Parents of current 7th graders - what do you think about the 6 regional magnets

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

When I listen to Taylor I get a very, very different impression than you. He seems like a snake oil salesman.

Haha, this snake oil salesman hit me right on spot! So accurate!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

When I listen to Taylor I get a very, very different impression than you. He seems like a snake oil salesman.

Marketing his vision is part of his job. It appears that he has thought through all the sharp, pointed questions on here and gave excellent answers. The primary issues left include:
(1) How is he ensuring that the principals and teachers are engaging elementary and middle parents and students to prepare for selecting the STEM programs they will be interested in by 2027?
(2) Given that more college graduates are doing jobs that don’t require degrees while employers are still scrambling for graduates, how will MCPS plan to match programs with corporate demand?

It would be nice to add additional pointed questions he hasn’t answered yet.

[Anonymous]

When I listen to Taylor I get a very, very different impression than you. He seems like a snake oil salesman.

Marketing his vision is part of his job. It appears that he has thought through all the sharp, pointed questions on here and gave excellent answers. The primary issues left include:
(1) How is he ensuring that the principals and teachers are engaging elementary and middle parents and students to prepare for selecting the STEM programs they will be interested in by 2027?
(2) Given that more college graduates are doing jobs that don’t require degrees while employers are still scrambling for graduates, how will MCPS plan to match programs with corporate demand?

It would be nice to add additional pointed questions he hasn’t answered yet.

This has to be Taylor posting himself. No adult should be this naive.

All one needs to realize how unprepared we are for what is coming is Taylor's answer to question who will teach new magnet classes. His response was (I am paraphrasing) that we are all set as current teachers have bunch of certificates and are ready to jump in. In reality, most current HS math teachers would have difficulties getting A in the Blair magnet let alone teaching it. Yeah, he really thought this through.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

Huh? They created one program and you call that "decades of experience" gmafb

It’s not just one program. MCPS has now expanded to 35 different programs over almost two decades, so they have the data to know what successful implementation does and does not look like.

As a member of the program analysis team, I can assure you that they do not have these data. They have not done the analysis to see what makes a successful program and what is missing from unsuccessful ones. They won't even label existing programs successful and unsuccessful. Your faith in MCPS is misplaced.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

Huh? They created one program and you call that "decades of experience" gmafb

It’s not just one program. MCPS has now expanded to 35 different programs over almost two decades, so they have the data to know what successful implementation does and does not look like.

As a member of the program analysis team, I can assure you that they do not have these data. They have not done the analysis to see what makes a successful program and what is missing from unsuccessful ones. They won't even label existing programs successful and unsuccessful. Your faith in MCPS is misplaced.

Because that pp is Dr. Taylor himself. He is an absolute narcissist in every sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I listen to Taylor I get a very, very different impression than you. He seems like a snake oil salesman.

Marketing his vision is part of his job. It appears that he has thought through all the sharp, pointed questions on here and gave excellent answers. The primary issues left include:
(1) How is he ensuring that the principals and teachers are engaging elementary and middle parents and students to prepare for selecting the STEM programs they will be interested in by 2027?
(2) Given that more college graduates are doing jobs that don’t require degrees while employers are still scrambling for graduates, how will MCPS plan to match programs with corporate demand?

It would be nice to add additional pointed questions he hasn’t answered yet.

This has to be Taylor posting himself. No adult should be this naive.

All one needs to realize how unprepared we are for what is coming is Taylor's answer to question who will teach new magnet classes. His response was (I am paraphrasing) that we are all set as current teachers have bunch of certificates and are ready to jump in. In reality, most current HS math teachers would have difficulties getting A in the Blair magnet let alone teaching it. Yeah, he really thought this through.

+1 the bolded sounds like MCPS speak for "we have dug a hole so deep we can't get out without admitting we are completely full of it and Thomas Taylor is a narcissist so that ain't happening, sorry kids who will be sent to terrible programs (don't worry the rich ones will hire tutors everyone else is sol)"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

When I listen to Taylor I get a very, very different impression than you. He seems like a snake oil salesman.

