MCPS percentiles based on current school and not county or home school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"My child's national verbal percentile was 97% and MCPS percentile was 78%. That seems like a large swing. The difference in quantitative was smaller - 99% national and 92% MCPS. The nonverbal was overall lower but also a large spread 79% and 49%

So yes, it can be a big change between national and MCPS percentiles."

Wow, that IS a big spread! Your child is in the top 3% nationally for verbal - and isn't even the top 20% in MoCo.. Really eye-opening.
I wish MCPS did the same last year for CES admissions other than just sending around rejections in the letter that also stated 99% test scores in all categories; it could have saved us a lot of frustration if we knew how our child performed in comparison to other MoCo applicants.

CES test was an abbreviated CoGAT and not as in-depth as the middle school magnets

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"My child's national verbal percentile was 97% and MCPS percentile was 78%. That seems like a large swing. The difference in quantitative was smaller - 99% national and 92% MCPS. The nonverbal was overall lower but also a large spread 79% and 49%

So yes, it can be a big change between national and MCPS percentiles."

Wow, that IS a big spread! Your child is in the top 3% nationally for verbal - and isn't even the top 20% in MoCo.. Really eye-opening.
I wish MCPS did the same last year for CES admissions other than just sending around rejections in the letter that also stated 99% test scores in all categories; it could have saved us a lot of frustration if we knew how our child performed in comparison to other MoCo applicants.

That's not what MCPS percentile means, though I think they choose that misleading label on purpose to cause us to think like you outline.

It's really a "special calculation" percentile. All the rest of this thread explains it. The actual difference between a 99% national CoGat and MoCo CoGAT is never revealed. Partly because all MCPS students don't take the CoGAT in 5th.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check out Table B4 for TPMS
2016, 2017,2018 numbers of invited students

White/37/48/53
Asian/67/53/43
Hispanic/<10/15/12

You decide whether "MCPS needs to explain to the AA and Hispanic communities why white students benefited the most from the reform."

In my experience, white families tend to trust the schools and teachers and are terrified of getting labeled pushy. So if their child complains that school is slow, they just think, “Oh, well, school isn’t fun for anyone.” They see kids of academically focused parents go to the magnets and the soccer field conversation is about how they are these horrible pressure cookers with outrageous homework and how they would never do that and deny their children the fun of childhood. They place emphasis on sports and community. They are used to the system working for them and don’t have any reason to question if it is working for their child. This is in general, of course. But I see it all the time. The global application process is identifying many more white children because the kids are from relatively high SES, have all of those advantages, and are as a result performing well in school... but their parents didn’t apply before. But once they are accepted, the parents sometimes have a change of heart, go to the open house, and decide to try it. I really think that is a big reason why the accepted white population has soared under the new system.

+1 I think I shared this in another of our many threads on the magnets, but I'm a highly educated professional, able to give my kids a lot of enrichment and support, and would likely not have applied under the previous system. Because I'm acutely aware of the ways in which my child might *appear* gifted but really just be lucky enough to have a stable home life, high quality preK, and ongoing enrichment, I would not have assumed my child was "HGC material."

It was only after the InView tests in 2nd that I started to consider it, and then we were in a pilot zone for the elementary level magnet roll out last year.

At any rate, what PP says here rings true for me based on my own experience as a parent, at least with the HGC/CES program.

Right. So I will say that I think this isn’t an anti-asian american thing so much as a way of identifying more kids from the entire population. And since Asian Americans were statistically more likely to apply than other groups when applications were primarily parent-driven, it would make sense that they are a lower percentage of accepted students in the new system. So maybe see this not as set up against one group so much as trying to include all groups.

If this is true, there is no need of the cohort criterion, the best students will get in anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"My child's national verbal percentile was 97% and MCPS percentile was 78%. That seems like a large swing. The difference in quantitative was smaller - 99% national and 92% MCPS. The nonverbal was overall lower but also a large spread 79% and 49%

So yes, it can be a big change between national and MCPS percentiles."

