Mathcounts results 2024 MoCo+PG

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

You keep repeating yourself and this is most absurd argument I've heard about those UMC prepped Takoma kids.

Nice try at gaslighting. It's the Rockville and N Bethesda set that are highly prepped. Anyone with a kid in the magnet is well aware. I am the poster whose kid noticed all the kids with A++ binders of test prep for the magnet exam (back in the day). No local kid did that. But, local kids do have lots of enrichment. Mostly humanities experiences (music, theatre, writing,
video, etc) as well as academic parents (we have a lot of those in TP).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

So by your logic, the 25 TPMS kids who are lotteried in are lotteried in to...basic TPMS?!? Not any specialized Math/Science/CS classes in a program built for such?

Laughable.

Is there a legal requirement in Maryland to keep any out-of-boundary population shift to 100 maximum per class year of which we are all unaware? That would bind MCPS such that it could not make the program 125? I'd be happy to revisit the thought if you can point me to such. (If it's an MCPS policy, that takes the same wave of the BOE's hand to change as would the shift from local set-aside seats to generally available seats.)

The board has only agreed to expand TPMS by 100 kids per grade (300 total) out of bounds for the magnet. The new building was constructed to meet the needs of the local population. No there isn’t space for an extra 75 out of bounds kids and no there is no consideration in expanding the magnet. That’s the situation and there is zero chance it will change no matter how many times you post here that it’s unfair!

Look at the capacities and utilizations in the most recent CIP:

https://gis.mcpsmd.org/cipmasterpdfs/CIP25_AppendixE.pdf

There's space for more than twice that many extra students at TPMS. Through 2029-30. If none of them qualified/lotteried in from the TPMS local catchment when the playing field was leveled.

As suggested by the prior post, the BOE could just as easily say 150 as 100 per grade, if they wanted to and the space existed, in the same breath that they might say no to disproportionate in-catchment set-asides. They also could create additional magnets to meet the overall need, but that still doesn't mean they should be favoring one locality over another by keeping those disproportionate set-asides in the meantime.

"Inequitable" -- the word is "inequitable". "Unfair" is what you use when you try to gaslight someone as whiney, trying to set them up for a, "Look, I'm sorry, but sometimes life's unfair!" rhetorically bankrupt rejoinder used by so many who seek to preserve an unjust and redressable status quo.

Who keeps repeating themselves? You! And, you don't listen! PP explained about the cap. If you want to change it, petition the county/BOE.

You live in a very small world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

You keep repeating yourself and this is most absurd argument I've heard about those UMC prepped Takoma kids.

Nice try at gaslighting. It's the Rockville and N Bethesda set that are highly prepped. Anyone with a kid in the magnet is well aware. I am the poster whose kid noticed all the kids with A++ binders of test prep for the magnet exam (back in the day). No local kid did that. But, local kids do have lots of enrichment. Mostly humanities experiences (music, theatre, writing,
video, etc) as well as academic parents (we have a lot of those in TP).

DP. The trail, here, was about the TP set-aside for the magnet. PP was referring to the absurdity of suggesting that TP kids need to have that set-aside and that the magnet would shrink if the set-aside wasn't constructed so as to make admission to it much more likely from TP than from the rest of the magnet catchment.

Given the exposure-based nature of the criteria, those local TP kids getting into the set-aside lottery are likely to be those UMC types, just like those from anywhere else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

So by your logic, the 25 TPMS kids who are lotteried in are lotteried in to...basic TPMS?!? Not any specialized Math/Science/CS classes in a program built for such?

Laughable.

Is there a legal requirement in Maryland to keep any out-of-boundary population shift to 100 maximum per class year of which we are all unaware? That would bind MCPS such that it could not make the program 125? I'd be happy to revisit the thought if you can point me to such. (If it's an MCPS policy, that takes the same wave of the BOE's hand to change as would the shift from local set-aside seats to generally available seats.)

The board has only agreed to expand TPMS by 100 kids per grade (300 total) out of bounds for the magnet. The new building was constructed to meet the needs of the local population. No there isn’t space for an extra 75 out of bounds kids and no there is no consideration in expanding the magnet. That’s the situation and there is zero chance it will change no matter how many times you post here that it’s unfair!

