with us driving) and logistically they couldn't make MC even work with the schedule they showed us.

If only every MCPS high school was located on a free public bus line… Wait! They are and MC2 students who don’t drive often use them to get to their on-campus classes the 3rd and 4th year. If your child thinks you have to drive them, take a weekend day and show them how to travel from their HS to one of MC’s three campuses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Equal opportunity does not lead to equal outcomes. There is no vast amount of untapped talent. Throwing resources at low performers won't significantly lift them. If equity is the goal, the only way to get there is to handicap the very top performers. This is exactly what MCPS is doing.

Who pissed in your cornflakes?

MCPS when it decided to destroy its gifted offerings.

Such rhetoric hurts your credibility. It suggests you don't have well-justified complaints when you refuse to state them.

Gifted kids thrive when they are able to be academically challenged in a cohort of their peers. MCPS in implementing things like “honors for all” or getting rid of ELC is making it so gifted students no longer have that opportunity. Period, end stop.

Exactly, so we need to create more opportunities for the gifted kids like mine who get no support and schools don't have enough AP and other classes for them to thrive in. So, does it make sense to spend that kind of money for a few hundred kids, when many other kids have zero opportunities, not even a stem club at their school?

DP. Whatever you think of the proposed changes, I think this is an accurate description of the stakes. Do you serve the very top performers very well or do you serve a broader group but with less acceleration. There's arguments both ways, but destroying education for gifted students isn't one of the possibilities.

Tell that to all of the 4th grade students who scored a 99th percentile on their MAP but didn’t make the lottery into the CES and their schools have chosen to do model 1 of the “new” ELA program (they may get enrichment, they may not).

That sounds like an argument against the CES model. Maybe that was intended.

As it stands now the CES model, based in a lottery based on MAP and not a true cognitive assessment is not serving the needs of the students who could most benefit — back pre-Covid when it was truly focused on gifted it was better equipped to serve those needs. ELC was established to make up for not enough seats at the CES… and now that’s gone.

So what do you want to see now? Create reading groups across the classes in a grade at all elementary schools?

Yes. That would be a huge start.

I'm good with reading groups. I wouldn't want to see entire classes grouped that way, but you can create reading groups in a way that allows mobility between groups during the year.

Problem is with how CKLA works, there are no books. And when a teacher is dealing with 15 students who cannot read, 10 who can but are still struggling, they’re not going to have time to meet with the 5 advanced readers. Ask me how I know.

Having ELC be its own, contained class meant they were a priority and could really focus on advanced learning. The cohort is so, so important.

As long as you're in the "right" one at the beginning of the year.

4th grade is too early to start segregating kids. The harms outweigh the benefits.

+10000

Why aren't more people talking about this?

Because, for some, segregation is the goal. And everyone likes to think their kid will be one of the chosen ones.

Some of us know that our kids wouldn’t be chosen if DCUM was the one admitting. They’d exclude the Black and Brown kids on general principle as well as any child with a disability.

Even a colleague at my school was incensed that my child made the cut and his son did not despite knowing that my kid had done engineering from 3rd grade onward and won an award for coding an app. He felt certain that my kid took his kid’s spot because he couldn’t conceive that a child of color could be gifted.

Must have been DEI

Test scores provide a reliable baseline for standards of achievement.

Unless you're a minority.

Minorities are unable to take standardized tests?

Are you saying you're ignorant of the research on this topic?

IQ tests have been so re-worked that any question with differential scores among races are removed. This isn't 1961.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once your student is in HS, they have full access to an array of advanced coursework (AP and DE). Nobody is dragging your gifted kid down.

What a crock. Call us back when the local course offerings across the system are the same, with the same burden or lack thereof.

Exactly. My kids don't have enough math classes to graduate. MCPS hasn't come up with a solution. They bus some kids to other schools but told us we have to drive mid-day or go to MC (again with us driving) and logistically they couldn't make MC even work with the schedule they showed us.

If only every MCPS high school was located on a free public bus line… Wait! They are and MC2 students who don’t drive often use them to get to their on-campus classes the 3rd and 4th year. If your child thinks you have to drive them, take a weekend day and show them how to travel from their HS to one of MC’s three campuses.

Guess where most class are not offered. NEC. Guess where MC doesn't have a campus. NEC. So much for equity. Ignorant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure this is your insecurity as an immigrant family that makes you see life in America as a zero sum game. How sad for you

There is a finite amount of resources that are available for public education. It is not a forever expanding pie with limitless funds available for each child. I’m sure that even Mayflower descendants such as yourself can understand that budgetary constraints are real.

If the budget constraints are real, which they aren't as MCPS is one of the highest funded school systems, then these magnet classes and all the extra stuff that they provide to the W and richer schools should be cut first.

Also one of the highest cost-burdened school systems. Difficult demographics, area cost of living for employees requiring higher salaries, aging facilities from many years of underfunding vs. capital need increasing operational cost, etc. You know -- constraints.

No, financial mismanagement.

Like it can't be both

The "I don't want to pay taxes for the common good; we're well served enough, ourselves, thanks" is strong with this one.