Wow, that IS a big spread! Your child is in the top 3% nationally for verbal - and isn't even the top 20% in MoCo.. Really eye-opening.
I wish MCPS did the same last year for CES admissions other than just sending around rejections in the letter that also stated 99% test scores in all categories; it could have saved us a lot of frustration if we knew how our child performed in comparison to other MoCo applicants.

That's not what MCPS percentile means, though I think they choose that misleading label on purpose to cause us to think like you outline.

It's really a "special calculation" percentile. All the rest of this thread explains it. The actual difference between a 99% national CoGat and MoCo CoGAT is never revealed. Partly because all MCPS students don't take the CoGAT in 5th.

Right. It seems like the MCPS % means that the child was in the 78th percentile of all MCPS students within the same poverty "band" who were selected to take the test for consideration for magnet programs. So it not only includes only your school's SES "band" but it also does not include your performance relative to students who were not selected to take the test to be considered for the magnets (well, it includes like 377 of them whose parents overrode the MCPS recommendation and had them take the test). But it is a measure of how your student compares within a relatively high performing MCPS cohort, which would give a read on whether your child is an "outlier" within the SES band or not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check out Table B4 for TPMS
2016, 2017,2018 numbers of invited students

White/37/48/53
Asian/67/53/43
Hispanic/<10/15/12

You decide whether "MCPS needs to explain to the AA and Hispanic communities why white students benefited the most from the reform."

In my experience, white families tend to trust the schools and teachers and are terrified of getting labeled pushy. So if their child complains that school is slow, they just think, “Oh, well, school isn’t fun for anyone.” They see kids of academically focused parents go to the magnets and the soccer field conversation is about how they are these horrible pressure cookers with outrageous homework and how they would never do that and deny their children the fun of childhood. They place emphasis on sports and community. They are used to the system working for them and don’t have any reason to question if it is working for their child. This is in general, of course. But I see it all the time. The global application process is identifying many more white children because the kids are from relatively high SES, have all of those advantages, and are as a result performing well in school... but their parents didn’t apply before. But once they are accepted, the parents sometimes have a change of heart, go to the open house, and decide to try it. I really think that is a big reason why the accepted white population has soared under the new system.

+1 I think I shared this in another of our many threads on the magnets, but I'm a highly educated professional, able to give my kids a lot of enrichment and support, and would likely not have applied under the previous system. Because I'm acutely aware of the ways in which my child might *appear* gifted but really just be lucky enough to have a stable home life, high quality preK, and ongoing enrichment, I would not have assumed my child was "HGC material."

It was only after the InView tests in 2nd that I started to consider it, and then we were in a pilot zone for the elementary level magnet roll out last year.

At any rate, what PP says here rings true for me based on my own experience as a parent, at least with the HGC/CES program.

Right. So I will say that I think this isn’t an anti-asian american thing so much as a way of identifying more kids from the entire population. And since Asian Americans were statistically more likely to apply than other groups when applications were primarily parent-driven, it would make sense that they are a lower percentage of accepted students in the new system. So maybe see this not as set up against one group so much as trying to include all groups.

If this is true, there is no need of the cohort criterion, the best students will get in anyway.

Lemme ask you, if your qualified child did not get into a magnet and was heading to a middle school without any of the enriched classes AT ALL because of lack of cohort, how would you feel then? If you knew other equally qualified kids going to the magnet had a powerful cohort and 2 enriched classes at their home middle school, would you think that was fair to your child or the best way to run a limited placement system?

[Anonymous]

I wonder if the 25 TPMS magnet spots are causing the problem with so many more white kids getting in with lower scores? This has been around forever and those kids (who are mostly UMC white) were always at the bottom of the magnet class. It really seems like a big oversight that these seats were not removed and ESs that feed into TPMS treated with the same formulas as the rest of the county.

