TJ Discrimination Case

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Rarely do any of these kids do well on any new problem. They seem to only excel at ones they've seen before. This isn't my opinion. It's a matter of fact to anyone familiar with these contests.

Yes that is true with seemingly "novel" problems such as the one above, but there are definitely kids who can and do solve them. But that is the point, the AMC 10 is designed to have a very high ceiling, each year there are "novel" looking questions that require kids to apply/connect what they know in a new way. There are definitely kids who can do this, in particular the ones who are very strong at problem solving, usually the ones who practice doing difficult problems and have lots of experience. Yes, one can't expect the average math contest kid to likely solve the above problem, but they can definitely solve some of the other ones on the test. Most kids will logically excel at what they've seen/practiced in the past, so of course the ones who have worked/practiced much more can solve more difficult problems.

State MathCounts last year did not do a good job with new questions. Sprint 29 & 30 had been seen before with 30 available on the SAAB practice site. 23-25 were all practiced by my school's team, it was just a matter of how many kids could get that far.

I guess that explains why some VA kids had super high scores for the State round, and then didn't even make top 56 for nationals.

[Anonymous]

Where are the results from last year (state or nationals)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where are the results from last year (state or nationals)?

I don't have State results, but the cutoff for making the nationals team was pretty high.

National results are here: https://www.mathcounts.org/sites/default/files/00%202022%20Final%20Standings%20Document.pdf
Team VA lost to several flyover states and overall had a pretty weak showing given the talent level in the state.

[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:Some of the TJ students admitted under the new admissions process are just a bad fit. Whether it is lacking intelligence, motivation, preparation, or work ethic, it doesn't matter.

Sadly, even more, admitted under the old process, struggled to keep up. All that prep made average kids appear gifted who once at TJ just couldn't hack it.

You are deeply committed to the notion that the new admissions process is leading to happier students and better results, despite the lack of evidence to support that.

One could just as easily speculate - and it is speculation at this point - that the new admissions process will lead to a reduction in TJ's academic standards and more kids who struggle to keep up even with less rigor.

At least the kids you disparage so much worked hard to keep up and please their parents. One suspects many current students applied on a lark, were admitted to fill middle school quotas, and over time will contribute to TJ's just becoming another FCPS high school, although one with better labs and stronger academics than schools like Annandale, Lewis, and Mount Vernon.

DP, agree with this. If one looks at the top TJ kids, ALL of them work very hard, it's not like "Oh, they're so gifted they don't need to strive as much as the rest". This is such a silly American misconception that one is born gifted thus they don't need to work as hard as others who are not. The PPs who keep claiming that the kids who work hard only 'appear gifted' will have to prove their silly claim by 1) defining what the heck they're talking about when using the word 'gifted' and 2) showing how they know that kids who work hard are not 'gifted' by their definition. The data at TJ is very much like the data at other base schools: the kids who work hard, are dedicated, and passionate, do very well. It's as simple as that; those qualities lead to success. It has nothing to do with the suggestion that normal kids with above qualities and no learning issues cannot somehow cut it at TJ.

It is a silly notion to not believe that some kids are indeed smarter than others, and much smarter, without actually having to try that hard. I work in an industry that attracts a lot of really bright people, but everyone knows who the really, really, smart people are. They are the ones who have photographic memories and the ability to think, reason and cut through the weeds much faster than others.

They produce massive quantities of high-quality work quickly and efficiently. They also manage to have families that they spend time with, coach their kid's soccer team, and do things like community theater or partake in juried photography exhibitions in their spare time. They aren't on anti-depressants and they don't take drugs to increase their stamina. They just have a ton of stamina because the act of living doesn't wear them out. They have energy at the end of the day because everything is just easier for them.

Some people just have a greater capacity than others, it's not about being more organized or working harder, they are just brilliant. You know it when you see it.

As an adult, I know who I want on my team, and trust me it isn't the guy who stays up all night long burning the midnight oil, night after night, after night. Because inevitably they crash and burn...when one week rolls into the next, and the next, and they are just keeping up. So they quit and decide to stay home with the kids, or they get a gov't job or teach... all things they could have done without having to go through the experience of pushing themselves past exhaustion and then burning out and flaming out.

I've seen your now adult kids in the workplace and it isn't pretty.

Churn and burn baby.

Your reasoning is flawed and your anecdotal evidence such as photographic memory is just plain silly. The gifted kids at TJ work INCREDIBLY hard. If you don't believe it, just ask the top kids at TJ. They win math and science competitions because they spend hours everyday preparing. If you want further evidence, try finding the mathematical forums that they inhabit at all hours of the day and see the types of questions they spend time solving. In fact, most of these kids were interested in learning way before TJ and did it from a younger age; you perceive them as 'gifted' but they've been training since elementary school, what you call 'prepping'. What you mistakenly perceive as effortless actually required a ton of effort behind the scenes. In fact those kids will continue to in your words "burn the midnight oil" at places such as MIT just as they did at TJ, because they love learning; it's part of who they are. Frankly I don't think you have any real understanding (or appreciation!) of how the kids you deem as 'smart' systematically train to develop their range of skills. Again, a very common American misunderstanding that results in them being called 'gifted' and 'genius' -- labels which are frankly offensive to them because they sweep aside the amount of effort they had to put in to succeed at high levels.

