Where do you consider MCPS high schools on a scale of good-bad

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

Except that you can't disentangle issues of race and poverty, at least, not if you're being honest. Just saying it's a confound is a nice out, but it's not going to solve any problems. What solutions are you offering?

I mean, what do you think those of us at non-W schools are trying to do but to better them? Plenty of us are involved and thoughtful and care a lot about our kids' education, but we literally cannot afford the wealthier parts of MCPS, at least not without significantly compromising other important aspects of raising children.

And then there's the issue of what "the best chance of success" for kids means. I want my kids to be healthy, productive members of our diverse society, and I don't think a largely white, largely wealthy school isd the best way to get them there. I don't want my kids to live in a bubble. Others want different goals for their kids. I know parents of kids at elite private schools complaining that they're too play-based, and bemoaning the lack of homework in early elementary (!). They *want* their kids in a highly competitive, academic setting. I don't want that for my kids because, again, I don't think it's the best way to raise them to be well-rounded adults (and there's a lot of data on the negative effects of chronic stress on development). But you have GOT to stop saying that people who send their kids to non "elite" or whatever school don't want their kids to be successful. That's damaging and unproductive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The magnet curricula throughout MCPS (and at all grade levels) is superior to the non-magnet curricula.

This is just a list of schools in order of how wealthy the parents are.

No, it is a list of quality of the local cohort, it just happens to be that better off parents produce better performers at a much higher rate.

In real life, I never hear people referring to the kids of low-income, little-education people as low-quality kids. But on DCUM, people do this all. the. time. Seriously, who are you all?!

+1

I don't know if it's a regional thing, but compassion and empathy seem to run very low here.

+2 It can be downright toxic. I hope all you people know that what you write is linked to your IP address and that one day your grandchildren will probably be able to read what you wrote as part of your history and be ashamed of you.

Paranoid much?

Not paranoid. Just knowledgeable about how information on the Internet can be used. But if it makes some of you post things that are less racist, classist and rotten, so much the better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

Is it the school or the student /parent?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I suspect the list also corresponds to the percentage of kids that got to college, avg SAT scores, #of AP's taken and scoring a 3 or better.

Indeed, which usually corresponds to income level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

Totally agree.
I grew up in a large European city where 'diversity' as it's known here just wasn't a issue. Over there, the best schools are located downtown, where the most educated/wealthy sliver of population happen to live. The further out you move, the more dubious the quality of schools become. FWIW, back in the day, it was a uniform curriculum all over the place, down to textbooks, workbooks and schedules! On a given day, every kid in a certain grade was supposed to learn the exact same thing. But in reality, peer cohorts mattered, the quality of instruction mattered, and the overall attitude toward education mattered.
When we moved when I started high school, I applied for their equivalent of a COSA and commuted for years for an hour and half each way, although I could have easily transferred to a school within walking distance from our apartment. The curriculum was the same, after all.. however, when it was time to apply to colleges, all the effort became worth it.
Just my 2cents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

But there are "well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success" at all MCPS high schools. This is not a useful thread/conversation, because the lists were not based on facts. And social economic prejudices affect non-white people as well.

So I will continue to call out stupid threads that continually try to put down my kids' school.

+1 lots of well informed, white collar professionals like lawyers, scientists, etc.. in non W schools like RM and Blair clusters. It just so happens that those clusters also have a high % of low income families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

But there are "well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success" at all MCPS high schools. This is not a useful thread/conversation, because the lists were not based on facts. And social economic prejudices affect non-white people as well.

So I will continue to call out stupid threads that continually try to put down my kids' school.

+1 lots of well informed, white collar professionals like lawyers, scientists, etc.. in non W schools like RM and Blair clusters. It just so happens that those clusters also have a high % of low income families.

And even places like Gaithersburg, Watkins Mill, Einstein, Kennedy, Springbrook, Magruder, Seneca Valley, etc. *shock face*

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

There is no shame in saying that good schools depend on well-informed parents with sufficient means to drive their kids’ academic success.

