2023 TJHSST Student - Ask me anything

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you begun looking at colleges and how do you think you will fare?

I have! I'll be honest, there used to be a lot of pressure from my parents to target the Ivy schools, and there still is from my aunts and uncles and my grandparents. But I am looking at schools like UVA, VT, Georgia Tech, Illinois-Champaign, and Pitt as reasonable targets, while still applying for the reaches like Duke (I LOVE that campus), Stanford (can't wait to visit) and Yale.

I think I'll do fine and I'm trying not to stress too much about it. I know TJ kids at all of those target schools and they think I have a good shot at all of those.

[Anonymous]

Okay - after an extended lunch due to the tornado warning, I'm headed back to 7th. Thanks everyone!

[Anonymous]

Did you want to attend TJ because you truly love science and math or did you want to attend because you felt like it would get you into a better college?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Did you and other Asian kids at TJ want more diversity? Just curious

Second student poster from before.

I am South Asian. I can tell you for sure that a good number of my Asian classmates did not want more diversity. A lot of them have younger siblings or family friends who are interested in TJ and it's a big thing in our community to share our experiences both with the school and the admissions process. I think when I was a freshman I honestly might have felt the same way - my parents have some feelings about Black people that are pretty backwards but that they don't think are racist, and I was raised with a lot of the same ideas. I think the biggest thing that changed my view, looking back, was hearing from the parents and my friends who wanted to fight against the changes - the things that they said about Black kids and poorer kids and their idea of "merit" started to sound really gross to me. I've always felt lucky to have been accepted to TJ, because a lot of my friends weren't.

I doubt if this is a real south asian student and whether what he/she said about the parents are true or not.
I am an asian parent. Let me tell you what I think.
If TJ is supposed to support academically strong students, let's evaluate students from this angle. It doesn't matter what color the students are and how rich/poor the students are.
I'm ok for TJ to increase some quotes to enhance diversity. But let's make things clear. How many students are admitted for merit and how many students are admitted for diversity. Don't mix everything up as the new admission does.
The new admission process doesn't help with finding those students who are academically strong.

That's exactly what the new selection criteria does! It evaluates all students relative to their home school. They do not know anyone's race. Seems perfect to me.

student name tells the race. Economic situation is also considered. The only thing not being considered in the new admission is whether the student is academically strong or not. Unweighted GPA doesn't tell anything. You cannot compare a student taking regular Algebra I in 8th grade with a student taking Algebra II HN in 8th grade.

The minimum is Alg 1 honors in 8th.

The minimum is not Algebra I HN. The minimum is regular Algebra I.

Guess you aren’t familiar with the admissions criteria.
https://www.fcps.edu/registration/thomas-jefferson-admissions/eligibility-requirements

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To the TJ kids answering questions here - thank you. I'm also the mom of a 2023 and your experience matches my kid's experience very closely. If you can separate out the crazy parents (which exist on both sides of the debate but the crazy runs much deeper on one side....), TJ has been an incredibly fulfilling, challenging but also warm environment for my kid.

+1

Sorry that some parents are raging nut jobs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did you want to attend TJ because you truly love science and math or did you want to attend because you felt like it would get you into a better college?

On the flip side, do you think you’d have equal or better chances at your base school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do you think of the quality of mathematics teaching at TJ so far in your 2.5 years of experience there? Do you feel you are learning why things work, building intuition, and making connections between ideas, or do you feel that it is mostly procedural in that it focuses on steps and formulae without a deeper understanding (as it typically does at base high schools).

Additional follow up: Do you feel that your math teachers inspire and encourage you to get a deeper understanding via encouraging exploration of ideas, forming arguments/proofs, and asking lots of questions? Or do you feel that the overall information flow is mostly one way with limited opportunity to have discussions about interesting topics?

Bump?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did you want to attend TJ because you truly love science and math or did you want to attend because you felt like it would get you into a better college?

Honestly, neither.

This is a good place to sort of counter a thing that most people believe about TJ. You don’t have to be passionate about or “love” STEM stuff to fit in here. What you have to be is serious about school. There are a surprising number of people in my class who love TJ for the other stuff that it provides - like you get to play sports with people who care about school and do clubs with people who care about school. Yes, TJ is a super-intense STEM school, but I think you grow to enjoy STEM more because of the experiences you get to have here and the people you do them with.