What is truly bizarre is that now you have the majority of highest outliers at the county level back in the W home schools with just the enriched curriculum while you have the lesser academic students and a few outliers in the magnet with the more rigorous curriculum. Unless your plan is to replace the entire magnet and enriched curriculum in the future and do away with county wide magnet bussing. this is really inverted with very small gains for any AA or hispanic students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check out Table B4 for TPMS
2016, 2017,2018 numbers of invited students

White/37/48/53
Asian/67/53/43
Hispanic/<10/15/12

You decide whether "MCPS needs to explain to the AA and Hispanic communities why white students benefited the most from the reform."

In my experience, white families tend to trust the schools and teachers and are terrified of getting labeled pushy. So if their child complains that school is slow, they just think, “Oh, well, school isn’t fun for anyone.” They see kids of academically focused parents go to the magnets and the soccer field conversation is about how they are these horrible pressure cookers with outrageous homework and how they would never do that and deny their children the fun of childhood. They place emphasis on sports and community. They are used to the system working for them and don’t have any reason to question if it is working for their child. This is in general, of course. But I see it all the time. The global application process is identifying many more white children because the kids are from relatively high SES, have all of those advantages, and are as a result performing well in school... but their parents didn’t apply before. But once they are accepted, the parents sometimes have a change of heart, go to the open house, and decide to try it. I really think that is a big reason why the accepted white population has soared under the new system.

+1 I think I shared this in another of our many threads on the magnets, but I'm a highly educated professional, able to give my kids a lot of enrichment and support, and would likely not have applied under the previous system. Because I'm acutely aware of the ways in which my child might *appear* gifted but really just be lucky enough to have a stable home life, high quality preK, and ongoing enrichment, I would not have assumed my child was "HGC material."

It was only after the InView tests in 2nd that I started to consider it, and then we were in a pilot zone for the elementary level magnet roll out last year.

At any rate, what PP says here rings true for me based on my own experience as a parent, at least with the HGC/CES program.

Right. So I will say that I think this isn’t an anti-asian american thing so much as a way of identifying more kids from the entire population. And since Asian Americans were statistically more likely to apply than other groups when applications were primarily parent-driven, it would make sense that they are a lower percentage of accepted students in the new system. So maybe see this not as set up against one group so much as trying to include all groups.

If this is true, there is no need of the cohort criterion, the best students will get in anyway.

Lemme ask you, if your qualified child did not get into a magnet and was heading to a middle school without any of the enriched classes AT ALL because of lack of cohort, how would you feel then? If you knew other equally qualified kids going to the magnet had a powerful cohort and 2 enriched classes at their home middle school, would you think that was fair to your child or the best way to run a limited placement system?

They should allow COSAs if there isn’t a cohort at home school- most schools do have a cohort.

[Anonymous]

Lemme ask you, if your qualified child did not get into a magnet and was heading to a middle school without any of the enriched classes AT ALL because of lack of cohort, how would you feel then? If you knew other equally qualified kids going to the magnet had a powerful cohort and 2 enriched classes at their home middle school, would you think that was fair to your child or the best way to run a limited placement system?

The problem is with your term equal. If the white kid in the high performing school scores higher than the white kid in the low performing school, yet the lower scoring white kid gets in then that is not equal. I realize that there is venom among people in the east that W school kids come into their schools for the magnets. I realize that there is intense jealousy that they did not choose to live in a W cluster but that is no reason to create an unequal admission system favoring less academically inclined students in the east because their parents are jealous and crazy.

One of the reasons that the W schools are so strong is that they attract parents who prioritize education and academics. The area is its own "magnet" for smart people. By lowering the standards for white kids in the east to get into the magnets, you are only strengthening the W schools that you hate so much and lowering the quality of the magnet near you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check out Table B4 for TPMS
2016, 2017,2018 numbers of invited students

White/37/48/53
Asian/67/53/43
Hispanic/<10/15/12

You decide whether "MCPS needs to explain to the AA and Hispanic communities why white students benefited the most from the reform."

