Kids who bombed the SAT - getting good college results

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok, can someone please explain how this makes any sense?

I know plenty of kids in this admissions cycle who have low (think, 1100) SATs but have high GPAs (4.0 range) from big public schools that grade inflate. These kids are going test optional and are getting into colleges that would normally be out of reach when SATs were required. This year, they get to hide their low SAT from the colleges.

On the other hand, I know plenty of kids at private schools that grade-deflate but who have strong grades (taking that grade deflation into account, say 3.8) and sky high SATs who are being deferred and rejected from safeties. In the past, the high SATs balanced out the grade deflation, but this year it seems meaningless because schools are filling spots with kids who didn't show an SAT.

This system is a joke but it is also very damaging. There under qualified kids who are making tic toc videos mocking the system. On the other hand, you have high achieving students who've worked their a$# off and who are getting shut out. Makes no sense.

The bottom line is that what you have written above is mere conjecture. You think public school kids don’t work as hard as private school kids. You think public school kids are less qualified than private school kids. Are you really as ignorant as you are coming off? Come on! Do better! Any public school kids who get in deserve to get in. It sounds like you are a bit salty that you thought your kid had an advantage going to an expensive private school that most people can’t afford and now you feel you were burned. All your post reflects is sour grapes.

I am certain that some public school kids work just as hard if not harder than some private school kids. BUT many public school kids can re-take tests throughout their high school years where private school kids can not. Forget about grade inflation or deflation. Re-taking tests has been around in the publics for years and it absolutely gives public school students an advantage in acquiring good grades.

[Anonymous]

^ my PS kids were never given an option to retake tests they did not do well on. Ever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok, can someone please explain how this makes any sense?

I know plenty of kids in this admissions cycle who have low (think, 1100) SATs but have high GPAs (4.0 range) from big public schools that grade inflate. These kids are going test optional and are getting into colleges that would normally be out of reach when SATs were required. This year, they get to hide their low SAT from the colleges.

On the other hand, I know plenty of kids at private schools that grade-deflate but who have strong grades (taking that grade deflation into account, say 3.8) and sky high SATs who are being deferred and rejected from safeties. In the past, the high SATs balanced out the grade deflation, but this year it seems meaningless because schools are filling spots with kids who didn't show an SAT.

This system is a joke but it is also very damaging. There under qualified kids who are making tic toc videos mocking the system. On the other hand, you have high achieving students who've worked their a$# off and who are getting shut out. Makes no sense.

The bottom line is that what you have written above is mere conjecture. You think public school kids don’t work as hard as private school kids. You think public school kids are less qualified than private school kids. Are you really as ignorant as you are coming off? Come on! Do better! Any public school kids who get in deserve to get in. It sounds like you are a bit salty that you thought your kid had an advantage going to an expensive private school that most people can’t afford and now you feel you were burned. All your post reflects is sour grapes.

I am certain that some public school kids work just as hard if not harder than some private school kids. BUT many public school kids can re-take tests throughout their high school years where private school kids can not. Forget about grade inflation or deflation. Re-taking tests has been around in the publics for years and it absolutely gives public school students an advantage in acquiring good grades.

Oh, I didn’t know attending private school precluded one from taking more to an one SAT. Is a private school child able to access test prep tutoring?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

In MCPS you get a full point bump for AP and honors, and honors is basically on-level. I'd say 30-40% of the kids had a 4.4 or above GPA.

And the colleges are well aware of the grading scales so what’s your point? As pps have pointed out, colleges are not comparing private school kids to public school kids. But if it makes you feel better to think that’s why your kids are not getting in, have at it.

This has been said multiple times in this thread and in others. Is there any evidence that this is the case? Do colleges really separate them into two completely separate piles that each have their own number of admits and never compare them against each other? That doesn't make any sense to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

In MCPS you get a full point bump for AP and honors, and honors is basically on-level. I'd say 30-40% of the kids had a 4.4 or above GPA.

