Magnet MS results - Takoma Park & Eastern - anyone heard today?
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Anonymous
| 16:09: ?? |
Anonymous
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Exhibit B3: Number of Students who Opted to Enroll in a Magnet Application Program (2013–14), by Home
Middle School (Schools with 5 or less students not listed) School†† Number of Students Rocky Hill MS 37 Kingsview MS 29 Cabin John MS 25 Herbert Hoover MS 22 Julius West MS 16 Silver Spring International MS 16 Robert Frost MS 15 Lakelands Park MS 15 Sligo MS 13 Newport Mill MS 13 Westland MS 10 Ridgeview MS 9 Banneker MS 8 White Oak MS 8 Francis Scott Key MS 7 Earle B. Wood MS 7 Neelsville MS 7 Forest Oak MS 6 North Bethesda MS 6 |
Anonymous
| /\ Sorry, I probably should have bolded Frost, too. |
Anonymous
I think what she did was reasonable and thoughtful. I am not a Cold Spring parent and don't have a child in 5th but I can see how devastating it must have been for some of these students to get rejected by the magnet programs. I applaud the principal for being transparent and tackling the unhappiness head on. I think too many administrators are sneaky and try to control the flow of information which makes the situation worse. |
Anonymous
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source: MCPS Annual Report, "closing the gap" Overview:
"Perhaps no school district in the nation has shown a greater commitment to closing the achievement gap than Montgomery County Public Schools. This commitment has borne results. The gap in performance among racial subgroups has narrowed in many areas, including graduation rate, dropout rate, and access to rigorous classes (AP and IB). But in other areas, these gaps have persisted and, in some cases, grown. Equity is one of our most important core values. MCPS is committed to ensuring that student outcomes are not predictable by race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, or educational need. There is a sense of urgency to closing the gap and that urgency becomes even greater as MCPS becomes a more diverse school district." Can we say that the Coldspring ES 2/55 or 3/55 Magnet MS acceptance rate well reflected the urgent action of "the closing the gap" core values of MCPS? No one really cares to solve any of the real old problems in the public education, as long as it can be covered up under the new "statistics"!!! It's the beginning of the end of MCPS GT system. |
Anonymous
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I am a parent who would not have applied to a MS because of the additional 2 hours of commuting. DD was just admitted to Eastern, HS is Pyle. Also in compacted math. Would appreciate input on pros and cons of each. Went to Pyle open house but hard to evaluate. Moved here bc of good reputation of schools but see many comments about stimulating curriculum in MS. Am also aware of long day, additional stress and opportunity cost of the long commute (esp as DD cannot read in vehicle).
Welcome helpful advice/thoughts. |
Anonymous
Yup. Sad but true. Look at what MCPS highlighted - Graduation Rate - lower the bar and more graduate. Dropout rate - lowering the bar to graduation will, in turn, lower the dropout rate. Access to rigorous classes - lower/eliminate prerequisites to take the class or enter the program means more access. So, the MCPS "successes" are all related to lowering standards, expectations, and requirements. Why are we surprised by them doing the same thing with the magnet programs. |
Anonymous
Where is Tilden? Are they saying there were fewer that 5 acceptances from Tilden? |
Anonymous
| Less than fewer acceptances at Pyle too? Is there any more recent data than 2013/14? |
Anonymous
It’s probably because not many applied, no thinking the trade off was worth it. Non-W school poster here. |
Anonymous
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The chart shows the number of students in the year before the Metis Study who actually attended the magnet school (all 3 years). Pyle and Tilden had less than 5 students attending.
Agreed that the students from these schools probably did not apply in large numbers because they did not value the magnet program over home school. The only "glut" of W school students were coming from Churchill and Wootton. That is likely why thsoe students are feeling unfairly treated now. |
Anonymous
| I think mcps made the right move. Mcps finally learns how to concentrate limited resources on the most vulnerable. Public education should be an entitlement program. Even though the new magnet selection might look like a penalty to families with means, mcps knows the parents will pay on their own to make up what Is missing no matter how unfair they feel. |
Anonymous
BINGO! |
Anonymous
yep! We are doing just that. zoned for a poor performing school, this was her shot at escaping. she got fantastic scores. we are moving to private sxhool for middle. |
Anonymous
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Just got email forwarded....
