Court: TJ's New Admission Policy Does Not Discriminate

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

One center even took out an ad in the paper to boast that their customers alone accounted for over 30% of the entering class at TJ. This wasn't merit at all but a rigged game that they had to address by changing to a fair process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

One center even took out an ad in the paper to boast that their customers alone accounted for over 30% of the entering class at TJ. This wasn't merit at all but a rigged game that they had to address by changing to a fair process.

The new process isn’t fair. It’s just another bad process for an unnecessary and divisive school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

#veryfakenews

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

One center even took out an ad in the paper to boast that their customers alone accounted for over 30% of the entering class at TJ. This wasn't merit at all but a rigged game that they had to address by changing to a fair process.

The new process isn’t fair. It’s just another bad process for an unnecessary and divisive school.

Whataboutery much? Seems more fair then admitting those who can afford to buy the test answers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

Sure people paid to get exposure to the test questions but they still learned a lot in the process so they deserved to get in. I bet SCOTUS would define wealth as merit just like they define money as speech.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Hmm.... Do you have any proof/reference? Looking at the performance for AMC 10 etc. it seems class of 2025 and beyond are lagging behind other local schools. PSAT/NMSQT this year will be another benchmark for the class of 2025. Science Olympiad and other Science/Math/Academic competitions will still have some seniors. Drama and other non-stem activities including sports; maybe is getting better

Both of you are wrong.

While I disagree with the assertion that FCPS has lowered the merit standards for TJ admissions, they certainly have not raised them either. What they've done is eliminated metrics that were occluding the selection process.

What students were doing to prepare for the TJ admissions exam wasn't "cheating" in any sense of the word. What they were doing is leveraging their parents' resources to attend prep programs that were cheating. That's not on the students or families, it's on the prep programs and their prior students who fed them questions from a secured exam. You can't blame the kids for this.

But at the same time, all PP is doing is insisting on continuing to measure the merit of students by standardized exams and academic competitions. This is a valueless statement. OF COURSE the new classes at TJ are going to have lower scores on standardized exams and probably not participate as heavily in competitions such as SciOly. Because the TJ admissions process is no longer overselecting for those metrics. When all you care about in an admissions process is metric X and Y, you shouldn't be surprised when your entire class excels at metric X and Y. It would be like a soccer team selecting their players entirely on goalkeeping skills or a basketball team on free throw shooting. Yes, those skills are tangentially relevant and could be a little bit predictive, but you're missing out on tons of other dimensions.

The key moving forward is for FCPS to do a better job of finding those other dimensions. But stopping the process of eliminating kids who aren't phenomenal test takers from the process at step one is a good...first step.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Post it. Repeating this over and over is not proof.

Curie deleted their Facebook post over two years ago. I never saw an ad in the paper but they were all over social media.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Despite racists accusing them as cheaters, competitive TJ students made their way to International Math competition and National Science Bowl finals

https://patch.com/virginia/greateralexandria/tj-students-secure-first-place-global-math-competition

https://www.jlab.org/news/releases/2023-virginia-regional-high-school-science-bowl-results

Go Colonials! never mind the racists!

It's worth noting that at least one of the students in that Science Bowl team was selected by the new process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Continually calling a bunch of kids cheaters without any proof doesn’t seem right.

The proof was posted here many many times. Wealthy families were gaming admissions by purchasing access to the test questions from various prep centers. The final straw was when one center took out an ad in the paper to boast how 30% of TJ's entering class were their clients and listed their names.

Taking a test prep course for TJ, SAT, LSAT, bar exam, etc. is not "cheating."

But taking a test prep class where they use the actual test questions to prep you is

It's been covered here many times. Prep centers were accused of cheating by students who claimed to have seen the same questions on the exam at the prep center. It came to light that they were debriefing students after the test to compile a question bank over several years in violation of the non-disclosure agreement. This gave their customers an unfair advantage and is cheating.

#veryfakenews

Former Curie students at TJ have confirmed the story. The idea that this is in any way "fake news" has long since been debunked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Despite racists accusing them as cheaters, competitive TJ students made their way to International Math competition and National Science Bowl finals

https://patch.com/virginia/greateralexandria/tj-students-secure-first-place-global-math-competition

https://www.jlab.org/news/releases/2023-virginia-regional-high-school-science-bowl-results

Go Colonials! never mind the racists!