And the colleges are well aware of the grading scales so what’s your point? As pps have pointed out, colleges are not comparing private school kids to public school kids. But if it makes you feel better to think that’s why your kids are not getting in, have at it.

This has been said multiple times in this thread and in others. Is there any evidence that this is the case? Do colleges really separate them into two completely separate piles that each have their own number of admits and never compare them against each other? That doesn't make any sense to me.

Of course they are technically comparing them, but yes, they do have regional reps who know each school. They know a 3.0 at Potomac is comparable to a 4.0 or even higher at Langley. They have different course levels, different grading scales. And fortunately, most schools know this. Some do not--or at least don't take the time to evaluate on that basis, which does leave the private kids at a disadvantage. Examples of those are typically the popular state flagships: Wisconsin, Penn State, Georgia, Auburn, UMD. Some do have closer reps and know how to evaluate private against public: UVA, Michigan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

In MCPS you get a full point bump for AP and honors, and honors is basically on-level. I'd say 30-40% of the kids had a 4.4 or above GPA.

And the colleges are well aware of the grading scales so what’s your point? As pps have pointed out, colleges are not comparing private school kids to public school kids. But if it makes you feel better to think that’s why your kids are not getting in, have at it.

This has been said multiple times in this thread and in others. Is there any evidence that this is the case? Do colleges really separate them into two completely separate piles that each have their own number of admits and never compare them against each other? That doesn't make any sense to me.

Of course they are technically comparing them, but yes, they do have regional reps who know each school. They know a 3.0 at Potomac is comparable to a 4.0 or even higher at Langley. They have different course levels, different grading scales. And fortunately, most schools know this. Some do not--or at least don't take the time to evaluate on that basis, which does leave the private kids at a disadvantage. Examples of those are typically the popular state flagships: Wisconsin, Penn State, Georgia, Auburn, UMD. Some do have closer reps and know how to evaluate private against public: UVA, Michigan.

Could you talk more about the school reps getting/having context of rigor of private schools? DC is at one of the area privates that recently eliminated APs.. I wish that I had understood a lot of things better a few years ago but am trying to figure out how to navigate moving forward, especially for colleges that are outside of our region.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hate the game? Definitely.

The problem is that very few kids can get great grades at some very competitive schools without cheating. I got sick of my DC getting crap grades during distance learning and moved DC into my home office so I could monitor them during the school day. I was appalled at all the cheating that is going on. It's actually so normalized that I don't think they even understand that they're out of line. It's different from when I was the smart kid in HS that everyone else cheated off of. Now, it's that they all exchange work with each other, even the smart kids. Granted, DC is at a super competitive HS so it's a different pool of kids than those I went to school with. But, if anything, this seems far worse ethically because these are the "top" kids who are cheating in order to achieve and maintain a high GPA. When I let kids cheat off my homework or exams 30 years ago, all that happened was the kid managed to pass and not flunk out of high school. Nobody was worried about how those kids' GPAs might nudge them out of the top 10% of the class or give them a leg up for college admissions.

At one point in HS my kid was caught cheating on an assignment. We had to go in and meet with the teacher and punish our kid. But what was most upsetting was that when I spoke with DC about why they felt cheating had been necessary, their answer made total sense to me. There is no way that a kid who isn't a genius can keep up with the workload at a school like theirs. These are kids that are eventually passing the AP exams with 4s and 5s, so they aren't dumb. They know the material. But the sheer volume of work is unrealistic and is essentially an invitation to cheat. When the top kids in the class are "sharing" work with one another, everyone else has to do this in order to not fall too far behind and still sleep for at least 6-7 hours a night. It's a huge problem that's entirely created by stupid adults setting "higher" standards. My sibling is a high school teacher in Texas where one's class rank now determines whether you get to go to UT Austin and become a Longhorn. It's become a cat and mouse game with the top kids all devising new tricks to raise their GPA by 0.05 over that of their classmate.