In my experience, white families tend to trust the schools and teachers and are terrified of getting labeled pushy. So if their child complains that school is slow, they just think, “Oh, well, school isn’t fun for anyone.” They see kids of academically focused parents go to the magnets and the soccer field conversation is about how they are these horrible pressure cookers with outrageous homework and how they would never do that and deny their children the fun of childhood. They place emphasis on sports and community. They are used to the system working for them and don’t have any reason to question if it is working for their child. This is in general, of course. But I see it all the time. The global application process is identifying many more white children because the kids are from relatively high SES, have all of those advantages, and are as a result performing well in school... but their parents didn’t apply before. But once they are accepted, the parents sometimes have a change of heart, go to the open house, and decide to try it. I really think that is a big reason why the accepted white population has soared under the new system.

+1 I think I shared this in another of our many threads on the magnets, but I'm a highly educated professional, able to give my kids a lot of enrichment and support, and would likely not have applied under the previous system. Because I'm acutely aware of the ways in which my child might *appear* gifted but really just be lucky enough to have a stable home life, high quality preK, and ongoing enrichment, I would not have assumed my child was "HGC material."

It was only after the InView tests in 2nd that I started to consider it, and then we were in a pilot zone for the elementary level magnet roll out last year.

At any rate, what PP says here rings true for me based on my own experience as a parent, at least with the HGC/CES program.

Right. So I will say that I think this isn’t an anti-asian american thing so much as a way of identifying more kids from the entire population. And since Asian Americans were statistically more likely to apply than other groups when applications were primarily parent-driven, it would make sense that they are a lower percentage of accepted students in the new system. So maybe see this not as set up against one group so much as trying to include all groups.

If this is true, there is no need of the cohort criterion, the best students will get in anyway.

Lemme ask you, if your qualified child did not get into a magnet and was heading to a middle school without any of the enriched classes AT ALL because of lack of cohort, how would you feel then? If you knew other equally qualified kids going to the magnet had a powerful cohort and 2 enriched classes at their home middle school, would you think that was fair to your child or the best way to run a limited placement system?

That was a response to previous pp who suggested with the universal screening and removal of parent application, the Asian number will naturally go down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Lemme ask you, if your qualified child did not get into a magnet and was heading to a middle school without any of the enriched classes AT ALL because of lack of cohort, how would you feel then? If you knew other equally qualified kids going to the magnet had a powerful cohort and 2 enriched classes at their home middle school, would you think that was fair to your child or the best way to run a limited placement system?

Hey, this happened to my kid! We were sad. Then we moved on. Kid is now in high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The problem is with your term equal. If the white kid in the high performing school scores higher than the white kid in the low performing school, yet the lower scoring white kid gets in then that is not equal. I realize that there is venom among people in the east that W school kids come into their schools for the magnets. I realize that there is intense jealousy that they did not choose to live in a W cluster but that is no reason to create an unequal admission system favoring less academically inclined students in the east because their parents are jealous and crazy.

One of the reasons that the W schools are so strong is that they attract parents who prioritize education and academics. The area is its own "magnet" for smart people. By lowering the standards for white kids in the east to get into the magnets, you are only strengthening the W schools that you hate so much and lowering the quality of the magnet near you.

This is true, if by "prioritize education and academics", you mean "have money".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:


The problem is with your term equal. If the white kid in the high performing school scores higher than the white kid in the low performing school, yet the lower scoring white kid gets in then that is not equal. I realize that there is venom among people in the east that W school kids come into their schools for the magnets. I realize that there is intense jealousy that they did not choose to live in a W cluster but that is no reason to create an unequal admission system favoring less academically inclined students in the east because their parents are jealous and crazy.

One of the reasons that the W schools are so strong is that they attract parents who prioritize education and academics. The area is its own "magnet" for smart people. By lowering the standards for white kids in the east to get into the magnets, you are only strengthening the W schools that you hate so much and lowering the quality of the magnet near you.

This is true, if by "prioritize education and academics", you mean "have money".

Nope not at all. I mean prioritizing education and academics. There are plenty of people in low performing school clusters who could afford a condo or TH in a W cluster but they chose to have a bigger house. They prioritized materialism over education, Fine choice but own it.

It doesn't take money to prioritize reading over video games in fact its cheaper to go to the library.