You just don’t understand what it’s like to be very, very intelligent. You honestly believe that it’s te “training” that makes kids smart because you simply haven’t been around kids who are naturally *extremely* intelligent.

You don’t believe it exists because it doesn’t fit into your narrative that all you have to do is “train” a child the right way and they will love solving difficult math problems.

Yes, I believe that proper training matters vastly more and intrinsic high IQ is neither necessary nor sufficient. I actually trained and taught students for math competitions in the past and I can tell you that many kids who are obviously naturally smart don't necessarily do well at all. They have to first be interested (i.e not pushed by parents who like you think their kid is naturally smart because they scored high on an IQ test and therefore are able to do anything), then on top of that they also have to be very motivated to work hard. Believe it or not, the old adage about 1% nature/99% nurture is much truer than what you seem to believe. You think the kids who do extremely well are 'genius' or whatever other word comes to your mind. Of course they're well functioning (they don't have learning issues), but really not that different from many other people. Where they really excel is in how they learn how to learn, how they self analyze when they make mistakes, how they iterate and seek help, how they ask lots of questions without being afraid or feeling dumb, how they enjoy thinking slowly and deeply about things until they feel they have a good understanding, and just how they love working very hard at this process and not give up when they don't initially succeed. Now not many kids in today's age can do this for a long time; if they did, they would become very skilled and you would be seeing 'geniuses' all over the place.

Um. Wow. I've also trained and taught students for math competitions, and my experience is exactly the opposite. Motivated, well trained kids do reasonably well, but they never rise to the top. The kids who are geniuses generally outperform the motivated, well trained kids, even without much practice. You must not have coached any particularly talented kids, and your students must not have achieved anything noteworthy for you to hold the beliefs that you hold.

All I've seen are slightly above average kids that work super hard. Haven't met many geniuses but I've only been coaching a math team since the 90s.

You mean purchased the test answers to appear gifted.

I read about that. A bunch of kids were buying access to the TJ admission test to improve their chances of admission and the county had to change the selection process to put an end to it.

#fakenews

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Rarely do any of these kids do well on any new problem. They seem to only excel at ones they've seen before. This isn't my opinion. It's a matter of fact to anyone familiar with these contests.

Yes that is true with seemingly "novel" problems such as the one above, but there are definitely kids who can and do solve them. But that is the point, the AMC 10 is designed to have a very high ceiling, each year there are "novel" looking questions that require kids to apply/connect what they know in a new way. There are definitely kids who can do this, in particular the ones who are very strong at problem solving, usually the ones who practice doing difficult problems and have lots of experience. Yes, one can't expect the average math contest kid to likely solve the above problem, but they can definitely solve some of the other ones on the test. Most kids will logically excel at what they've seen/practiced in the past, so of course the ones who have worked/practiced much more can solve more difficult problems.

State MathCounts last year did not do a good job with new questions. Sprint 29 & 30 had been seen before with 30 available on the SAAB practice site. 23-25 were all practiced by my school's team, it was just a matter of how many kids could get that far.

I guess that explains why some VA kids had super high scores for the State round, and then didn't even make top 56 for nationals.

It's the same test in every state.

[Anonymous]

So....what happened to the case?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So....what happened to the case?

Thought it got laughed out of court since the last judge found there was no harm done i.e. the group bringing the complaint appears to be doing better than any other group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And like everything else in this world, both innate ability and hard work are required to rise to the top. Being slightly above average, but working hard is not sufficient.

in this case, being average but hard working suffices just look at all the kids that got into TJ from Curie half are run of the mill

It is all quite incredible that all these average kids have produced the top ranked US high school. What gives?

An over-reliance on testing in high school rankings is mostly to blame.

The existence of high school rankings at all to begin with is dubious at best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So....what happened to the case?

It's bee argued before the Fourth Circuit and we are waiting on an opinion from there. Most everyone viewing the case accepts that it will fall 2-1 in favor of the School Board just as the initial decision did on the emergency stay last year.

One imagines that the Coalition and PLF will be carefully watching the results of the Harvard and North Carolina cases to determine the value of continuing to fight this battle at the Supreme Court. It had to be disappointing for the Coalition that Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Barrett all voted not to impede the selection process for the Class of 2026.

The Class of 2027 will almost certainly be seated under the new process and indeed we may see the School Board elections in November 2023 happen before we see the Supreme Court weigh in on the new process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Rarely do any of these kids do well on any new problem. They seem to only excel at ones they've seen before. This isn't my opinion. It's a matter of fact to anyone familiar with these contests.

Yes that is true with seemingly "novel" problems such as the one above, but there are definitely kids who can and do solve them. But that is the point, the AMC 10 is designed to have a very high ceiling, each year there are "novel" looking questions that require kids to apply/connect what they know in a new way. There are definitely kids who can do this, in particular the ones who are very strong at problem solving, usually the ones who practice doing difficult problems and have lots of experience. Yes, one can't expect the average math contest kid to likely solve the above problem, but they can definitely solve some of the other ones on the test. Most kids will logically excel at what they've seen/practiced in the past, so of course the ones who have worked/practiced much more can solve more difficult problems.