This is one of the problems with reducing a student down to a single letter grade for each subject. We get what we measure in life. If we measure by letter grades, kids are going to chase the letter grade by whatever means. It’s time to rethink that system to have one that incentives learning, rather than grade grubbing. Universities were around for >1000 years without them. Socrates did not give Plato letter grades. They came into vogue about 100 years ago as a way to lessen the burden on teachers, and not as a pedagogical tool to benefit students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hate the game? Definitely.

The problem is that very few kids can get great grades at some very competitive schools without cheating. I got sick of my DC getting crap grades during distance learning and moved DC into my home office so I could monitor them during the school day. I was appalled at all the cheating that is going on. It's actually so normalized that I don't think they even understand that they're out of line. It's different from when I was the smart kid in HS that everyone else cheated off of. Now, it's that they all exchange work with each other, even the smart kids. Granted, DC is at a super competitive HS so it's a different pool of kids than those I went to school with. But, if anything, this seems far worse ethically because these are the "top" kids who are cheating in order to achieve and maintain a high GPA. When I let kids cheat off my homework or exams 30 years ago, all that happened was the kid managed to pass and not flunk out of high school. Nobody was worried about how those kids' GPAs might nudge them out of the top 10% of the class or give them a leg up for college admissions.

At one point in HS my kid was caught cheating on an assignment. We had to go in and meet with the teacher and punish our kid. But what was most upsetting was that when I spoke with DC about why they felt cheating had been necessary, their answer made total sense to me. There is no way that a kid who isn't a genius can keep up with the workload at a school like theirs. These are kids that are eventually passing the AP exams with 4s and 5s, so they aren't dumb. They know the material. But the sheer volume of work is unrealistic and is essentially an invitation to cheat. When the top kids in the class are "sharing" work with one another, everyone else has to do this in order to not fall too far behind and still sleep for at least 6-7 hours a night. It's a huge problem that's entirely created by stupid adults setting "higher" standards. My sibling is a high school teacher in Texas where one's class rank now determines whether you get to go to UT Austin and become a Longhorn. It's become a cat and mouse game with the top kids all devising new tricks to raise their GPA by 0.05 over that of their classmate.

This is one of the problems with reducing a student down to a single letter grade for each subject. We get what we measure in life. If we measure by letter grades, kids are going to chase the letter grade by whatever means. It’s time to rethink that system to have one that incentives learning, rather than grade grubbing. Universities were around for >1000 years without them. Socrates did not give Plato letter grades. They came into vogue about 100 years ago as a way to lessen the burden on teachers, and not as a pedagogical tool to benefit students.

Agree. With one already in college....another issue with letter grades is that they can discourage students from tackling difficult challenging courses because if the concern that a poor grade will drag down gpa. How do we incentivize and reward learning over chasing grades?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

In MCPS you get a full point bump for AP and honors, and honors is basically on-level. I'd say 30-40% of the kids had a 4.4 or above GPA.

And the colleges are well aware of the grading scales so what’s your point? As pps have pointed out, colleges are not comparing private school kids to public school kids. But if it makes you feel better to think that’s why your kids are not getting in, have at it.

This has been said multiple times in this thread and in others. Is there any evidence that this is the case? Do colleges really separate them into two completely separate piles that each have their own number of admits and never compare them against each other? That doesn't make any sense to me.

I have long wondered this too. All the Ivies and top SLACs have far higher percentages (from 20-50%) of privates school kids matriculating when only 2% of all students in US go to private schools. If it’s true that there are two separate piles for applicants - private and public - that wouldn’t seem to be true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hate the game? Definitely.

The problem is that very few kids can get great grades at some very competitive schools without cheating. I got sick of my DC getting crap grades during distance learning and moved DC into my home office so I could monitor them during the school day. I was appalled at all the cheating that is going on. It's actually so normalized that I don't think they even understand that they're out of line. It's different from when I was the smart kid in HS that everyone else cheated off of. Now, it's that they all exchange work with each other, even the smart kids. Granted, DC is at a super competitive HS so it's a different pool of kids than those I went to school with. But, if anything, this seems far worse ethically because these are the "top" kids who are cheating in order to achieve and maintain a high GPA. When I let kids cheat off my homework or exams 30 years ago, all that happened was the kid managed to pass and not flunk out of high school. Nobody was worried about how those kids' GPAs might nudge them out of the top 10% of the class or give them a leg up for college admissions.