Marketing his vision is part of his job. It appears that he has thought through all the sharp, pointed questions on here and gave excellent answers. The primary issues left include:
(1) How is he ensuring that the principals and teachers are engaging elementary and middle parents and students to prepare for selecting the STEM programs they will be interested in by 2027?
(2) Given that more college graduates are doing jobs that don’t require degrees while employers are still scrambling for graduates, how will MCPS plan to match programs with corporate demand?

It would be nice to add additional pointed questions he hasn’t answered yet.

He has basically no good answers for any of the questions besides "Just trust us" and "We have lots of time to figure that out later.". What questions do you think he has actually answered? It would be much easier to list those since it is a much shorter list ..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm trying to understand the downsides of having a region without wealthy schools. I don't think families from wealthy schools are going to send their kids to a high FARMS school. We have seen this in the DCC where with school choice the demographics of the schools still match the home school area. We are zoned for Einstein and I would rather not be in a region with BCC or Whitman. It will just siphon off high performing kids who can do the commute and make it harder to offer advanced classes.

Another Einstein parent who agrees. Also, I don’t want my kid at Whitman or even BCC! I considered and rejected those environments when we bought a house, and I don’t think ant my STEM kid to have to choose between rigor and that kind of place.

I am also upset that they are screaming “equity” while, in our proposed region, putting academic programs in rich white schools and music/dance in the poorer Black and Brown schools.

+1 they are not approaching this from an equity lens. They are putting programs in based on what schools already have which will just exacerbate inequities.

Yep. They have explicitly admitted they have not designed the program distribution without considering the equity impacts. That's completely unforgivable in a school district like ours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm trying to understand the downsides of having a region without wealthy schools. I don't think families from wealthy schools are going to send their kids to a high FARMS school. We have seen this in the DCC where with school choice the demographics of the schools still match the home school area. We are zoned for Einstein and I would rather not be in a region with BCC or Whitman. It will just siphon off high performing kids who can do the commute and make it harder to offer advanced classes.

Another Einstein parent who agrees. Also, I don’t want my kid at Whitman or even BCC! I considered and rejected those environments when we bought a house, and I don’t think ant my STEM kid to have to choose between rigor and that kind of place.

I am also upset that they are screaming “equity” while, in our proposed region, putting academic programs in rich white schools and music/dance in the poorer Black and Brown schools.

Are the SMCS and CAP programs at Blair examples of academic programs at rich, white schools? Same with Biomedical at Einstein?

1. They are eliminating SMCS and CAP, so don’t use them to defend the new model.
2. As for Biomedical at Einstein. I will believe that when I see it IRL. It is actually called “health sciences,” and I fear it will be for people who want degrees like MA/LPN that take like nine months of training. We need more of them, but that’s not where my kid is aiming.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have an academically strong 7th grader and I support the new programs. Here’s why.

According to the October 3rd I Hate Politics podcast, when the popular SMCS programs began at Blair and Poolesville High Schools in the 1980s, the organizers had just 20 days to implement the program from scratch. The success of the program was attributed to focusing on gifted and talented testing. They accepted students as low as 54 percentile in academic performance and were still successful.

In contrast, MCPS has allocated two whole academic years, has historical information t guide them and has since shifted towards focusing instead on academic performance for criteria-based programs. I have no reason to believe that it isn’t possible to pull this off successfully.

Many parents and teachers point to MCPS in the past. However, I am confident in Taylor’s leadership so far. It is clear to me that he is listening and making intelligent, well thought-out choices for our district. He answered many of the questions asked here in the November 19th meeting with BOE.

I admit I haven't listened to the podcast, but Poolesville SMCS opened in 2006 with the support of the Blair program. And the Blair program opened in 1985, but the program initial development started with a survey presented in 1982 followed by a task force that built all the plans before opening 3 years later. So opening a single magnet at Blair was a three year process and now they are planning to open new programs in every high school over less than two years. Also, it's great that Blair focused on gifted testing, but the county no longer uses gifted testing in their criteria.

This +1. The pp that this post responded to must not listen to that podcast carefully, or intentionally trying to spread wrong perspectives. Rome is not built in one day, nor did these two SMCS programs.