State MathCounts last year did not do a good job with new questions. Sprint 29 & 30 had been seen before with 30 available on the SAAB practice site. 23-25 were all practiced by my school's team, it was just a matter of how many kids could get that far.

I guess that explains why some VA kids had super high scores for the State round, and then didn't even make top 56 for nationals.

It's the same test in every state.

Yeah, but a test that favors prep over talent is going to hurt the states with deeper talent pools. It's less likely to affect Iowa or Alabama, where the same kids were going to land in the top 4 regardless of the test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree that talent for contest math differs from being a talented mathematician. It's more about memorizing types of problems which is a rote exercise that requires a lot of time and effort. This is all good and well but we're talking about children who have barely begun their journey, and offering them an opportunity to help nurture their talents. Kids who have had years of math coaching to do well on these contests early on will be fine anywhere.

While there are repeated types of questions, usually when you get into the harder sections kids have to do more than recall previous problems.
For example, a flat solar panel is resting above a regular hexagon with different length pillars. Three are height 12,10,9 in order. What is the height of the next pillar?

These days the latter half of the AMC 10 test is very challenging, especially under the given time conditions. There are some annoying problems found in the first half, which can trip up kids (or suck up significant time, if they're not careful). The process of learning more math combined with practicing creative problem solving yields a lot of benefits in life, including finding many things at TJ relatively easy by comparison. Again it's not easy to acquire these problem solving skills; that's why the dedicated kids tend to spend a few years honing them starting from early middle school or even elementary. It's not really about IQ as others keep trying to claim. Yes, kids who are having a hard time in school, are not generally ahead with reading and learning, will have a much harder time do well in these higher level math contests, so of course having above average learning abilities will help. But it's nowhere near enough (if it was, there would be hundreds and hundreds of AIME qualifiers). I think the TJ application process should respect the kids that put in significant work and effort building up their problem solving skills, as their skills will easily transfer over to TJ and STEM in general. This is why people are skeptical of many other disadvantaged kids applying to TJ. If they're struggling at all in the classroom, how will they cope with TJ classes? It's not obvious that they will just magically adapt (some will, but likely more will not, and will end up struggling). Just because some of these kids have 'innate IQ' that is high will not help if they are academically behind and do not have the time to get up to speed. In this sense, the road to TJ has become an arms race (sadly), which makes it very difficult for some kids who have never been exposed to serious academics in middle school to be able to handle TJ without a lot of assistance. If we want to support these kids (assuming they somehow decided they really want to go to TJ late in middle school while realizing they're not prepared), then we should enroll these kids in programs designed to get them ready and up to speed by the beginning of 7th grade. Someone will have to pay for this and it's clear that schools will not support it.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but making TJ a reward for kids who have had the privilege of honing these skills on their parent's dime seems unfair for a public school program that should be open to all kids. I agree these kids would do better at TJ but maybe there's a bigger picture and providing opportunities to gifted students who may not be so lucky is lifechanging.

Sure, but applying to TJ will never be perfectly fair, right? Kids (parents?) who are dead set on TJ from a very early age and assuming their kids cooperate, will always have an unfair advantage. The application process should be optimized to make it as fair as possible for all types of kids, that is optimized for an overall level of fairness. So what does this mean? Some kids from every school should be given a chance (and I assume this is the reason the 1.5% was set up). It should be recognized that kids who are underrepresented or not high income will be very disadvantaged in enrichment and learning opportunities (this is not always true, but mostly true), so the application process should figure out how to help them be successful (in both applying and thriving if they get in). Some ways would be to get the word out about TJ and encourage them to excel academically from a younger age (this is very hard to do, and frankly I'm not seeing schools will ever do this; they're not going to prioritize a small subset of kids at each school for optimizing for TJ as they have bigger problems to deal with). Other ways would be to give "points" in the application process to make up for the unfairness -- here I believe this is being done under the new system. Another thing is to remove obstacles -- this one is probably the most contentious as seen on these threads because people believe that removing certain things will 'dilute' or otherwise make it unable to compare applicants. I think there are arguments for and against (teacher recs in my opinion are telling and important and teachers generally give honest feedback, rich kids cannot really game these). Removing the test, (the most contentious change) makes it much easier for kids who don't have the same problem solving skills to at least be considered in the final round now. Is this a good thing? Perhaps, but in my view especially without recommendations, will almost certainly result in kids who are false positives... they'll get in and struggle very hard without being able to adapt. I agree of course that the old test was inadequate because it did not have a super high ceiling as some of the math contests such as the AMC 10+ do. But the old test simply could have been weighted much less, just like colleges weight the SAT. Just the use the quant test as a low bar filter; if the score is high great (it could mean kid is very strong at problem solving, or they prepped, or a combination of both, but without more info it doesn't necessarily suggest something special about the kids), but if the score is low, that could be a red flag that kids may not be able to handle the environment at TJ, so the rest of the application should be more carefully scrutinized. This is what colleges do these days; their main concern is to not only get a diverse class, but also to make sure kids can thrive and graduate (and hopefully give back at some point).

I'm the loudest and most well-informed pro-reform person on these boards. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this response. I also know a LOT of people who are deeply connected to TJ and converse with them all the time, so I know what the conditions on the ground are.

