Big 5 = "most desired" schools, not necessarily "the best"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

To those PP's, we see through you.

Got lice?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To those PP's, we see through you.

Got lice?

Huh? What are you talking about? I hope that those in this discussion at least have older children and are not battling out over their 6 year old's school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To those PP's, we see through you.

Got lice?

Huh? What are you talking about?

Use of the royal "we."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the previous posters are trying to somehow claim they are taking a higher road than the Maret booster and not engaging in disparagement of another school, yet these posters are the ones who are trying to force a ranking based on one data point of a the number of National Merit Scholars, and one of them specifically suggested that only SFS, Cathedral, and GDS be included in a BIG 3 discussion because of it.

To those PP's, we see through you.

I would be grateful if you were able to point out the quotes in this thread where PPs are "trying to force a ranking" and "that only SFS, Cathedral, and GDS be included in a BIG 3 discussion." I don't glean that from reading this thread, but perhaps I am late to this thread and not grokking it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the previous posters are trying to somehow claim they are taking a higher road than the Maret booster and not engaging in disparagement of another school, yet these posters are the ones who are trying to force a ranking based on one data point of a the number of National Merit Scholars, and one of them specifically suggested that only SFS, Cathedral, and GDS be included in a BIG 3 discussion because of it.

To those PP's, we see through you.

I would be grateful if you were able to point out the quotes in this thread where PPs are "trying to force a ranking" and "that only SFS, Cathedral, and GDS be included in a BIG 3 discussion." I don't glean that from reading this thread, but perhaps I am late to this thread and not grokking it.

Page 1, post 18:49. Poster suggested would should only use BIG 3 (SF, Cathedral, GDS) instead of BIG 5.

The same poster then had the gall to copy and re-post the same message over on the "Big 3 promoters..." thread. See pg 6 post 20:04.

Clearly this poster has an agenda of trying to separate out these 3 schools.

[Anonymous]

No, I'm that poster and when the data set suggested here contributed to a discussion on two threads that cross-referenced each other, I posted in both places.

I've also posted that the whole "big x" concept seems like a waste of time to me -- so I started out by addressing the question in the terms others posed it (what sets the Big 5 apart? and should it be the Big 3 or the Big 5), but then also produced the longer list and included public schools because that seemed to me to be a potential springboard to a more interesting and substantive discussion which we *were* having here. All good things must come to an end, I suppose. I'm done responding to these kinds of baseless accusations.

Still happy to talk how about to assess/characterize/choose schools and what kind of data is relevant, what this data means, etc.

[Anonymous]

The Big 5 (Big 1 or Big 10) = "most desired" schools, not necesaarily "the best", "the smartest" or the "most intelligent". Consider the fact the preponderance of emerging data annoints the homeschooled crowd with the greatest smarts and their tuition does not cost $35,000 per annum. No surprise that pound for pound the public magnets are home to those with the highest IQs, test performance and National Merit Semi-finalists.

I have no disclosures or conflicts on interest. I was neither home schooled nor do I home school my two primary school boys. They attend their local public elementary school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To those PP's, we see through you.

Got lice?

Huh? What are you talking about?

Use of the royal "we."

Oops, looks like my mom mangled that quotation. When I was growing up, she'd always say "only kings, schizophrenics, and people with lice get to use the royal we" and cite Mark Twain as her authority. When I tried to find the quote on google, I came up empty-handed. But wikipedia yielded two variations on the theme:

United States Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover told a subordinate who used the royal we: "Three groups are permitted that usage: pregnant women, royalty, and schizophrenics. Which one are you?"

Mark Twain once made a similar remark: "Only kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms have the right to use the editorial 'we.'"

No wonder you couldn't figure out what I was talking about! I was just wondering how an anonymous poster on an internet board could claim to speak for the group.

[Anonymous]

I am learning things on this thread.

Ahem, we are learning things on this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last year's "big 5" National Merit semifinalists

Sidwell 18
Gds 14
St Albans 10
NCS 9
Potomac 6
Maret 2

Drop in the bucket compared to TJ (or Blair which had 43, I think). Supporting the point that public magnet is probably the way to go if what you are looking for is a critical mass of high-performing kids with similar interests.

Also suggests that Big 3 makes more sense than the Big 5. But that's only if you're asking where the kids who do best on aptitude tests go/come from.

Please give the denominator. In other words, how large are the classes?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Please give the denominator. In other words, how large are the classes?

I used the document linked on page 2 of thread for class sizes, which might not correspond exactly with the 2009 graduating classes at these schools, but should be relatively close. Percentages and raw numbers shown below.

Sidwell 16% (18/111)
StA 12% (10/82)
NCS 12% (9/73)
GDS 12% (14/114)
Holton 9% (7/76)
Potomac 8% (6/73)
Maret 2% (2/69)
Landon 1% (1/69)

TJ 37% (153/403)
Blair 6% (43/650?)
BCC 1% (8/450?)

[Anonymous]

Nice job. How many students graduate from the Blair magnet/year. If 100, I would surmise the bulk of the National Merit Semi-finalists are from that group and a ~40% rate is indeed impressive comparing favorably with the Thomas Jefferson cohort.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The Big 5 (Big 1 or Big 10) = "most desired" schools, not necesaarily "the best", "the smartest" or the "most intelligent". Consider the fact the preponderance of emerging data annoints the homeschooled crowd with the greatest smarts and their tuition does not cost $35,000 per annum. No surprise that pound for pound the public magnets are home to those with the highest IQs, test performance and National Merit Semi-finalists.

I have no disclosures or conflicts on interest. I was neither home schooled nor do I home school my two primary school boys. They attend their local public elementary school.

Actually, it probably costs a lot more given the lost earnings of the parent home educator (likely to be much more than $35,000).

[Anonymous]

# NMSF – School – size of senior class (class size came from privateschoolreview.com (or publicschoolreview.com); I can’t vouch for its accuracy). This is a complete list of NMSFs for DC. For MD and VA, I just took the magnet schools and privates that had been discussed and threw in only other (i.e. not-discussed) MD private that performed well on this measure.

143 TJ 411
43 Blair 751
18 Sidwell 120
14 GDS 113
10 St Albans 79
9 NCS 77
7 Holton 82
6 Potomac 69
6 Charles E. Smith 116
5 Visitation 132
5 Wilson 423
4 Gonzaga 206
2 Burke 62
2 Maret 77

[Anonymous]

Damn -- that was a waste of my time, LOL! Started before 10:52 posted.