Disappointed by TJ decision?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

You mean to see if we still have people who claimed to be "poor" and cannot afford gas so are forced to use the Tesla's

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

From before the changes to after, absolutely. From about 0.5-1% to 25-30%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

some self-employ families

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

You mean to see if we still have people who claimed to be "poor" and cannot afford gas so are forced to use the Tesla's

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

From before the changes to after, absolutely. From about 0.5-1% to 25-30%.

But if in post-Covid admissions this number has dropped substantially, it would mean the previous admissions had a lot of cheating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

some self-employed families

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

You mean to see if we still have people who claimed to be "poor" and cannot afford gas so are forced to use the Tesla's

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

From before the changes to after, absolutely. From about 0.5-1% to 25-30%.

Yes, the old process was skewed heavily in the favor of those who could afford outside enrichment.

[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:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

From before the changes to after, absolutely. From about 0.5-1% to 25-30%.

But if in post-Covid admissions this number has dropped substantially, it would mean the previous admissions had a lot of cheating.

Didn't they require proof later as a means to weed out the toxic liars from the TJ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

You mean to see if we still have people who claimed to be "poor" and cannot afford gas so are forced to use the Tesla's

some self employed families

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They also had Aspire Reading and Science tests along with this QuantQ.

Yes, but if you didn't perform adequately on the Quant-Q relative to the rest of the population, you weren't going to make the semifinalist round. That's the problem - it's not even that you had to achieve a minimum acceptable score - it's that you had to perform well enough to be in the top half of a pool that included a bunch of kids who (unknowingly, and through no fault of their own) had access to actual questions and sophisticated strategies for solving the various problem types.

I can't emphasize this enough - the whole point of the Quant-Q is to test a student's ability to develop a quick elegant solution to a problem. If they enter the exam already having those methods to solve the problems, the exam is worse than useless - it actually occludes the process.

People always find a way to hack the system. It's kind of predictable, and my guess is this is why they won't go back to this. Nevertheless, they could figure out how to address the issues with teacher recs.

They had two other tests called Aspire that they dropped at the same time. These do not have this issue of needing to secure the test.

The two Aspire exams (Reading and Science) were not secured. The Admissions Office was open about prep opportunities for these.

What they acknowledged is that free prep is, by its nature, not nearly as effective as expensive, time-intensive prep. As such, even offering exams with free prep opportunities results in an imbalanced playing field even if the students are equivalent in academic capability and potential.

That applies to course grades and essay writing as well.

Not in nearly the same way. With respect to course grades, students begin on a much more level playing field - ~4 hours of professional instruction in the content area per week for the entire year/semester.

And with respect to essay writing, the evaluation of them is purely subjective, there usually isn’t a correct answer, and most parents would agree that, while they have opinions about how they SHOULD be evaluated, they don’t really know much about how they ARE evaluated.

But there is prep available for this, and the numbers appear to show it is working, maybe not as much as before, but definitely an impact.

Too early to tell. It's also challenging because, unlike in previous years, the Admissions Office did not release a demographic breakdown of the applicants to the class of 2026 along with the demos of those who were offered admission.

I'm curious if there's been a big change in FARMS level.

From before the changes to after, absolutely. From about 0.5-1% to 25-30%.

But if in post-Covid admissions this number has dropped substantially, it would mean the previous admissions had a lot of cheating.

Didn't they require proof later as a means to weed out the toxic liars from the TJ?

They required proof, but it wasn't 'proof' proof. Some 'cheaters' got to keep their spots because of advice inadvertently provided by people on this forum, letting them know how they could really cheat. The first instance was not lying. In fact it was the opposite. People were lying if they answered no to 'are you eligible for free meals'.