Here's the reality of the situation right now as reported by those folks... There are absolutely a few (and I emphasize a FEW...10-20 is the number that's shared with me) kids over the past couple of years who entered TJ completely out of their element. They are receiving interventions within the first couple of months and some of them are taking to it like fish to water, while others are returning to their base schools. These are kids who absolutely never would have been selected by the old process and most of them are arriving from Prince William County, so there's the added question of the commute.

The biggest difference with these kids (as opposed to the kids in the old process that didn't belong at TJ) is that these kids are relatively easily identified early in their freshmen year as kids who need additional support to make the adjustment and their parents are enthusiastic about them getting that support. For the most part, it's not a problem of intelligence (the intelligence required to thrive at TJ is overrated), but rather of study skills and habits, which are easily correctable at such an early age. The students who didn't belong at TJ who were identified by the old process, meanwhile, didn't present as problematic until their sophomore or junior year, when they would crash and burn usually due to over-acceleration in math beyond their actual abilities. These are the kids who would be up until midnight every night during their freshmen year even without significant extracurricular attachments, but who would never seek assistance usually due to a cultural embargo against asking for help.

My argument has consistently been the following:

1) Teacher recommendations HAVE to come back, but in a reworked format so that teachers are not writing long narratives but are instead evaluating students against the rest of their classmates using a standardized form across several different metrics - most of them focused on contributions to the classroom environment.
2) The percentage of allocated seats needs to come down and should be more in the neighborhood of 1% rather than 1.5%. This would result in more than half of the class being selected through an open evaluation and less than half by allocated seats. There are simply not 6-8 students at each middle school that belong at TJ but there might be 4-5. This would also reopen the process to a few more private school kids, which would make the process more fair to them. Kids shouldn't be punished so hard in the TJ admissions process because their parents decided to send them to a private school, and right now they are.
3) The solution for exams should be optional test submissions. There should be a core group of students who are at TJ because of their excellent test taking ability - it just shouldn't be the entire class. Students would be free to submit a maximum of three relevant exam results as part of the admissions portfolio.
4) Essays should be very simple and relatively short - and proctored in-person during the school day at each respective school. They should include three questions: 1) What is your proudest accomplishment in STEM? 2) What is your proudest accomplishment outside of STEM? 3) How would you impact the learning environment at TJ?
5) The points-based rubric system should be eliminated in favor of a truly holistic evaluation process and FCPS should be very open about the fact that they are seeking a truly diverse group of individuals to fill each class - diverse across experiences, backgrounds, strengths, and talents - with the common threads between them being an interest and aptitude for STEM and a strong ability to contribute positively to an advanced learning environment.

Do these five things and you will:

1) Increase applications by at least 50%;
2) Admit the strongest class in TJ's history;
3) Immediately solve 95% of TJ's historic climate issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree that talent for contest math differs from being a talented mathematician. It's more about memorizing types of problems which is a rote exercise that requires a lot of time and effort. This is all good and well but we're talking about children who have barely begun their journey, and offering them an opportunity to help nurture their talents. Kids who have had years of math coaching to do well on these contests early on will be fine anywhere.

While there are repeated types of questions, usually when you get into the harder sections kids have to do more than recall previous problems.
For example, a flat solar panel is resting above a regular hexagon with different length pillars. Three are height 12,10,9 in order. What is the height of the next pillar?

These days the latter half of the AMC 10 test is very challenging, especially under the given time conditions. There are some annoying problems found in the first half, which can trip up kids (or suck up significant time, if they're not careful). The process of learning more math combined with practicing creative problem solving yields a lot of benefits in life, including finding many things at TJ relatively easy by comparison. Again it's not easy to acquire these problem solving skills; that's why the dedicated kids tend to spend a few years honing them starting from early middle school or even elementary. It's not really about IQ as others keep trying to claim. Yes, kids who are having a hard time in school, are not generally ahead with reading and learning, will have a much harder time do well in these higher level math contests, so of course having above average learning abilities will help. But it's nowhere near enough (if it was, there would be hundreds and hundreds of AIME qualifiers). I think the TJ application process should respect the kids that put in significant work and effort building up their problem solving skills, as their skills will easily transfer over to TJ and STEM in general. This is why people are skeptical of many other disadvantaged kids applying to TJ. If they're struggling at all in the classroom, how will they cope with TJ classes? It's not obvious that they will just magically adapt (some will, but likely more will not, and will end up struggling). Just because some of these kids have 'innate IQ' that is high will not help if they are academically behind and do not have the time to get up to speed. In this sense, the road to TJ has become an arms race (sadly), which makes it very difficult for some kids who have never been exposed to serious academics in middle school to be able to handle TJ without a lot of assistance. If we want to support these kids (assuming they somehow decided they really want to go to TJ late in middle school while realizing they're not prepared), then we should enroll these kids in programs designed to get them ready and up to speed by the beginning of 7th grade. Someone will have to pay for this and it's clear that schools will not support it.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but making TJ a reward for kids who have had the privilege of honing these skills on their parent's dime seems unfair for a public school program that should be open to all kids. I agree these kids would do better at TJ but maybe there's a bigger picture and providing opportunities to gifted students who may not be so lucky is lifechanging.