At one point in HS my kid was caught cheating on an assignment. We had to go in and meet with the teacher and punish our kid. But what was most upsetting was that when I spoke with DC about why they felt cheating had been necessary, their answer made total sense to me. There is no way that a kid who isn't a genius can keep up with the workload at a school like theirs. These are kids that are eventually passing the AP exams with 4s and 5s, so they aren't dumb. They know the material. But the sheer volume of work is unrealistic and is essentially an invitation to cheat. When the top kids in the class are "sharing" work with one another, everyone else has to do this in order to not fall too far behind and still sleep for at least 6-7 hours a night. It's a huge problem that's entirely created by stupid adults setting "higher" standards. My sibling is a high school teacher in Texas where one's class rank now determines whether you get to go to UT Austin and become a Longhorn. It's become a cat and mouse game with the top kids all devising new tricks to raise their GPA by 0.05 over that of their classmate.

This is one of the problems with reducing a student down to a single letter grade for each subject. We get what we measure in life. If we measure by letter grades, kids are going to chase the letter grade by whatever means. It’s time to rethink that system to have one that incentives learning, rather than grade grubbing. Universities were around for >1000 years without them. Socrates did not give Plato letter grades. They came into vogue about 100 years ago as a way to lessen the burden on teachers, and not as a pedagogical tool to benefit students.

Agree. With one already in college....another issue with letter grades is that they can discourage students from tackling difficult challenging courses because if the concern that a poor grade will drag down gpa. How do we incentivize and reward learning over chasing grades?

Bingo.

By giving qualitative evaluations and rewarding risk taking in academics. My DD’s school, e.g., has 2 components to grading. A 10-12 page spreadsheet that gives 0-4 on each individual skill. 0 is not covered and 4 is mastery. So the math portion accounts for about 2 pages by itself etc. And they do a 4 or 5 page written summary in addition. About 3/4 page to a full page by each teacher. They do this 3 times per year, in conjunction with PT conferences. Which portion is the more constructive? The narrative portion. But they are both better tools than the single letter grade my DS gets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok, can someone please explain how this makes any sense?

I know plenty of kids in this admissions cycle who have low (think, 1100) SATs but have high GPAs (4.0 range) from big public schools that grade inflate. These kids are going test optional and are getting into colleges that would normally be out of reach when SATs were required. This year, they get to hide their low SAT from the colleges.

On the other hand, I know plenty of kids at private schools that grade-deflate but who have strong grades (taking that grade deflation into account, say 3.8) and sky high SATs who are being deferred and rejected from safeties. In the past, the high SATs balanced out the grade deflation, but this year it seems meaningless because schools are filling spots with kids who didn't show an SAT.

This system is a joke but it is also very damaging. There under qualified kids who are making tic toc videos mocking the system. On the other hand, you have high achieving students who've worked their a$# off and who are getting shut out. Makes no sense.

This post is meaningless without specific colleges. Where are these low SAT kids getting into college without submitting a test score? Where? Name them, please.

[Anonymous]

The "system" is not set in stone.

It sets its own admissions criteria. Fewer and fewer schools are requiring standardized tests. That is their prerogative.

They will see if it changes student outcomes dramatically. It may not. SAT/ACT's are not intelligence tests.

You have to let go of the formula that advantaged your child. Time marches on.

(I think half of the laments from people like you are based upon resentment because you thought the tuition you had been paying at a private school would gain you more than an edge than it has. )

If your kid is healthy, feel lucky. If your kid tries his/her best, feel proud. They will be fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hate the game? Definitely.

