MoCo school trends

[Anonymous]

Do you think the MoCo schools will still remain one of the best school districts in the country after 2.0, common core etc? I was talking to my neighbor whose kid is about to graduate from whitman. She said shen her kid was in ES and MS, there was optionality of enrichment, acceleration, some teachers proactively encouraged kids to go beyond grade level work if they were up for it. However, now there is more rigidity in terms of following prescribed curricula, and teachers are active discouraged to go beyond it. In other words, what was once a nourishing individualized teaching environment has become an "automaton" teaching environment. Is this generally true? Moms who have HS kids please weigh in on how you have seen the evolution of MoCo schools over the last decade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think the MoCo schools will still remain one of the best school districts in the country after 2.0, common core etc? I was talking to my neighbor whose kid is about to graduate from whitman. She said shen her kid was in ES and MS, there was optionality of enrichment, acceleration, some teachers proactively encouraged kids to go beyond grade level work if they were up for it. However, now there is more rigidity in terms of following prescribed curricula, and teachers are active discouraged to go beyond it. In other words, what was once a nourishing individualized teaching environment has become an "automaton" teaching environment. Is this generally true? Moms who have HS kids please weigh in on how you have seen the evolution of MoCo schools over the last decade.

those days are long gone, OP. MCPS cannot run the school system like the way they used to. too many kids and not enough money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think the MoCo schools will still remain one of the best school districts in the country after 2.0, common core etc? I was talking to my neighbor whose kid is about to graduate from whitman. She said shen her kid was in ES and MS, there was optionality of enrichment, acceleration, some teachers proactively encouraged kids to go beyond grade level work if they were up for it. However, now there is more rigidity in terms of following prescribed curricula, and teachers are active discouraged to go beyond it. In other words, what was once a nourishing individualized teaching environment has become an "automaton" teaching environment. Is this generally true? Moms who have HS kids please weigh in on how you have seen the evolution of MoCo schools over the last decade.

I don't think they're even close to being the best now. They have a lot of high scoring kids because they have a ton of smart, well educated parents having smart kids. Tests don't come home, homework isn't graded/corrected, no books, poor resources online. I'm honestly baffled how they expect kids to learn from their mistakes. I regret believing the hype about this school system; the only good year was 4th grade in an HGC. I wish I had sent my kid to private.

[Anonymous]

My oldest daughter is graduating this year and she never experienced the nirvana you describe, although she did benefit greatly from the gifted programs. My younger daughter (now a sophomore) had a lot more opportunities for enrichment/acceleration.

In my experience that sort of experience has always been more dependent on what a classroom teacher/school principal chooses to do rather than what MCPS policies dictate. For example, when my older daughter (a mathy kid) was in 3rd grade the official MCPS position was that at the beginning of each math unit a pretest was to be administered. If a child demonstrated competence with the material to be covered they were supposed to be given more advanced material. Meanwhile, at a parent meeting the principal explicitly stated that she believed that kids could test well and still not know the information so she believed all children should cover the basic material to ensure they leaened it. Meanwhile, the teacher seemed disinclined to go to any extra effort. On the other hand, my other daughter in 3rd grade (with another teacher) was far enough of her clasamates in reading that her teacher assigned her a separate book and spent some lunch periods having book discussions with my daughter. As tge year progressed a few other students joined their book club. I would never have expected that level of attention for a single child, but it had a transformative effect.

MCPS has always paid lip service to differentiation (hypothetically adjusting instruction to the child's level), but without grouping this quickly becomes unfeasible.

I have seen MCPS's opportunities for math acceleration curtailed. Other than that, I'm not sure there's been any significant changes.

I think MCPS does have some fabulous opportunities, but as a whole I have always felt it was deficient in many respects. I think MCPS's reputation is based more on the quality of the parents' education and less on the quality of the school system. I think that as the school population has changed, a smaller percentage of families is able to compensate at home for MCPS deficiencies. Meanwhile, I think MCPS continues to head in the wrong direction.

[Anonymous]

Actually, it's not 2.0 that's the problem.
Neither the previous nor the current curriculum went in depth and neither truly developed students' critical thinking skills. Not enough writing essays and not enough challenging math problems. Acceleration just to get basic facts covered in as many areas as possible is not the same as rigorous teaching and application of math (or thoughtful writing or the scientific method or whichever skill) in difficult problems, which is what colleges expect or should expect.

The current issue with MCPS relates more to overcrowding due to locally intense demographic pressure. It makes it even more difficult for teachers who already may not have been stellar, implementing an imperfect curriculum, to reach all their students and adapt their teaching methods to all their individual needs.

The other counties are probably just as bad or worse.

As always, if you want your children to have a well-rounded education and critical thinking skills, you need to talk to your kids about current events at the dinner table, take them to interesting happenings, have them read seminal texts way beyond what is required in school, do more challenging math problems, etc.

[Anonymous]

The question to ask is if US schools will remain on the top? They haven't been for a long time. MCPS may suck, but it still sucks less than other school districts in the US.

Asians know that. They already enrich and accelerate their students outside of the school day. Mostly because they know how rigorous the education is in their own home country. They are aware of the competition that the world will offer. They are not waiting for anything to change here. They are taking the opportunities available here and running with it.

