Are the non "W" schools really that bad?

[Anonymous]

I don't live in Montgomery County, so you can take my advice with a grain of salt. However, I have many co-workers and friends who do live in MoCo and I know many kids who attend schools there.

When you buy in MoCo you are paying a premium for the school district and proximity and commuting into DC. There is a larger premium in the W school zones, but you are still paying a premium over other parts of MD to live there. The non-W schools still have some good schools and your child will get a good education, but the non-W schools are not significantly better than other school districts where you are not paying the premium. So you can get equivalent or better education for your child outside of MoCo for less money.

If proximity to your in-laws is important for your family, then you live near them. But if you want a better bang for your buck, then you should consider good school zones in other counties because you getter a better bang for your buck. Not saying that your child won't get a good education in non-W schools, but it's not different enough from other MD counties to warrant the higher property costs of living in MoCo.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes

QO has about 40% FARMS
And 1/3 at RM which isn’t representative of the area since it’s IB.

I grew up in Moco and now live in Va and would not want to live in Gaithersburg or Rockville, and I would not send my kids to either of those high schools.

why not?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Only BCC. And they'd be fine if only they'd embrace their W-ness with open arms!

I never thought of B-CC as a W. And many area natives never did either.

In fact the school was put down by the Ws for many, many years. While B-CC is an academically strong, high performing, diverse, urban school, most will never see it as a W. And that’s a good thing.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Both my dcc kids went from CES -> TPMS magnet -> Blair SMCS and I feel this was much stronger education that what any W could provide and is an option for anyone who is serious about their education.

But it is a lottery. What if your name isn’t picked? Or are you saying it is better to avoid the pressure of Ws by living in DCC and pushing your child to guaranteed magnet admission all the way through.

HS is not a lottery and neither were CES or MS when my kids went through this.

If that's true then the program had changed a lot since then, and your experience isn't that relevant anymore.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

I am the PP and we are zoned for the DCC and plan to stay and send our child to publics. I hear you, but someone above (you?) said rather rudely (so I'm guessing it was you) "NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective." I don't know in what universe a school like Kennedy, where less than 10% of students were proficient in math and 40% are proficient in ELA, would not be considered "poorly performing". I think those kids deserve better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

I don't know in what universe a school like Kennedy, where less than 10% of students were proficient in math and 40% are proficient in ELA, would not be considered "poorly performing". I think those kids deserve better.

They really do. If only you could pick the family you're born into.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

I don't know in what universe a school like Kennedy, where less than 10% of students were proficient in math and 40% are proficient in ELA, would not be considered "poorly performing". I think those kids deserve better.

They really do. If only you could pick the family you're born into.

The question of who is at fault is complicated, but to say Kennedy is not poorly performing is preposterous. Maybe don't be so rude to people who are just stating facts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

I am the PP and we are zoned for the DCC and plan to stay and send our child to publics. I hear you, but someone above (you?) said rather rudely (so I'm guessing it was you) "NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective." I don't know in what universe a school like Kennedy, where less than 10% of students were proficient in math and 40% are proficient in ELA, would not be considered "poorly performing". I think those kids deserve better.

Yeah, that was me. Of course it's better if more kids are proficient than what the Kennedy stats indicate. But MCPS, as a whole, outperforms most comparable school districts in the country. We're not in Newton. The whole premise of this thread is whether non "W" schools are really that bad and the answer is clear: they're not. Lousy as Kennedy is in many ways, it still offers opportunities that most public high schools in large, diverse school districts in this country do not offer. So when you say "those kids deserve better," the places from which they deserve better are really outside of school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good morning OP. The answer to your question is NO. There are plenty of wonderful schools and communities outside of the W’s. There are plenty of engaged families whose kid are thriving and going on to be successful who go to schools outside of the W’s. There are plenty of highly capable teachers outside of the W’s.

The zones outside the W’s are more diverse both racially and socioeconomically. That’s it.

+1

Children of affluent educated people perform well and that's why the perception is that the W schools are the "best." OP, the fact is that your children will do as well at Richard Montgomery or Quince Orchard (or Blair or Einstein) as they would at Whitman or Wooton.

This is only partially true. When the majority of the student body performs at a lower level the teachers and administrators supports and expectations follow. The same is true when the majority of the student body is higher achieving. The PTA matters, too. I can not enumerate the extras provided by a strong PTA. Our W provides college prep seminars for both parents and students on a regular basis. Paid college advisors are clamoring to hold free sessions at our school because they understand that enough of our parents will follow up with paid services. You will not get that in the poorly perfor.ing schools. Furthermore, our strong parental presence keeps pressure on administrators to retain teachers who go above and beyond in the classroom.

Those who would have you believe it is as simple as what happens at home must be unaware of what they are missing.

Huh??
My non-W school has that and I'm pretty sure most, if not all MCPS school, provides that.

DP - exactly, because NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective.

Test scores look pretty bad to me

Lol - you don't understand how mean scores work, do you? Or that "test scores" on their own, especially when averaged, are a poor metric of school quality.

But please, keep telling me how my kids and I are the dumb ones.

You are not very persuasive. When less than 50% of kids are considered proficient in many schools that doesn't strike me as high performing.

You have no interest in changing your mind, which is fine. People are allowed to remain ignorant. Not everyone wants their kids in a 100% "high performing" environment, often with very good reasons.