From: Lang Lin Date: February 19, 2018 at 10:09:57 PM EST To: gtliaisons2017-2018@googlegroups.com Subject: Urgent message on Magnet program admission Reply-To: gtliaisons2017-2018@googlegroups.com Dear GT Liaisons, This year, as many of you are aware, MCPS conducted a pilot program changing the Eastern/Takoma Park magnet application and selection process. MCPS screened the entire 5th grade population of the down county magnet feeder schools, and identified 4000 "potentially qualified" students to test for admission to the 200 spaces in the EMS and TPMS magnet programs. (By contrast, in previous years, approximately 800 students self-selected to test for those spaces.) One of the new selection criteria evaluated whether each student has the "availability of a peer group at the local middle school," as reflected in the evaluation and test results of a much larger number of students at each middle school than was available in earlier years. Over the last few days, it has come to our attention that, a number of students in the 99th percentile in all of the CogAT categories (Verbal, Quantitative, Nonverbal, and Composite) are being denied entrance - and are not even eligible for the wait pool -- because MCPS believes that the presence of large numbers of academic peers in their local schools will result in their needs being met at those schools. In addition, early indicators suggest that large numbers of very high performing students currently attending one of in the Centers for Enriched Studies (particularly in Barnsley CES, Chevy Chase CES, and Cold Spring CES as we learned for now) are not being offered placement in the magnets, even though those students have completed an elementary curriculum that places them well above the MCPS curriculum offered in local middle schools. The MCCPTA Gifted Child Committee (GCC) has been working for the last few days to better understand this concern. As we navigate these issues, we encourage the following actions on the part of parents throughout the down county. Please pass this information on to parents in your communities that may be affected by these developments. APPEAL: For students in the top percentiles, we encourage parents to consider filing an appeal to the decision, following the process outlined in the admission decision letter. We further suggest sending a copy of the appeal to both the Board of Education members (boe@mcpsmd.org), Dr. Smith, and us. Since the appeal calls for "new" or unknown information, we suggest you inform the magnet coordinators that contrary to what they apparently were told, your local school does not group students by ability or offer accelerated curriculum yet. Ask that your student's need for rigor and challenge be reconsidered in light of this reality. Please note, we do not think the appeal effort will increase the seats at the magnet, nor do we believe this effort will result in students being added to the wait pool or the class. However, we think this is a critical step to bring BOE members the awareness of the caliber of student that is being denied entrance to the magnet programs and the fallacy of the reasoning for it. ADVOCATE: Families of all children denied entrance to the magnets that attended one of the Centers for Enriched Studies AND families of any other students that scored in the top percentiles in the CogAT and were rejected from the magnets are encouraged to make inquiries to both the MCPS central office and local home middle schools into the following questions: 1. Will the MCPS central office officially identify these highly able students and inform local middle schools that these students were denied admission because a peer group exists at the middle school? 2. How will the master schedule be used this spring at the local middle schools to ensure the "substantial cohort of highly able students" are grouped together in core courses and group projects? 3. What local school curriculum offerings are planned for the 2018-2019 school year to offer the peer group cohort the rigor and challenge they would have been offered in the magnet programs? 4. What supports and evaluations will be in place to ensure that these highly able students will be served successfully in the local middle schools? MCCPTA GCC will continue to advocate directly on behalf of all highly able students within MCPS, raising these same concerns. We encourage our GT liaisons to share any information gathered on specific middle school plans on our GTliaison listserv so we can learn from each other and move quickly to ensure that highly able students' needs are met during the 2018-19 school year. Kim Testa, Iris Masucci, and Lang Lin Gifted Child Committee, MCCPTA |