I am “the pp that [the] post responded to”. I went back and re-listened to the podcast to see where the discrepancy might be.

According to Eileen, MCPS had a meeting in January 1985 to look at what program would bring students into the Blair High School because it was not yet associated with high academic achievement. According to Bob who was collaborating with Eileen, back then teachers had more planning time and so they both spent over a hundred hours in each other’s classrooms. They then had about 20 paid days over the summer right before implementing it at Blair.

Bob started the Poolesville SMCS program and was involved in SMCS from the very start in 1985. It just wasn’t clear from the podcast that the programs were deployed 13 years from each other - Blair SMCS in 1985 with both coordinators and Poolesville SMCS in 2006 with Bob as coordinator so thank you to the poster who provided that clarification.

When asked about the feasibility of what MCPS is doing right now, they mentioned:

(1) Teacher quality: Teacher planning time was a core component as it allowed teachers to observe each other’s classrooms to determine which teacher was engaging to students, excited about their craft and willing to speak up;

(2) Student Quality: MCPS should “recreate” the Gifted and Talented Office and continue using Algebra I as a criterion and use essays that are done in-person to help weed out which students are passionate abd which ones are only indicating an interest because of a parent;

(3) Program Continuity and Flexibility: The dynamics of the program depend on continuity with teachers guiding students through how to do a presentation and work as a team and MCPS should trust teachers to adapt the program to current events

(4) Program Outcome: The main objective was for students to get into the college of their choice and the program coordinator felt it was successful at that

It would be good to highlight the areas where MCPS has departed from this approach and find out why.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe that my point still stands that it did not take them long between deciding what programs to implement at Blair in January 1985 and full implementation from scratch at Blair by fall of 1985 and so I have have full faith and confidence that MCPS’ timeline is achievable.

Source: IHatePolitics.com

Is this supposed to be sarcastic? They are planning to implement dozens of programs at dozens of high schools.

Why can’t they?
(1) It only took less than a year to implement Blair SMCS from scratch
(2) Starting in 2006 with the implementation of Poolesville HS SMCS, MCPS has almost two decades of experience branching off new programs
(3) Dr. Taylor appears to have an excellent track record so far when it comes to listening, trying to engage with the community and responding to concerns

Can you specify the track record of Taylor's to which you refer? I am seeing a lot of chaos.

[Anonymous]

A tremendous amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth could be alleviated if Taylor was willing to do one simple thing - bring back differentiated classes in HS (and MS while he's at it).

There are truly gifted kids in MCPS, as well as kids with well-defined specialized interests. But the drama around magnets is amplified by the absurd decision to put every single kid regardless of ability or motivation into the same classes through 10th grade.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:What the title says -

Which high school is your kid zoned for and what do you think about the 6 regional magnets and the placement of the program your kid would be interested in?

WJ/Woodward, and my thoughts are: 🤢🤮 it's horrible

I think WJ/Woodward is getting a bad deal with respect to IB. They are now being assigned to the regional program at Kennedy even though RM and BCC would both be closer. Wasn't the whole point of the model to provide programming closer to home?

What the BOE didn't want to tell you is that they're trying to also balance FARMS and racial demographics with these new regions too. They just don't want to say that out loud in this anti-DEI climate we're in under Trump.

By switching QO from region 6 to region 5, they are clearly showing that they don’t GAF to FARM balance.

They care in some regions more than others. But there's a reason they're didn't group BCC, Walter Johnson and Woodward together and instead split them between different regions that have higher FARMS and minority populations.

They are counting on QO kids going to Watkins Mill for IB and WJ/Woodward kids going to Kennedy. I'm not convinced that will happen.

Yeah, they want everyone to stay home, and that is what will happen. Segregation re-enforced.

Exactly. It's not going to happen. My kid's friend's sibling got in to Watkins Mill and then decided to go to the home school because of the bad rep that school has in MCPS. Now the other thread about Magruder tells me even Magruder would not be worth it.

Watkins Mill was and still is the ghetto in MCPS and that IB program there doesn't look like an incentive at all to go there.