Sure, but applying to TJ will never be perfectly fair, right? Kids (parents?) who are dead set on TJ from a very early age and assuming their kids cooperate, will always have an unfair advantage. The application process should be optimized to make it as fair as possible for all types of kids, that is optimized for an overall level of fairness. So what does this mean? Some kids from every school should be given a chance (and I assume this is the reason the 1.5% was set up). It should be recognized that kids who are underrepresented or not high income will be very disadvantaged in enrichment and learning opportunities (this is not always true, but mostly true), so the application process should figure out how to help them be successful (in both applying and thriving if they get in). Some ways would be to get the word out about TJ and encourage them to excel academically from a younger age (this is very hard to do, and frankly I'm not seeing schools will ever do this; they're not going to prioritize a small subset of kids at each school for optimizing for TJ as they have bigger problems to deal with). Other ways would be to give "points" in the application process to make up for the unfairness -- here I believe this is being done under the new system. Another thing is to remove obstacles -- this one is probably the most contentious as seen on these threads because people believe that removing certain things will 'dilute' or otherwise make it unable to compare applicants. I think there are arguments for and against (teacher recs in my opinion are telling and important and teachers generally give honest feedback, rich kids cannot really game these). Removing the test, (the most contentious change) makes it much easier for kids who don't have the same problem solving skills to at least be considered in the final round now. Is this a good thing? Perhaps, but in my view especially without recommendations, will almost certainly result in kids who are false positives... they'll get in and struggle very hard without being able to adapt. I agree of course that the old test was inadequate because it did not have a super high ceiling as some of the math contests such as the AMC 10+ do. But the old test simply could have been weighted much less, just like colleges weight the SAT. Just the use the quant test as a low bar filter; if the score is high great (it could mean kid is very strong at problem solving, or they prepped, or a combination of both, but without more info it doesn't necessarily suggest something special about the kids), but if the score is low, that could be a red flag that kids may not be able to handle the environment at TJ, so the rest of the application should be more carefully scrutinized. This is what colleges do these days; their main concern is to not only get a diverse class, but also to make sure kids can thrive and graduate (and hopefully give back at some point).

I'm the loudest and most well-informed pro-reform person on these boards. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this response. I also know a LOT of people who are deeply connected to TJ and converse with them all the time, so I know what the conditions on the ground are.

Here's the reality of the situation right now as reported by those folks... There are absolutely a few (and I emphasize a FEW...10-20 is the number that's shared with me) kids over the past couple of years who entered TJ completely out of their element. They are receiving interventions within the first couple of months and some of them are taking to it like fish to water, while others are returning to their base schools. These are kids who absolutely never would have been selected by the old process and most of them are arriving from Prince William County, so there's the added question of the commute.

The biggest difference with these kids (as opposed to the kids in the old process that didn't belong at TJ) is that these kids are relatively easily identified early in their freshmen year as kids who need additional support to make the adjustment and their parents are enthusiastic about them getting that support. For the most part, it's not a problem of intelligence (the intelligence required to thrive at TJ is overrated), but rather of study skills and habits, which are easily correctable at such an early age. The students who didn't belong at TJ who were identified by the old process, meanwhile, didn't present as problematic until their sophomore or junior year, when they would crash and burn usually due to over-acceleration in math beyond their actual abilities. These are the kids who would be up until midnight every night during their freshmen year even without significant extracurricular attachments, but who would never seek assistance usually due to a cultural embargo against asking for help.

My argument has consistently been the following:

1) Teacher recommendations HAVE to come back, but in a reworked format so that teachers are not writing long narratives but are instead evaluating students against the rest of their classmates using a standardized form across several different metrics - most of them focused on contributions to the classroom environment.
2) The percentage of allocated seats needs to come down and should be more in the neighborhood of 1% rather than 1.5%. This would result in more than half of the class being selected through an open evaluation and less than half by allocated seats. There are simply not 6-8 students at each middle school that belong at TJ but there might be 4-5. This would also reopen the process to a few more private school kids, which would make the process more fair to them. Kids shouldn't be punished so hard in the TJ admissions process because their parents decided to send them to a private school, and right now they are.
3) The solution for exams should be optional test submissions. There should be a core group of students who are at TJ because of their excellent test taking ability - it just shouldn't be the entire class. Students would be free to submit a maximum of three relevant exam results as part of the admissions portfolio.
4) Essays should be very simple and relatively short - and proctored in-person during the school day at each respective school. They should include three questions: 1) What is your proudest accomplishment in STEM? 2) What is your proudest accomplishment outside of STEM? 3) How would you impact the learning environment at TJ?
5) The points-based rubric system should be eliminated in favor of a truly holistic evaluation process and FCPS should be very open about the fact that they are seeking a truly diverse group of individuals to fill each class - diverse across experiences, backgrounds, strengths, and talents - with the common threads between them being an interest and aptitude for STEM and a strong ability to contribute positively to an advanced learning environment.

Do these five things and you will:

1) Increase applications by at least 50%;
2) Admit the strongest class in TJ's history;
3) Immediately solve 95% of TJ's historic climate issues.