Look at the capacities and utilizations in the most recent CIP:

https://gis.mcpsmd.org/cipmasterpdfs/CIP25_AppendixE.pdf

There's space for more than twice that many extra students at TPMS. Through 2029-30. If none of them qualified/lotteried in from the TPMS local catchment when the playing field was leveled.

As suggested by the prior post, the BOE could just as easily say 150 as 100 per grade, if they wanted to and the space existed, in the same breath that they might say no to disproportionate in-catchment set-asides. They also could create additional magnets to meet the overall need, but that still doesn't mean they should be favoring one locality over another by keeping those disproportionate set-asides in the meantime.

"Inequitable" -- the word is "inequitable". "Unfair" is what you use when you try to gaslight someone as whiney, trying to set them up for a, "Look, I'm sorry, but sometimes life's unfair!" rhetorically bankrupt rejoinder used by so many who seek to preserve an unjust and redressable status quo.

Who keeps repeating themselves? You! And, you don't listen! PP explained about the cap. If you want to change it, petition the county/BOE.

You live in a very small world.

Think globally, act locally, right? It would help if you bothered to read before posting, unless you're intentionally trolling, here.

PP claimed the BOE-approved cap was the reason the program would shrink. BOE can change that cap if they want, and the capacity/utilization table shows there's plenty of room to do that (which PP claimed wasn't the case).

Of course this would have to go through BOE, just as elimination of the set-aside would, or just about anything on this forum where folks are suggesting change. Trying to dismiss an argument by saying you'd have to go to the BOE is a red herring in this regard.

Still waiting on that moral justification from proponents of the set-aside as to why a TP student should be given a much, much greater chance of getting in to a highly sought program that is supposed to serve more than half the county by MCPS, not by TP...

Of course, the same goes for the couple of other special set-asides/differential local treatments not based in legal requirement (e.g., Title I) that MCPS has allowed for special interests over the years (some discussed above).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

So by your logic, the 25 TPMS kids who are lotteried in are lotteried in to...basic TPMS?!? Not any specialized Math/Science/CS classes in a program built for such?

Laughable.

Is there a legal requirement in Maryland to keep any out-of-boundary population shift to 100 maximum per class year of which we are all unaware? That would bind MCPS such that it could not make the program 125? I'd be happy to revisit the thought if you can point me to such. (If it's an MCPS policy, that takes the same wave of the BOE's hand to change as would the shift from local set-aside seats to generally available seats.)

The board has only agreed to expand TPMS by 100 kids per grade (300 total) out of bounds for the magnet. The new building was constructed to meet the needs of the local population. No there isn’t space for an extra 75 out of bounds kids and no there is no consideration in expanding the magnet. That’s the situation and there is zero chance it will change no matter how many times you post here that it’s unfair!

Look at the capacities and utilizations in the most recent CIP:

https://gis.mcpsmd.org/cipmasterpdfs/CIP25_AppendixE.pdf

There's space for more than twice that many extra students at TPMS. Through 2029-30. If none of them qualified/lotteried in from the TPMS local catchment when the playing field was leveled.

As suggested by the prior post, the BOE could just as easily say 150 as 100 per grade, if they wanted to and the space existed, in the same breath that they might say no to disproportionate in-catchment set-asides. They also could create additional magnets to meet the overall need, but that still doesn't mean they should be favoring one locality over another by keeping those disproportionate set-asides in the meantime.

"Inequitable" -- the word is "inequitable". "Unfair" is what you use when you try to gaslight someone as whiney, trying to set them up for a, "Look, I'm sorry, but sometimes life's unfair!" rhetorically bankrupt rejoinder used by so many who seek to preserve an unjust and redressable status quo.

Who keeps repeating themselves? You! And, you don't listen! PP explained about the cap. If you want to change it, petition the county/BOE.

You live in a very small world.

Think globally, act locally, right? It would help if you bothered to read before posting, unless you're intentionally trolling, here.

PP claimed the BOE-approved cap was the reason the program would shrink. BOE can change that cap if they want, and the capacity/utilization table shows there's plenty of room to do that (which PP claimed wasn't the case).