Gaithersburg may have a standing chance in Region 5, but even then it's going to be a watered down STEM magnet with so many local seats, so that may not work either. The reason Blair was successful is because of the high academic criteria.

+1 I would not send my kids to Walkins Mill special program during to the poor reputation. We are home zoned to Quince Orchard. Quince Orchard is just okay, but at least it is considered the best high school in terms of overall reputation now in region 5. So bad it seems like my academically strong kid won't even have a chance for other opportunities(other than going other region 5 high school programs) , probably we may just stay at our home school. I hope that Quince Orchard local school program is strong enough to make up something. He won't attend high school till after 4 years in 2030 fall, hope everythings will be more clear by then.

And mCPS will be perfectly happy with your decision to stay home because it means less transportation cost and then they can say the programs have low enrollment so are not needed.

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Anonymous wrote:I'm trying to understand the downsides of having a region without wealthy schools. I don't think families from wealthy schools are going to send their kids to a high FARMS school. We have seen this in the DCC where with school choice the demographics of the schools still match the home school area. We are zoned for Einstein and I would rather not be in a region with BCC or Whitman. It will just siphon off high performing kids who can do the commute and make it harder to offer advanced classes.

Another Einstein parent who agrees. Also, I don’t want my kid at Whitman or even BCC! I considered and rejected those environments when we bought a house, and I don’t think ant my STEM kid to have to choose between rigor and that kind of place.

I am also upset that they are screaming “equity” while, in our proposed region, putting academic programs in rich white schools and music/dance in the poorer Black and Brown schools.

+1 they are not approaching this from an equity lens. They are putting programs in based on what schools already have which will just exacerbate inequities.

Yep. They have explicitly admitted they have not designed the program distribution without considering the equity impacts. That's completely unforgivable in a school district like ours.

It's horrible I agree, and they have been like this for a very long time.

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Anonymous wrote:Are all regional program names fake magnets , except humanities, stem and computer science these main ones?

Be careful. MCPS is using the names of established magnets and applying the same name to the new programs, but in actuality, the new programs are NOT the same as the current programs.

No program specifics were provided in the mailer, so middle school families don't have official visibility into this. The mailer claims only that new programs are coming, and they are going to be accessible and convenient while also providing exceptional local high schools.

Sounds too good to be true, given its history. MCPS likes to market, but can't deliver the goods.

Not SMCS...they changed the name to STEM highlighting that no one should think they are the same.

No they didn’t. They places SMCS under the STEM theme.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I'm trying to understand the downsides of having a region without wealthy schools. I don't think families from wealthy schools are going to send their kids to a high FARMS school. We have seen this in the DCC where with school choice the demographics of the schools still match the home school area. We are zoned for Einstein and I would rather not be in a region with BCC or Whitman. It will just siphon off high performing kids who can do the commute and make it harder to offer advanced classes.

Another Einstein parent who agrees. Also, I don’t want my kid at Whitman or even BCC! I considered and rejected those environments when we bought a house, and I don’t think ant my STEM kid to have to choose between rigor and that kind of place.

I am also upset that they are screaming “equity” while, in our proposed region, putting academic programs in rich white schools and music/dance in the poorer Black and Brown schools.

Are the SMCS and CAP programs at Blair examples of academic programs at rich, white schools? Same with Biomedical at Einstein?

1. They are eliminating SMCS and CAP, so don’t use them to defend the new model.
2. As for Biomedical at Einstein. I will believe that when I see it IRL. It is actually called “health sciences,” and I fear it will be for people who want degrees like MA/LPN that take like nine months of training. We need more of them, but that’s not where my kid is aiming.

The course list for the biomedical program includes "HL" physics and biology (high-level IB). I do think they want it to be rigorous and something that can lead to a lot of careers. If you want to do a PhD in a biomedical field you need get lab experience in college and having this certification could give kids an edge for those jobs. However I don't think many if any kids from BCC or Whitman or even Blair will commute for this since they can get what they need at their home schools without a commute.it won't attract many kids and I fear it will therefore not be supported.