I'm genuinely impressed by this. I've been on the side of the Coalition for most of this conversation and I actually could see a plan like this working very well to balance the respective goals. Well said.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree that talent for contest math differs from being a talented mathematician. It's more about memorizing types of problems which is a rote exercise that requires a lot of time and effort. This is all good and well but we're talking about children who have barely begun their journey, and offering them an opportunity to help nurture their talents. Kids who have had years of math coaching to do well on these contests early on will be fine anywhere.

While there are repeated types of questions, usually when you get into the harder sections kids have to do more than recall previous problems.
For example, a flat solar panel is resting above a regular hexagon with different length pillars. Three are height 12,10,9 in order. What is the height of the next pillar?

These days the latter half of the AMC 10 test is very challenging, especially under the given time conditions. There are some annoying problems found in the first half, which can trip up kids (or suck up significant time, if they're not careful). The process of learning more math combined with practicing creative problem solving yields a lot of benefits in life, including finding many things at TJ relatively easy by comparison. Again it's not easy to acquire these problem solving skills; that's why the dedicated kids tend to spend a few years honing them starting from early middle school or even elementary. It's not really about IQ as others keep trying to claim. Yes, kids who are having a hard time in school, are not generally ahead with reading and learning, will have a much harder time do well in these higher level math contests, so of course having above average learning abilities will help. But it's nowhere near enough (if it was, there would be hundreds and hundreds of AIME qualifiers). I think the TJ application process should respect the kids that put in significant work and effort building up their problem solving skills, as their skills will easily transfer over to TJ and STEM in general. This is why people are skeptical of many other disadvantaged kids applying to TJ. If they're struggling at all in the classroom, how will they cope with TJ classes? It's not obvious that they will just magically adapt (some will, but likely more will not, and will end up struggling). Just because some of these kids have 'innate IQ' that is high will not help if they are academically behind and do not have the time to get up to speed. In this sense, the road to TJ has become an arms race (sadly), which makes it very difficult for some kids who have never been exposed to serious academics in middle school to be able to handle TJ without a lot of assistance. If we want to support these kids (assuming they somehow decided they really want to go to TJ late in middle school while realizing they're not prepared), then we should enroll these kids in programs designed to get them ready and up to speed by the beginning of 7th grade. Someone will have to pay for this and it's clear that schools will not support it.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but making TJ a reward for kids who have had the privilege of honing these skills on their parent's dime seems unfair for a public school program that should be open to all kids. I agree these kids would do better at TJ but maybe there's a bigger picture and providing opportunities to gifted students who may not be so lucky is lifechanging.

Sure, but applying to TJ will never be perfectly fair, right? Kids (parents?) who are dead set on TJ from a very early age and assuming their kids cooperate, will always have an unfair advantage. The application process should be optimized to make it as fair as possible for all types of kids, that is optimized for an overall level of fairness. So what does this mean? Some kids from every school should be given a chance (and I assume this is the reason the 1.5% was set up). It should be recognized that kids who are underrepresented or not high income will be very disadvantaged in enrichment and learning opportunities (this is not always true, but mostly true), so the application process should figure out how to help them be successful (in both applying and thriving if they get in). Some ways would be to get the word out about TJ and encourage them to excel academically from a younger age (this is very hard to do, and frankly I'm not seeing schools will ever do this; they're not going to prioritize a small subset of kids at each school for optimizing for TJ as they have bigger problems to deal with). Other ways would be to give "points" in the application process to make up for the unfairness -- here I believe this is being done under the new system. Another thing is to remove obstacles -- this one is probably the most contentious as seen on these threads because people believe that removing certain things will 'dilute' or otherwise make it unable to compare applicants. I think there are arguments for and against (teacher recs in my opinion are telling and important and teachers generally give honest feedback, rich kids cannot really game these). Removing the test, (the most contentious change) makes it much easier for kids who don't have the same problem solving skills to at least be considered in the final round now. Is this a good thing? Perhaps, but in my view especially without recommendations, will almost certainly result in kids who are false positives... they'll get in and struggle very hard without being able to adapt. I agree of course that the old test was inadequate because it did not have a super high ceiling as some of the math contests such as the AMC 10+ do. But the old test simply could have been weighted much less, just like colleges weight the SAT. Just the use the quant test as a low bar filter; if the score is high great (it could mean kid is very strong at problem solving, or they prepped, or a combination of both, but without more info it doesn't necessarily suggest something special about the kids), but if the score is low, that could be a red flag that kids may not be able to handle the environment at TJ, so the rest of the application should be more carefully scrutinized. This is what colleges do these days; their main concern is to not only get a diverse class, but also to make sure kids can thrive and graduate (and hopefully give back at some point).

I'm the loudest and most well-informed pro-reform person on these boards. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this response. I also know a LOT of people who are deeply connected to TJ and converse with them all the time, so I know what the conditions on the ground are.

Here's the reality of the situation right now as reported by those folks... There are absolutely a few (and I emphasize a FEW...10-20 is the number that's shared with me) kids over the past couple of years who entered TJ completely out of their element. They are receiving interventions within the first couple of months and some of them are taking to it like fish to water, while others are returning to their base schools. These are kids who absolutely never would have been selected by the old process and most of them are arriving from Prince William County, so there's the added question of the commute.