Honestly, tutors and prep centers aren't actually widely used in the W schools. However, if you believe that is the only way a child will succeed then there are plenty of parents in lower performing schools that could choose to do one of these rather than go on vacation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Nope not at all. I mean prioritizing education and academics. There are plenty of people in low performing school clusters who could afford a condo or TH in a W cluster but they chose to have a bigger house. They prioritized materialism over education, Fine choice but own it.

It doesn't take money to prioritize reading over video games in fact its cheaper to go to the library.

Honestly, tutors and prep centers aren't actually widely used in the W schools. However, if you believe that is the only way a child will succeed then there are plenty of parents in lower performing schools that could choose to do one of these rather than go on vacation.

You don't say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


The problem is with your term equal. If the white kid in the high performing school scores higher than the white kid in the low performing school, yet the lower scoring white kid gets in then that is not equal. I realize that there is venom among people in the east that W school kids come into their schools for the magnets. I realize that there is intense jealousy that they did not choose to live in a W cluster but that is no reason to create an unequal admission system favoring less academically inclined students in the east because their parents are jealous and crazy.

One of the reasons that the W schools are so strong is that they attract parents who prioritize education and academics. The area is its own "magnet" for smart people. By lowering the standards for white kids in the east to get into the magnets, you are only strengthening the W schools that you hate so much and lowering the quality of the magnet near you.

This is true, if by "prioritize education and academics", you mean "have money".

Nope not at all. I mean prioritizing education and academics. There are plenty of people in low performing school clusters who could afford a condo or TH in a W cluster but they chose to have a bigger house. They prioritized materialism over education, Fine choice but own it.

It doesn't take money to prioritize reading over video games in fact its cheaper to go to the library.

Honestly, tutors and prep centers aren't actually widely used in the W schools. However, if you believe that is the only way a child will succeed then there are plenty of parents in lower performing schools that could choose to do one of these rather than go on vacation.

My God, if it weren’t for DCUM I would never have known there were people like you who thought this way. So you actually think that parents who live in Silver Spring are materialistic showoffs who just want bigger houses? (Where are these bigger houses in Silver Spring anyway?) You think you prioritized education and we didn’t?! You, naively, prioritized Great Schools scores, which are a 100% proxy for how few low-income kids are in your schools. So what you prioritized is white kids. Period. Meanwhile, we have much smaller class sizes, and our children grow up learning that the world is bigger than white suburbs. Plus we have magnets on our side of town. Plus, my kids’ colleges are fully funded wherever they want to go. Cut it with your ludicrous presumptions.

[Anonymous]

My God, if it weren’t for DCUM I would never have known there were people like you who thought this way. So you actually think that parents who live in Silver Spring are materialistic showoffs who just want bigger houses? (Where are these bigger houses in Silver Spring anyway?) You think you prioritized education and we didn’t?! You, naively, prioritized Great Schools scores, which are a 100% proxy for how few low-income kids are in your schools. So what you prioritized is white kids. Period. Meanwhile, we have much smaller class sizes, and our children grow up learning that the world is bigger than white suburbs. Plus we have magnets on our side of town. Plus, my kids’ colleges are fully funded wherever they want to go. Cut it with your ludicrous presumptions.

Yep pretty much and plenty of Silver Spring posters inadvertently admit to it all the time on different threads. You could afford to rent, buy a condo, or buy a TH in one of the W clusters but you wanted a SFH and your own yard more than the best schools. There's even a saying -you want the Silver Spring discount without the price of Silver Spring. Your claims for wanting diversity are really blown apart by all the cries about what to do if your kid doesn't get into a magnet and is sent back into the general population. Silver Spring parents spend all their energy trying to make sure their snowflakes don't have to mix too much with the rest of the school. Its actually disturbing how much this is a focus over there.

BTW- the magnets aren't yours, they are supposed to be for the county. I'm all for admitting FARMs AA and hispanic students that have potential but didn't score as well but rewarding the white UMC/MC hypocritical bargain hunters is ridiculous and just waters down the magnet.