[Anonymous]

I see a big difference even between my 9th grader and 7th grader. When 9th grader was in ES, she had lots of homework, projects, speeches, Math unit tests that she studied for a full week. 7th grader never had to memorize multiplication fact, state capitals--no science projects, math became only 30 minute assessments that never required studying. I am open to the fact I am wrong but it seems like MCPS dumbed everything down in order to prevent statistics showing no improvement in achievement gap. It pisses me off because my younger kid is really smart (older one average) but he does not get pushed at all. He gets no lower than 98% on anything in Algebra and never has big tests or big projects that he has to do outside of school. Without the challenge of a foreign language he would have nothing but 30 minutes a week of work. Getting rid of finals, which absolutely helps my older with her GPA, but I still feel is the worst decision the system could make. Thank goodness AP exams are national or they would get rid of those too. They provide too much data to evaluate results. I hope I am wrong but my opinion is that the system gets worse every year.

[Anonymous]

MCPS is riding on it's coattails. I graduated from MCPS many years ago and there is no question in my mind that the quality of education has gone downhill. One of my kids has already graduated and the other has another year. We will be so glad when they are out of MCPS. The county is playing the game of taking resources from one part of the county and putting them in the lower performing, less economically advantaged parts of the county. That's a horrible way to try to solve their problems and will only lead to the more advantaged students leaving the school system. My kids have had pretty mediocre or just plain bad math/science teachers (with the occasional good one thrown in) throughout their MCPS journey and we've been supplementing with tutors for years. If we had the money for private we would have gone that way. MCPS needs to re-evaluate how they are going to serve the needs of ALL students, not just focus on "closing the achievement" gap.

[Anonymous]

Agree that MCPS is riding its coattails. I grew up here and also graduated from some of the more popular schools. I don't think many of them were that great and they were based off reputation back them, But, upper MC and Howard, AA and many parts of VA were also farm country back then. We have done private and MCPS. Both have their advantages but I am not a fan of Curriculum 2.0 (Common Core and having standards is good) as it leaves a lot of gaps in education (at least for younger kids), no books or workbooks (plenty of common core workbooks other states use, some of which are very good as we did them at the private) and really concerned about how our classroom functions. If it continues we will move or go back to private, if we can find one we can afford. We heavily supplement.

I have a SN kid and while mine is doing fine with Curriculum 2.0, I cannot imagine the struggle it must be for many SN kids or kids who don't get support at home. The math in the early grades makes no sense. They don't teach handwriting or spelling. It is heavy writing in the grade we are in but I cannot imagine many SN kids keeping up if they have fine motor or other processing issues. They are so focused on one curriculum that it impossible to just have a one size fits all approach and its clearly not working.

I'm also very disappointed with the services in MCPS. We were refused for many years and are finally getting some support but in the meanwhile we've spent a fortune. The irony is the same staff who denied us asks why we didn't ask sooner. We did many times and it got refused.

[Anonymous]

I went to FCPS years ago, and although it's far from perfect, this seems a lot better than my experience.

[Anonymous]

Good detailed responses in this thread. Thank you PPs.

I am most concerned about math and science curriculum at MCPS. the rigor has certainly deteriorated. I speak as a theoretical physicist who spent middle and high school in India and the US. I have a 8th grader and the math he does in school is just ridiculously easy. The way he is taught to solve problems is round about and inelegant. To the point of being counter-intuitive. Mathematical problem solving is a skill that blossoms in people who think through the questions and practice for hours. Those insane worksheets where you have to solve problems in a very prescribed way is anti-thetical to development of mathematical intuition.

PPs did I get it right the ES kids do not have homework anymore?

[Anonymous]

When a school system has administration and teachers backed up by their union, there can only be deterioration of service. MoCo schools, WMATA etc. take away the teachers' union, institute pay for performance.

[Anonymous]

I remember taking physics and chem in FCPS at a school with a GS rating of 10. The problem I had was the majority of kids lacked basic math skills needed to take these subjects so the classes were useless. MoCo has its problems for sure, but still seems better than this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good detailed responses in this thread. Thank you PPs.

I am most concerned about math and science curriculum at MCPS. the rigor has certainly deteriorated. I speak as a theoretical physicist who spent middle and high school in India and the US. I have a 8th grader and the math he does in school is just ridiculously easy. The way he is taught to solve problems is round about and inelegant. To the point of being counter-intuitive. Mathematical problem solving is a skill that blossoms in people who think through the questions and practice for hours. Those insane worksheets where you have to solve problems in a very prescribed way is anti-thetical to development of mathematical intuition.

PPs did I get it right the ES kids do not have homework anymore?

My first grader typically has two assignments per week. Although I can only speculate, I suspect this is to involve parents, keep them involved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good detailed responses in this thread. Thank you PPs.

I am most concerned about math and science curriculum at MCPS. the rigor has certainly deteriorated. I speak as a theoretical physicist who spent middle and high school in India and the US. I have a 8th grader and the math he does in school is just ridiculously easy. The way he is taught to solve problems is round about and inelegant. To the point of being counter-intuitive. Mathematical problem solving is a skill that blossoms in people who think through the questions and practice for hours. Those insane worksheets where you have to solve problems in a very prescribed way is anti-thetical to development of mathematical intuition.

PPs did I get it right the ES kids do not have homework anymore?

No, not true. My 3rd grader has math HW almost every day. And they learn their times tables at school.

I've seen my 6th grader's math hw/test. They solve the equations the old fashioned way.

Honestly, I don't think this is an mcps issue, as much as a specific teacher/school issue.