Of course this would have to go through BOE, just as elimination of the set-aside would, or just about anything on this forum where folks are suggesting change. Trying to dismiss an argument by saying you'd have to go to the BOE is a red herring in this regard.

Still waiting on that moral justification from proponents of the set-aside as to why a TP student should be given a much, much greater chance of getting in to a highly sought program that is supposed to serve more than half the county by MCPS, not by TP...

Of course, the same goes for the couple of other special set-asides/differential local treatments not based in legal requirement (e.g., Title I) that MCPS has allowed for special interests over the years (some discussed above).

Why would they want to do anything like that? It makes no sense. The set aside seems like a good thing to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

So by your logic, the 25 TPMS kids who are lotteried in are lotteried in to...basic TPMS?!? Not any specialized Math/Science/CS classes in a program built for such?

Laughable.

Is there a legal requirement in Maryland to keep any out-of-boundary population shift to 100 maximum per class year of which we are all unaware? That would bind MCPS such that it could not make the program 125? I'd be happy to revisit the thought if you can point me to such. (If it's an MCPS policy, that takes the same wave of the BOE's hand to change as would the shift from local set-aside seats to generally available seats.)

The board has only agreed to expand TPMS by 100 kids per grade (300 total) out of bounds for the magnet. The new building was constructed to meet the needs of the local population. No there isn’t space for an extra 75 out of bounds kids and no there is no consideration in expanding the magnet. That’s the situation and there is zero chance it will change no matter how many times you post here that it’s unfair!

Look at the capacities and utilizations in the most recent CIP:

https://gis.mcpsmd.org/cipmasterpdfs/CIP25_AppendixE.pdf

There's space for more than twice that many extra students at TPMS. Through 2029-30. If none of them qualified/lotteried in from the TPMS local catchment when the playing field was leveled.

As suggested by the prior post, the BOE could just as easily say 150 as 100 per grade, if they wanted to and the space existed, in the same breath that they might say no to disproportionate in-catchment set-asides. They also could create additional magnets to meet the overall need, but that still doesn't mean they should be favoring one locality over another by keeping those disproportionate set-asides in the meantime.

"Inequitable" -- the word is "inequitable". "Unfair" is what you use when you try to gaslight someone as whiney, trying to set them up for a, "Look, I'm sorry, but sometimes life's unfair!" rhetorically bankrupt rejoinder used by so many who seek to preserve an unjust and redressable status quo.

Who keeps repeating themselves? You! And, you don't listen! PP explained about the cap. If you want to change it, petition the county/BOE.

You live in a very small world.

Think globally, act locally, right? It would help if you bothered to read before posting, unless you're intentionally trolling, here.

PP claimed the BOE-approved cap was the reason the program would shrink. BOE can change that cap if they want, and the capacity/utilization table shows there's plenty of room to do that (which PP claimed wasn't the case).

Of course this would have to go through BOE, just as elimination of the set-aside would, or just about anything on this forum where folks are suggesting change. Trying to dismiss an argument by saying you'd have to go to the BOE is a red herring in this regard.

Still waiting on that moral justification from proponents of the set-aside as to why a TP student should be given a much, much greater chance of getting in to a highly sought program that is supposed to serve more than half the county by MCPS, not by TP...

Of course, the same goes for the couple of other special set-asides/differential local treatments not based in legal requirement (e.g., Title I) that MCPS has allowed for special interests over the years (some discussed above).

Why would they want to do anything like that? It makes no sense. The set aside seems like a good thing to me.

Since the lottery has shown that even more students can benefit from this programming, it makes even more sense to expand the set-aside since these kids are at the school anyway.

[Anonymous]

Love this thread.

Next time, instead of buying ad banners,
I'm going to mention my product in the thread title, and then mention TPMS in a comment, so you all keep the ad on the Recent Posts page for a month.

[Anonymous]

This thread is so sad. Mathcounts is great and instead of just celebrating all the kids who participated, this thread is just using it to bash and complain. Kids, if you are reading, I think you’re all wonderful. Every mathlete is a champion because anyone who loves math enough to compete is already a winner. Super corny, but really true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

You keep repeating yourself and this is most absurd argument I've heard about those UMC prepped Takoma kids.