I am the PP and we are zoned for the DCC and plan to stay and send our child to publics. I hear you, but someone above (you?) said rather rudely (so I'm guessing it was you) "NO high school in MCPS would be considered "poorly performing" in any reasonable definition of the term. It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that people don't understand that. That speaks volumes about their lack of perspective." I don't know in what universe a school like Kennedy, where less than 10% of students were proficient in math and 40% are proficient in ELA, would not be considered "poorly performing". I think those kids deserve better.

Yeah, that was me. Of course it's better if more kids are proficient than what the Kennedy stats indicate. But MCPS, as a whole, outperforms most comparable school districts in the country. We're not in Newton. The whole premise of this thread is whether non "W" schools are really that bad and the answer is clear: they're not. Lousy as Kennedy is in many ways, it still offers opportunities that most public high schools in large, diverse school districts in this country do not offer. So when you say "those kids deserve better," the places from which they deserve better are really outside of school.

It's comical, to the point of being pathetic, that you've refused to apologize for your rude comments after (barely) admitting you were wrong.

[Anonymous]

Btw there are plenty of examples of kids of color being failed by the school system itself (for example, being steered into ESL programs when they don't need them) and mountains of research on how teachers treat kids of color differently. So no, it's not just things "outside of school" that are to blame. Everyone should be concerned about MCPS low performing schools and gaslighting people by saying they don't exist is terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Btw there are plenty of examples of kids of color being failed by the school system itself (for example, being steered into ESL programs when they don't need them) and mountains of research on how teachers treat kids of color differently. So no, it's not just things "outside of school" that are to blame. Everyone should be concerned about MCPS low performing schools and gaslighting people by saying they don't exist is terrible.

? you seem to be blaming teachers for the low test scores of URM, when in fact, it's mostly the home life that is to blame. You can't seriously think that the low test scores for that group is mostly due to teacher bias.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:First of all, I understand that this is probably a hot button topic, but I need a bit of insight here.

My wife, my self, and our three year old daughter are planning on moving to Montgomery County sometime in 2025. We currently live on the west coast. She grew up going to MCPS and her parents still live in the area (which is why we're moving back). I lived in DC for a few years in the early 2010's, so I'm familiar with the area as a whole, but not as intimately familiar with the suburbs as my wife and her family are.

From my understanding, the "W" schools in MCPS are very high performing, and we'd love to move to an area zoned for a W school, but, they're pretty expensive and at the top of our price range. There are other houses outside the W schools that are more affordable, but when I brought up the idea of moving to one of these neighborhoods, my wife and IL's acted like it would be like sending our daughter to go to a school in a third world country. Is the gap between the W and non-W schools really that big? FWIW, the non-W schools we'd be looking at are Quince Orchard and Richard Montgomery.

The W's have fewer low-income students who are struggling. I wouldn't classify them as "high-performing". There are plenty of high-performing students at all MCPS schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Btw there are plenty of examples of kids of color being failed by the school system itself (for example, being steered into ESL programs when they don't need them) and mountains of research on how teachers treat kids of color differently. So no, it's not just things "outside of school" that are to blame. Everyone should be concerned about MCPS low performing schools and gaslighting people by saying they don't exist is terrible.

? you seem to be blaming teachers for the low test scores of URM, when in fact, it's mostly the home life that is to blame. You can't seriously think that the low test scores for that group is mostly due to teacher bias.

You're suggesting teacher bias plays no role at all. We don't know how much is due to each but there absolutely are educational disparities (and health, and housing, and everything else) by race independent of income. Racism is real, and we know MCPS isn't meeting these kids' needs. It's true that some of these needs may be difficult to meet, but that doesn't mean we should dismiss the low test scores as signs of "bad home life". Most of the Latino students at Kennedy aren't even EML. These are English speaking kids many of which were born here or grew up here most of their lives. We're failing them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Here's the thing, if you buy in a zone that's within your budget, you are going to be surrounded by people like you. There are plenty of perfectly normal, involved parents in schools across the county. They may not be able to afford the same things as the W school parents but neither can you if you stretch your budget just for the schools.

What the heck? How would you know what parents can afford at what school in what community? Ew. How arrogant of you.

You are misreading what I'm saying. OP said in the first post that a W school district is at the top of his range. I live in a cluster that most DCUMers wouldn't even consider living in and that gets bashed constantly. There is a thread right now bashing it. My point is, people always act like you have to live in a W school district to provide a good life for your child. And that's simply not true. Just because you can't afford a W school doesn't mean that your child is doomed to live in the ghetto. There are plenty of us who aren't willing to be house poor to live in a W school district and we are perfectly normal people who are still involved parents with happy kids.

I don't know why the other PP got so worked up. A shorter way of saying what you said is: "OP presumably thinks they are an involved parent who will make sure their kid gets good opportunities. If they pick a neighborhood they can afford, there will be other people who are also involved parents making sure their kids get good opportunities. You don't have to max out your budget to find other good parents."

Yes, thank you. You said that much more eloquently than I did.

I agree with this, I'm the poster who said that our ES isn't as vigorous as our friends' ES. There are plenty of kids in my kid's "cohort" and a lot of very nice families that go to our school. My concerns with the school are not about the kids that go there, my concerns are about the lack of vigorous instruction and curriculum at our ES. But I think my concerns are MCPS-wide, and ultimately my kid will be successful going through non-W schools. And we will be able to save for retirement, go on lots of cool vacations, and not be house poor.