That is a documented FACT.

Stop saying we’re racist or elitist to say so. The confounding factor is that non-whites are statistically less likely to be wealthy or have higher education degrees (recent exception: Asians). Stop presuming that wanting the best schools means people wish to avoid brown people. It is not true. People want the best chance of success for their kids, and if this was at a a school full of green Martians, they would send them there!

The racist tropes are getting old and are impeding useful discussions based on facts. You can’t figure out a way to reduce the achievement gap if you start with a false racial premise instead of focusing on economics.

But it’s easier to whine about racism than it is to work on poverty and economic inequality! Blaming others instead of actually brainstorming is the lazy solution.

- a non-white person.

We must have different definitions of the word "fact", then. Because as I understand it, good schools depend on good administrators, good teachers, good facilities, and a good curriculum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Blair non magnets are getting accepted to great colleges ( UMD college Park, UVA, Tulane, UCLA, Vanderbilt, Georgia)., Tech)

More kids go to jail from Blair than all those schools combined, just the facts

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well this is fun!

Tier 1
Churchill
Whitman
BCC
WJ

Tier 2
Wootton
Poolesville
QO
Sherwood

Tier 3
Damascus
RM
Blair
Clarksburg

Tier 4
Northwest
Magruder
Rockville
Blake

Tier 5
All other schools.

I would send my kids to any school in tiers 1-3. We need more posts like this!!!

Amazing.. this list corresponds very closely to how white the schools are. Surely you are not saying that the whiter the school the better?

That graphic was from 2012. Do you have an updated one?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The magnet curricula throughout MCPS (and at all grade levels) is superior to the non-magnet curricula.

This is just a list of schools in order of how wealthy the parents are.

No, it is a list of quality of the local cohort, it just happens to be that better off parents produce better performers at a much higher rate.

In real life, I never hear people referring to the kids of low-income, little-education people as low-quality kids. But on DCUM, people do this all. the. time. Seriously, who are you all?!

You have never heard as poor drop outs as low quality kids? Pull your head out of your ass

It isn’t that all poor kids are bad, just poor kids are much less likely to be successful. Unsuccessful people often resort to doing ratchet stuff in slummy places with dubious results. Even if society is nudging them to those outcomes it is still their truth.

[Anonymous]

I think having a peer cohort is important, however, that doesn't mean you can only get it at a W school, and actually, while you can easily find an academic cohort at a W school, those schools also have other issues due to too much wealth and not enough diversity.

It is harder to get that cohort in a school with a very high farms rate, though, simply because of the numbers.


I think a school with caring and awesome teachers, great ECs and about a 20% or so FARMs rate is the ideal. There was a study that found that low income students do best in a school that has less than about a 20% FARMs rate. Anything above that, the performance level goes down.


A school with too many of either of the extreme income spectrum has too many issues related to that extreme income bracket.

[Anonymous]

You don't have a clue about their truths. Some of those kids have been through more hardships in the first two years of their lives than you will ever know in your entire life.

Ignorant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

That graphic was from 2012. Do you have an updated one?

Can't find one. You could probably go through every single At A Glance sheet to get updated numbers, but I don't have time to do that, nor the inclination. In any case, I doubt it's all that different. Some schools may have slid a few spaces to the left or right. You could take the 10 to 15 HS from the right going left and check.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well this is fun!

Tier 1
Churchill
Whitman
BCC
WJ

Tier 2
Wootton
Poolesville
QO
Sherwood

Tier 3
Damascus
RM
Blair
Clarksburg

Tier 4
Northwest
Magruder
Rockville
Blake

Tier 5
All other schools.

I would send my kids to any school in tiers 1-3. We need more posts like this!!!

Amazing.. this list corresponds very closely to how white the schools are. Surely you are not saying that the whiter the school the better?

That graphic was from 2012. Do you have an updated one?

No the Washington post hasn’t revisited the story. That said I bet you will see less white kids in the lower income schools in the east and north with increased FARMS kids back filling them. Schools are the harbinger for white flight