Nice try at gaslighting. It's the Rockville and N Bethesda set that are highly prepped. Anyone with a kid in the magnet is well aware. I am the poster whose kid noticed all the kids with A++ binders of test prep for the magnet exam (back in the day). No local kid did that. But, local kids do have lots of enrichment. Mostly humanities experiences (music, theatre, writing,
video, etc) as well as academic parents (we have a lot of those in TP).

DP. The trail, here, was about the TP set-aside for the magnet. PP was referring to the absurdity of suggesting that TP kids need to have that set-aside and that the magnet would shrink if the set-aside wasn't constructed so as to make admission to it much more likely from TP than from the rest of the magnet catchment.

Given the exposure-based nature of the criteria, those local TP kids getting into the set-aside lottery are likely to be those UMC types, just like those from anywhere else.

Yeah, you're not a DP. This is the same stuff PP was spouting. It is just contrary to the way it works. For the nth time, it's not a set aside, it's an addition from students already assigned to the school. If you get rid 9f it, these students will also compete for the 100 spots. You are do obtuse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread is so sad. Mathcounts is great and instead of just celebrating all the kids who participated, this thread is just using it to bash and complain. Kids, if you are reading, I think you’re all wonderful. Every mathlete is a champion because anyone who loves math enough to compete is already a winner. Super corny, but really true.

Mathcounts is great. Wouldn't it be nice if that extracurricular were available such that every interested MCPS student had access? Frost, for instance, could team with Banneker to bring in students via Zoom if the latter didn't have a staff sponsor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

You keep repeating yourself and this is most absurd argument I've heard about those UMC prepped Takoma kids.

Nice try at gaslighting. It's the Rockville and N Bethesda set that are highly prepped. Anyone with a kid in the magnet is well aware. I am the poster whose kid noticed all the kids with A++ binders of test prep for the magnet exam (back in the day). No local kid did that. But, local kids do have lots of enrichment. Mostly humanities experiences (music, theatre, writing,
video, etc) as well as academic parents (we have a lot of those in TP).

DP. The trail, here, was about the TP set-aside for the magnet. PP was referring to the absurdity of suggesting that TP kids need to have that set-aside and that the magnet would shrink if the set-aside wasn't constructed so as to make admission to it much more likely from TP than from the rest of the magnet catchment.

Given the exposure-based nature of the criteria, those local TP kids getting into the set-aside lottery are likely to be those UMC types, just like those from anywhere else.

Yeah, you're not a DP. This is the same stuff PP was spouting. It is just contrary to the way it works. For the nth time, it's not a set aside, it's an addition from students already assigned to the school. If you get rid 9f it, these students will also compete for the 100 spots. You are do obtuse.

Um...Yes, I was a DP? Sure, I posted earlier, but the person noting the repetition and absurdity of the argument that MCPS/the BOE couldn't simply shift the inbounds allocation to make it more equitable was someone else. No idea who, but maybe, just maybe, there's more than one person who can see through that silliness?

Look out, Takoma Park real estate agents. Your commissions are showing!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange how none of you who are suggesting that the sky would fall if the set aside were eliminated or modified has any explanation as to why it is OK in an equity-obsessed school system to have inequitable relative opportunity to get magnet-level enriched education. Is equity a good thing only when getting there doesn't negatively impact your neighborhood?

No one is saying the sky would fall. People are saying it doesn't make sense to eliminate it, because it would not free up more out of bounds seats. Those 25 kids would be at TPMS no matter what.

This is also pretty normal. Potomac ES has a whole immersion program essentially to themselves. Cold Spring ES gets a whole class of AIM. Kids zoned for RM can join the IB program junior year and get an outstanding education.

There are slight variations and opportunities depending on the home school. The set-aside for TPMS is not an outlier.

It is an outlier. So is Potomac, with its much larger set-aside as a proportion of the capacity of the Mandarin Immersion program hosted there. So is Stonegate, with its in-bounds-only CES (a couple of others in that situation, too). These are the exceptions. There are 130-something elementaries, 40 or so middles and nearly 30 high schools. The vast majority of these schools don't have overbooked-demand magnets, much less set-asides for them.

Is there a set-aside for Rock Creek Forest's Full Spanish Immersion program? I don't think so.