It's worth noting that at least one of the students in that Science Bowl team was selected by the new process.

Only as a froshmore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Despite racists accusing them as cheaters, competitive TJ students made their way to International Math competition and National Science Bowl finals

https://patch.com/virginia/greateralexandria/tj-students-secure-first-place-global-math-competition

https://www.jlab.org/news/releases/2023-virginia-regional-high-school-science-bowl-results

Go Colonials! never mind the racists!

It's worth noting that at least one of the students in that Science Bowl team was selected by the new process.

Only as a froshmore.

I don't think that's correct.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Hmm.... Do you have any proof/reference? Looking at the performance for AMC 10 etc. it seems class of 2025 and beyond are lagging behind other local schools. PSAT/NMSQT this year will be another benchmark for the class of 2025. Science Olympiad and other Science/Math/Academic competitions will still have some seniors. Drama and other non-stem activities including sports; maybe is getting better

Both of you are wrong.

While I disagree with the assertion that FCPS has lowered the merit standards for TJ admissions, they certainly have not raised them either. What they've done is eliminated metrics that were occluding the selection process.

What students were doing to prepare for the TJ admissions exam wasn't "cheating" in any sense of the word. What they were doing is leveraging their parents' resources to attend prep programs that were cheating. That's not on the students or families, it's on the prep programs and their prior students who fed them questions from a secured exam. You can't blame the kids for this.

But at the same time, all PP is doing is insisting on continuing to measure the merit of students by standardized exams and academic competitions. This is a valueless statement. OF COURSE the new classes at TJ are going to have lower scores on standardized exams and probably not participate as heavily in competitions such as SciOly. Because the TJ admissions process is no longer overselecting for those metrics. When all you care about in an admissions process is metric X and Y, you shouldn't be surprised when your entire class excels at metric X and Y. It would be like a soccer team selecting their players entirely on goalkeeping skills or a basketball team on free throw shooting. Yes, those skills are tangentially relevant and could be a little bit predictive, but you're missing out on tons of other dimensions.

The key moving forward is for FCPS to do a better job of finding those other dimensions. But stopping the process of eliminating kids who aren't phenomenal test takers from the process at step one is a good...first step.

One could just as easily argue that a school that is supposed to nurture STEM students that bases admissions heavily on geography to placate politicians with no STEM backgrounds themselves is “overselecting” for geography.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Hmm.... Do you have any proof/reference? Looking at the performance for AMC 10 etc. it seems class of 2025 and beyond are lagging behind other local schools. PSAT/NMSQT this year will be another benchmark for the class of 2025. Science Olympiad and other Science/Math/Academic competitions will still have some seniors. Drama and other non-stem activities including sports; maybe is getting better

Both of you are wrong.

While I disagree with the assertion that FCPS has lowered the merit standards for TJ admissions, they certainly have not raised them either. What they've done is eliminated metrics that were occluding the selection process.

What students were doing to prepare for the TJ admissions exam wasn't "cheating" in any sense of the word. What they were doing is leveraging their parents' resources to attend prep programs that were cheating. That's not on the students or families, it's on the prep programs and their prior students who fed them questions from a secured exam. You can't blame the kids for this.

But at the same time, all PP is doing is insisting on continuing to measure the merit of students by standardized exams and academic competitions. This is a valueless statement. OF COURSE the new classes at TJ are going to have lower scores on standardized exams and probably not participate as heavily in competitions such as SciOly. Because the TJ admissions process is no longer overselecting for those metrics. When all you care about in an admissions process is metric X and Y, you shouldn't be surprised when your entire class excels at metric X and Y. It would be like a soccer team selecting their players entirely on goalkeeping skills or a basketball team on free throw shooting. Yes, those skills are tangentially relevant and could be a little bit predictive, but you're missing out on tons of other dimensions.

The key moving forward is for FCPS to do a better job of finding those other dimensions. But stopping the process of eliminating kids who aren't phenomenal test takers from the process at step one is a good...first step.

One could just as easily argue that a school that is supposed to nurture STEM students that bases admissions heavily on geography to placate politicians with no STEM backgrounds themselves is “overselecting” for geography.

By definition a process is not "overselecting" for anything if distributions of allocated spots are equal. That's the opposite of overselecting for geography.

What was happening previously is that an increasing number of students were coming from a decreasing geographical area. That WOULD be an example of overselecting for geography, even though that wasn't the reason they were getting in.