The biggest difference with these kids (as opposed to the kids in the old process that didn't belong at TJ) is that these kids are relatively easily identified early in their freshmen year as kids who need additional support to make the adjustment and their parents are enthusiastic about them getting that support. For the most part, it's not a problem of intelligence (the intelligence required to thrive at TJ is overrated), but rather of study skills and habits, which are easily correctable at such an early age. The students who didn't belong at TJ who were identified by the old process, meanwhile, didn't present as problematic until their sophomore or junior year, when they would crash and burn usually due to over-acceleration in math beyond their actual abilities. These are the kids who would be up until midnight every night during their freshmen year even without significant extracurricular attachments, but who would never seek assistance usually due to a cultural embargo against asking for help.

My argument has consistently been the following:

1) Teacher recommendations HAVE to come back, but in a reworked format so that teachers are not writing long narratives but are instead evaluating students against the rest of their classmates using a standardized form across several different metrics - most of them focused on contributions to the classroom environment.
2) The percentage of allocated seats needs to come down and should be more in the neighborhood of 1% rather than 1.5%. This would result in more than half of the class being selected through an open evaluation and less than half by allocated seats. There are simply not 6-8 students at each middle school that belong at TJ but there might be 4-5. This would also reopen the process to a few more private school kids, which would make the process more fair to them. Kids shouldn't be punished so hard in the TJ admissions process because their parents decided to send them to a private school, and right now they are.
3) The solution for exams should be optional test submissions. There should be a core group of students who are at TJ because of their excellent test taking ability - it just shouldn't be the entire class. Students would be free to submit a maximum of three relevant exam results as part of the admissions portfolio.
4) Essays should be very simple and relatively short - and proctored in-person during the school day at each respective school. They should include three questions: 1) What is your proudest accomplishment in STEM? 2) What is your proudest accomplishment outside of STEM? 3) How would you impact the learning environment at TJ?
5) The points-based rubric system should be eliminated in favor of a truly holistic evaluation process and FCPS should be very open about the fact that they are seeking a truly diverse group of individuals to fill each class - diverse across experiences, backgrounds, strengths, and talents - with the common threads between them being an interest and aptitude for STEM and a strong ability to contribute positively to an advanced learning environment.

Do these five things and you will:

1) Increase applications by at least 50%;
2) Admit the strongest class in TJ's history;
3) Immediately solve 95% of TJ's historic climate issues.

I'm genuinely impressed by this. I've been on the side of the Coalition for most of this conversation and I actually could see a plan like this working very well to balance the respective goals. Well said.

+1. I'm generally opposed to the current reforms, but I would totally get on board with PP's proposed system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree that talent for contest math differs from being a talented mathematician. It's more about memorizing types of problems which is a rote exercise that requires a lot of time and effort. This is all good and well but we're talking about children who have barely begun their journey, and offering them an opportunity to help nurture their talents. Kids who have had years of math coaching to do well on these contests early on will be fine anywhere.

While there are repeated types of questions, usually when you get into the harder sections kids have to do more than recall previous problems.
For example, a flat solar panel is resting above a regular hexagon with different length pillars. Three are height 12,10,9 in order. What is the height of the next pillar?

These days the latter half of the AMC 10 test is very challenging, especially under the given time conditions. There are some annoying problems found in the first half, which can trip up kids (or suck up significant time, if they're not careful). The process of learning more math combined with practicing creative problem solving yields a lot of benefits in life, including finding many things at TJ relatively easy by comparison. Again it's not easy to acquire these problem solving skills; that's why the dedicated kids tend to spend a few years honing them starting from early middle school or even elementary. It's not really about IQ as others keep trying to claim. Yes, kids who are having a hard time in school, are not generally ahead with reading and learning, will have a much harder time do well in these higher level math contests, so of course having above average learning abilities will help. But it's nowhere near enough (if it was, there would be hundreds and hundreds of AIME qualifiers). I think the TJ application process should respect the kids that put in significant work and effort building up their problem solving skills, as their skills will easily transfer over to TJ and STEM in general. This is why people are skeptical of many other disadvantaged kids applying to TJ. If they're struggling at all in the classroom, how will they cope with TJ classes? It's not obvious that they will just magically adapt (some will, but likely more will not, and will end up struggling). Just because some of these kids have 'innate IQ' that is high will not help if they are academically behind and do not have the time to get up to speed. In this sense, the road to TJ has become an arms race (sadly), which makes it very difficult for some kids who have never been exposed to serious academics in middle school to be able to handle TJ without a lot of assistance. If we want to support these kids (assuming they somehow decided they really want to go to TJ late in middle school while realizing they're not prepared), then we should enroll these kids in programs designed to get them ready and up to speed by the beginning of 7th grade. Someone will have to pay for this and it's clear that schools will not support it.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but making TJ a reward for kids who have had the privilege of honing these skills on their parent's dime seems unfair for a public school program that should be open to all kids. I agree these kids would do better at TJ but maybe there's a bigger picture and providing opportunities to gifted students who may not be so lucky is lifechanging.