The problem is that very few kids can get great grades at some very competitive schools without cheating. I got sick of my DC getting crap grades during distance learning and moved DC into my home office so I could monitor them during the school day. I was appalled at all the cheating that is going on. It's actually so normalized that I don't think they even understand that they're out of line. It's different from when I was the smart kid in HS that everyone else cheated off of. Now, it's that they all exchange work with each other, even the smart kids. Granted, DC is at a super competitive HS so it's a different pool of kids than those I went to school with. But, if anything, this seems far worse ethically because these are the "top" kids who are cheating in order to achieve and maintain a high GPA. When I let kids cheat off my homework or exams 30 years ago, all that happened was the kid managed to pass and not flunk out of high school. Nobody was worried about how those kids' GPAs might nudge them out of the top 10% of the class or give them a leg up for college admissions.

At one point in HS my kid was caught cheating on an assignment. We had to go in and meet with the teacher and punish our kid. But what was most upsetting was that when I spoke with DC about why they felt cheating had been necessary, their answer made total sense to me. There is no way that a kid who isn't a genius can keep up with the workload at a school like theirs. These are kids that are eventually passing the AP exams with 4s and 5s, so they aren't dumb. They know the material. But the sheer volume of work is unrealistic and is essentially an invitation to cheat. When the top kids in the class are "sharing" work with one another, everyone else has to do this in order to not fall too far behind and still sleep for at least 6-7 hours a night. It's a huge problem that's entirely created by stupid adults setting "higher" standards. My sibling is a high school teacher in Texas where one's class rank now determines whether you get to go to UT Austin and become a Longhorn. It's become a cat and mouse game with the top kids all devising new tricks to raise their GPA by 0.05 over that of their classmate.

This is one of the problems with reducing a student down to a single letter grade for each subject. We get what we measure in life. If we measure by letter grades, kids are going to chase the letter grade by whatever means. It’s time to rethink that system to have one that incentives learning, rather than grade grubbing. Universities were around for >1000 years without them. Socrates did not give Plato letter grades. They came into vogue about 100 years ago as a way to lessen the burden on teachers, and not as a pedagogical tool to benefit students.

Agree. With one already in college....another issue with letter grades is that they can discourage students from tackling difficult challenging courses because if the concern that a poor grade will drag down gpa. How do we incentivize and reward learning over chasing grades?

But everyone knows that colleges look at grades in relation to the difficulty of courses...so amazing grades in non-honors/AP classes carry much less weight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

In MCPS you get a full point bump for AP and honors, and honors is basically on-level. I'd say 30-40% of the kids had a 4.4 or above GPA.

And the colleges are well aware of the grading scales so what’s your point? As pps have pointed out, colleges are not comparing private school kids to public school kids. But if it makes you feel better to think that’s why your kids are not getting in, have at it.

This has been said multiple times in this thread and in others. Is there any evidence that this is the case? Do colleges really separate them into two completely separate piles that each have their own number of admits and never compare them against each other? That doesn't make any sense to me.

I have long wondered this too. All the Ivies and top SLACs have far higher percentages (from 20-50%) of privates school kids matriculating when only 2% of all students in US go to private schools. If it’s true that there are two separate piles for applicants - private and public - that wouldn’t seem to be true.

I think it’s more you are competing against applicants from your own school first, and then the field of applicants second. So if you are the third or fourth best applicant from your school, your chances are very, very low even if on paper you have better stats than 99% of the rest of the field. I doubt very much any college say they are designating 20% of their seat to private school kids and the rest to public school kids, and those kids only compete within their buckets, but I may be wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Just stop. What evidence (besides comments on DCUM) do you have that public schools inflate grades and private schools deflate grades?

Just stop. Are you serious? Let's start with MoCo. In March 2020, the "do no harm" policy required students to earn at least one grade higher than they did the previous quarter. So if you got a B, you got an A. That's grade inflation. How many posters on here with kids at Wilson have said they and all their kids friends now have averages in the high 90s, courtesy of the covid special grading policies. In public schools, you get a full point bump for AP classes. Again, grade inflation. None of that exists at many of the private schools in this area.

It's been clear forever that grades are nearly meaningless.

The valedictorian at my large public high school decades ago had a 4.0. She took only classes she was sure she could get As in, bypassing the honors classes the smart kids took.

It's a dumb system, always has been.