Cold Spring (and its MS/HS pyramid) is an example of inequity for a similar, but somewhat separate reason, as it isn't a magnet that is supposed to be drawing from a whole portion of the county. CSES administration genuflects to aggressive family push enabled by outside enrichment (not saying that enrichment is wrong, just that that's how they get scores to push a justification). The problem is not so much that, as it is that MCPS hides this fact and doesn't do what it should, given it is enabling this at CSES, to ensure equivalent identification/access for anyone outside of CSES demonstrating such capability.

Back to TPMS and its set-aside. They got rid of or reduced some of the other set-asides (Eastern magnet or somewhere else?), didn't they? No reason they couldn't do so for TPMS. It would free up those spots to equilibrate access across the entire magnet catchment because they'd be keeping the program at 125. Not getting rid of 25 seats, just getting rid of 25 set-aside admissions spaces (or reducing the set-aside so that the proportion of set-aside admissions slots to total admission slots was the same as the proportion of the TPMS catchment to the whole magnet catchment).

No, it would not free up spots. The program is 100 students. The 25 additional are pulled from students already attending as a way to expand a limited program without actually expanding it. It has been explained many times on thus board. Eliminating the set aside would mean that inboundary kids will compete for those 100 spots. The TPMS catchment cohort is very competitive. I know several incredibly smart kids who did not get in. (I taught them in ES). Trying to get rid of the set aside would just reduce seats overall and would hurt everyone.

You keep repeating yourself and this is most absurd argument I've heard about those UMC prepped Takoma kids.

Nice try at gaslighting. It's the Rockville and N Bethesda set that are highly prepped. Anyone with a kid in the magnet is well aware. I am the poster whose kid noticed all the kids with A++ binders of test prep for the magnet exam (back in the day). No local kid did that. But, local kids do have lots of enrichment. Mostly humanities experiences (music, theatre, writing,
video, etc) as well as academic parents (we have a lot of those in TP).

Just stop this line that anyone with a kid in the magnet is aware…. They are not. There are 125 kids in the magnet in each grade. No family can make broad statements about what all the other kids do. This is middle school and by middle school parents are less involved. Even the staff can’t make statements like the ones you are making with any accuracy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is so sad. Mathcounts is great and instead of just celebrating all the kids who participated, this thread is just using it to bash and complain. Kids, if you are reading, I think you’re all wonderful. Every mathlete is a champion because anyone who loves math enough to compete is already a winner. Super corny, but really true.

Mathcounts is great. Wouldn't it be nice if that extracurricular were available such that every interested MCPS student had access? Frost, for instance, could team with Banneker to bring in students via Zoom if the latter didn't have a staff sponsor.

Unfortunately I don't think it's the staff sponsor that is missing. But if you know anyone at a school who might be interested in participating or rallying me members for a team, please post here on DCUM or on https://artofproblemsolving.com/community/c307_maryland

[Anonymous]

The one thing I didn't like about TPMS is the parents like that PP who keeps making stupid illogical arguments about why the set asides should remain and at the same time continually putting down those "Potomac" kids when she really is really making poorly veiled racist digs She'll now claim she's not racist because we're not talking about URMs and she thinks it's okay to put down people of other races because in her mind she's not really doing that.

I don't really meet parents like you in CC, Potomac or Bethesda but for some reason they are all over the place in Takoma Park and Silver Spring.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The one thing I didn't like about TPMS is the parents like that PP who keeps making stupid illogical arguments about why the set asides should remain and at the same time continually putting down those "Potomac" kids when she really is really making poorly veiled racist digs She'll now claim she's not racist because we're not talking about URMs and she thinks it's okay to put down people of other races because in her mind she's not really doing that.

I don't really meet parents like you in CC, Potomac or Bethesda but for some reason they are all over the place in Takoma Park and Silver Spring.

I do live in Takoma park (not who you are replying to) and the topic of “enrichment” has never come up in any conversation I’ve ever had with any families here - whether it’s about their kid or other families from other parts of the county. Families do seem to talk about what sports their kids are playing or the amount of screen time their kids get (usually too much is the consensus). So please don’t take the tone of this conversation to mean anything more than that you are responding to a stranger on an anonymous website.