Sure, but applying to TJ will never be perfectly fair, right? Kids (parents?) who are dead set on TJ from a very early age and assuming their kids cooperate, will always have an unfair advantage. The application process should be optimized to make it as fair as possible for all types of kids, that is optimized for an overall level of fairness. So what does this mean? Some kids from every school should be given a chance (and I assume this is the reason the 1.5% was set up). It should be recognized that kids who are underrepresented or not high income will be very disadvantaged in enrichment and learning opportunities (this is not always true, but mostly true), so the application process should figure out how to help them be successful (in both applying and thriving if they get in). Some ways would be to get the word out about TJ and encourage them to excel academically from a younger age (this is very hard to do, and frankly I'm not seeing schools will ever do this; they're not going to prioritize a small subset of kids at each school for optimizing for TJ as they have bigger problems to deal with). Other ways would be to give "points" in the application process to make up for the unfairness -- here I believe this is being done under the new system. Another thing is to remove obstacles -- this one is probably the most contentious as seen on these threads because people believe that removing certain things will 'dilute' or otherwise make it unable to compare applicants. I think there are arguments for and against (teacher recs in my opinion are telling and important and teachers generally give honest feedback, rich kids cannot really game these). Removing the test, (the most contentious change) makes it much easier for kids who don't have the same problem solving skills to at least be considered in the final round now. Is this a good thing? Perhaps, but in my view especially without recommendations, will almost certainly result in kids who are false positives... they'll get in and struggle very hard without being able to adapt. I agree of course that the old test was inadequate because it did not have a super high ceiling as some of the math contests such as the AMC 10+ do. But the old test simply could have been weighted much less, just like colleges weight the SAT. Just the use the quant test as a low bar filter; if the score is high great (it could mean kid is very strong at problem solving, or they prepped, or a combination of both, but without more info it doesn't necessarily suggest something special about the kids), but if the score is low, that could be a red flag that kids may not be able to handle the environment at TJ, so the rest of the application should be more carefully scrutinized. This is what colleges do these days; their main concern is to not only get a diverse class, but also to make sure kids can thrive and graduate (and hopefully give back at some point).

I'm the loudest and most well-informed pro-reform person on these boards. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this response. I also know a LOT of people who are deeply connected to TJ and converse with them all the time, so I know what the conditions on the ground are.

Here's the reality of the situation right now as reported by those folks... There are absolutely a few (and I emphasize a FEW...10-20 is the number that's shared with me) kids over the past couple of years who entered TJ completely out of their element. They are receiving interventions within the first couple of months and some of them are taking to it like fish to water, while others are returning to their base schools. These are kids who absolutely never would have been selected by the old process and most of them are arriving from Prince William County, so there's the added question of the commute.

The biggest difference with these kids (as opposed to the kids in the old process that didn't belong at TJ) is that these kids are relatively easily identified early in their freshmen year as kids who need additional support to make the adjustment and their parents are enthusiastic about them getting that support. For the most part, it's not a problem of intelligence (the intelligence required to thrive at TJ is overrated), but rather of study skills and habits, which are easily correctable at such an early age. The students who didn't belong at TJ who were identified by the old process, meanwhile, didn't present as problematic until their sophomore or junior year, when they would crash and burn usually due to over-acceleration in math beyond their actual abilities. These are the kids who would be up until midnight every night during their freshmen year even without significant extracurricular attachments, but who would never seek assistance usually due to a cultural embargo against asking for help.

My argument has consistently been the following:

1) Teacher recommendations HAVE to come back, but in a reworked format so that teachers are not writing long narratives but are instead evaluating students against the rest of their classmates using a standardized form across several different metrics - most of them focused on contributions to the classroom environment.
2) The percentage of allocated seats needs to come down and should be more in the neighborhood of 1% rather than 1.5%. This would result in more than half of the class being selected through an open evaluation and less than half by allocated seats. There are simply not 6-8 students at each middle school that belong at TJ but there might be 4-5. This would also reopen the process to a few more private school kids, which would make the process more fair to them. Kids shouldn't be punished so hard in the TJ admissions process because their parents decided to send them to a private school, and right now they are.
3) The solution for exams should be optional test submissions. There should be a core group of students who are at TJ because of their excellent test taking ability - it just shouldn't be the entire class. Students would be free to submit a maximum of three relevant exam results as part of the admissions portfolio.
4) Essays should be very simple and relatively short - and proctored in-person during the school day at each respective school. They should include three questions: 1) What is your proudest accomplishment in STEM? 2) What is your proudest accomplishment outside of STEM? 3) How would you impact the learning environment at TJ?
5) The points-based rubric system should be eliminated in favor of a truly holistic evaluation process and FCPS should be very open about the fact that they are seeking a truly diverse group of individuals to fill each class - diverse across experiences, backgrounds, strengths, and talents - with the common threads between them being an interest and aptitude for STEM and a strong ability to contribute positively to an advanced learning environment.

Do these five things and you will:

1) Increase applications by at least 50%;
2) Admit the strongest class in TJ's history;
3) Immediately solve 95% of TJ's historic climate issues.

So....this would place a pretty significant burden on the application reviewers, but if FCPS could find enough of them and train them adequately, you'd have a workable system here. It would retain a lot of the benefits of the new system while clawing back some of the measurables that would help the right kids to be rewarded by the changes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Yeah, but a test that favors prep over talent is going to hurt the states with deeper talent pools. It's less likely to affect Iowa or Alabama, where the same kids were going to land in the top 4 regardless of the test.

Alabama and Iowa beat Virginia at last year's National MathCounts.