Yes, some of the teachers are trash, but that’s the case anywhere and even the trash teachers are really smart and helpful if you ask them questions (and there aren’t that many of them). It’s the feeling that everyone is in it together and there are NO kids who just don’t care.

The thing about TJ and college is that I think it helps you find the right college. And the other thing is that no matter where you go, you’re gonna be prepared. My older friends in 2020 and 2021 always talk about how easy college is compared to TJ and they appreciate it when they see their base school friends struggling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you want to attend TJ because you truly love science and math or did you want to attend because you felt like it would get you into a better college?

On the flip side, do you think you’d have equal or better chances at your base school?

You know I really don’t know. I think the experiences that I would have to write about would be less interesting if I went to base. Colleges know what TJ is, and I think the whole “getting in is harder from TJ” is a little overblown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you want to attend TJ because you truly love science and math or did you want to attend because you felt like it would get you into a better college?

Honestly, neither.

This is a good place to sort of counter a thing that most people believe about TJ. You don’t have to be passionate about or “love” STEM stuff to fit in here. What you have to be is serious about school. There are a surprising number of people in my class who love TJ for the other stuff that it provides - like you get to play sports with people who care about school and do clubs with people who care about school. Yes, TJ is a super-intense STEM school, but I think you grow to enjoy STEM more because of the experiences you get to have here and the people you do them with.

Yes, some of the teachers are trash, but that’s the case anywhere and even the trash teachers are really smart and helpful if you ask them questions (and there aren’t that many of them). It’s the feeling that everyone is in it together and there are NO kids who just don’t care.

The thing about TJ and college is that I think it helps you find the right college. And the other thing is that no matter where you go, you’re gonna be prepared. My older friends in 2020 and 2021 always talk about how easy college is compared to TJ and they appreciate it when they see their base school friends struggling.

I've had 2 who graduated TJ and PP has managed to summarize the TJ experience and advantage in just 3 paragraphs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the TJ kids answering questions here - thank you. I'm also the mom of a 2023 and your experience matches my kid's experience very closely. If you can separate out the crazy parents (which exist on both sides of the debate but the crazy runs much deeper on one side....), TJ has been an incredibly fulfilling, challenging but also warm environment for my kid.

+1

Sorry that some parents are raging nut jobs.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do you think of the quality of mathematics teaching at TJ so far in your 2.5 years of experience there? Do you feel you are learning why things work, building intuition, and making connections between ideas, or do you feel that it is mostly procedural in that it focuses on steps and formulae without a deeper understanding (as it typically does at base high schools).

Additional follow up: Do you feel that your math teachers inspire and encourage you to get a deeper understanding via encouraging exploration of ideas, forming arguments/proofs, and asking lots of questions? Or do you feel that the overall information flow is mostly one way with limited opportunity to have discussions about interesting topics?

Bump?

It completely depends on which teacher you have but I think in general in math it’s more of a conceptual focus. Which is a big part of why the freshmen struggle when they come in in Math 4 or 5, because I think they’re more used to the linear math sequence of problem-solving for its own sake unless they’ve done AoPS or something.

[Anonymous]

How many hours of sleep do kids get at TJ? I have heard so many parents complain about kids only getting 4-6 hours of sleep.

How many APs + Post APs would you have done by the end of 12th grade? I was shocked to hear most kids get around 10+. Is it true?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How many hours of sleep do kids get at TJ? I have heard so many parents complain about kids only getting 4-6 hours of sleep.

How many APs + Post APs would you have done by the end of 12th grade? I was shocked to hear most kids get around 10+. Is it true?

Most kids at any school can do 10-12.

[Anonymous]

“It’s the feeling that everyone is in it together and there are NO kids who just don’t care. ”

Thanks you, OP. That’s good to hear. This sense is what my daughter was most excited about as the ones who just don’t care and impact the classroom where she is now bother her a lot. She has a blossoming interest in science and has always liked and done really well at math.