Arguing in bad faith doesn't make anyone look good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Hmm.... Do you have any proof/reference? Looking at the performance for AMC 10 etc. it seems class of 2025 and beyond are lagging behind other local schools. PSAT/NMSQT this year will be another benchmark for the class of 2025. Science Olympiad and other Science/Math/Academic competitions will still have some seniors. Drama and other non-stem activities including sports; maybe is getting better

Both of you are wrong.

While I disagree with the assertion that FCPS has lowered the merit standards for TJ admissions, they certainly have not raised them either. What they've done is eliminated metrics that were occluding the selection process.

What students were doing to prepare for the TJ admissions exam wasn't "cheating" in any sense of the word. What they were doing is leveraging their parents' resources to attend prep programs that were cheating. That's not on the students or families, it's on the prep programs and their prior students who fed them questions from a secured exam. You can't blame the kids for this.

But at the same time, all PP is doing is insisting on continuing to measure the merit of students by standardized exams and academic competitions. This is a valueless statement. OF COURSE the new classes at TJ are going to have lower scores on standardized exams and probably not participate as heavily in competitions such as SciOly. Because the TJ admissions process is no longer overselecting for those metrics. When all you care about in an admissions process is metric X and Y, you shouldn't be surprised when your entire class excels at metric X and Y. It would be like a soccer team selecting their players entirely on goalkeeping skills or a basketball team on free throw shooting. Yes, those skills are tangentially relevant and could be a little bit predictive, but you're missing out on tons of other dimensions.

The key moving forward is for FCPS to do a better job of finding those other dimensions. But stopping the process of eliminating kids who aren't phenomenal test takers from the process at step one is a good...first step.

One could just as easily argue that a school that is supposed to nurture STEM students that bases admissions heavily on geography to placate politicians with no STEM backgrounds themselves is “overselecting” for geography.

So TJ is supposed to care about SO team participation in middle and ES even though not ever school even has those teams?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When a group of people is good enough to fill 95% of a team, 70% does feel like discrimination.

Another example, the NBA, Athletics teams, NFL, NHL...Well, Asians are not represented per their population % there and NO ONE seems to be saying "Let's fix this"

Why should someone else be expected to represent Asian American interests? If they want it so badly, Asian Americans need to develop their own diversity, equity & inclusion industry, financially and politically, to assert their census status as a minority populace, and defend merit based access to advanced education.

Not sure about any of that but glad that FCPS has raised the merit standards for TJ by eliminating the rampant cheating that had tainted admissions in previous years.

Hmm.... Do you have any proof/reference? Looking at the performance for AMC 10 etc. it seems class of 2025 and beyond are lagging behind other local schools. PSAT/NMSQT this year will be another benchmark for the class of 2025. Science Olympiad and other Science/Math/Academic competitions will still have some seniors. Drama and other non-stem activities including sports; maybe is getting better

Both of you are wrong.

While I disagree with the assertion that FCPS has lowered the merit standards for TJ admissions, they certainly have not raised them either. What they've done is eliminated metrics that were occluding the selection process.

What students were doing to prepare for the TJ admissions exam wasn't "cheating" in any sense of the word. What they were doing is leveraging their parents' resources to attend prep programs that were cheating. That's not on the students or families, it's on the prep programs and their prior students who fed them questions from a secured exam. You can't blame the kids for this.

In the name of "whatever"; It seems like the new process is missing more students for the "top" slots (e.g. are the JMO kids), even if a kid uses parents "resources" to prep for the tests, he/she must have dedication/commitment/resolve to ace the subject. A teachers recommendation could help here.

But at the same time, all PP is doing is insisting on continuing to measure the merit of students by standardized exams and academic competitions. This is a valueless statement. OF COURSE the new classes at TJ are going to have lower scores on standardized exams and probably not participate as heavily in competitions such as SciOly. Because the TJ admissions process is no longer overselecting for those metrics. When all you care about in an admissions process is metric X and Y, you shouldn't be surprised when your entire class excels at metric X and Y. It would be like a soccer team selecting their players entirely on goalkeeping skills or a basketball team on free throw shooting. Yes, those skills are tangentially relevant and could be a little bit predictive, but you're missing out on tons of other dimensions.

The key moving forward is for FCPS to do a better job of finding those other dimensions. But stopping the process of eliminating kids who aren't phenomenal test takers from the process at step one is a good...first step.