What makes MoCO so great?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Proficiency equals mediocrity.

You must have a different dictionary. That's not what it says in mine.

Wow, I hope you aren't in charge of the curriculum. The definition of mediocre is average, or barely adequate. If 80% or more of the class is a P then aiming for proficiency by definition is aiming to be mediocre.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Proficiency equals mediocrity.

You must have a different dictionary. That's not what it says in mine.

Wow, I hope you aren't in charge of the curriculum. The definition of mediocre is average, or barely adequate. If 80% or more of the class is a P then aiming for proficiency by definition is aiming to be mediocre.

Proficient - Competent or skilled in doing or using something

How do you get mediocre from this?

[Anonymous]

OK, if we really are going to quote from the dictionary, then according to Merriam-Webster,

Mediocre: of moderate or low quality, value, ability, or performance

Proficient: well advanced in an art, occupation, or branch of knowledge

[Anonymous]

Obviously PP didn't go to MoCo public schools!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A voice from the middle here..my child is not a high achiever. She's very smart and interested in some subjects. She had a learning disability in other areas. She's smart enough to compensate and tries to overcome it but the new grading system has really negatively impacted her performance.

Last year, she received Os in the subjects that she is interested in and does fine. She received several S and an N in areas where her learning disability affects her more. We adjusted her medication, her teacher came up with some new approaches, and she (DD) worked really hard in those areas. She received several Os in areas that had been previously S grades and even an O in the N area by the end of the year. She was REALLY proud of this. The quarterly grade report validated her efforts, showed her that she was making great progress and more importantly we SAW the improvement in her writing.

This year, she received all Ps and one or two ES grades. In one quarter, she was all Ps. Its very clear from her work that she is just barely getting by in the subjects where her learning disability affects her. She does the minimum required on her homework and its very hard to get her to do any more at home because her teacher just focuses on what is required for the P. She isn't improving at all and this affects how fast she can do things in class. She is noticing that she is falling behind the other kids and she's anxious about this but according to her teacher she's still proficient.

Its sad because last year the most important thing that she learned was not everything is easy but if you work hard at something then you will succeed, and that homework can really help you learn things that you couldn't do before. This year basically negated that experience. This summer we'll need to put her into tutoring or a more academic focused camp for her reading and writing because she hasn't learned much this year.

Awful to hear this. Ugh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Proficiency equals mediocrity.

You must have a different dictionary. That's not what it says in mine.

Wow, I hope you aren't in charge of the curriculum. The definition of mediocre is average, or barely adequate. If 80% or more of the class is a P then aiming for proficiency by definition is aiming to be mediocre.

Proficient - Competent or skilled in doing or using something

How do you get mediocre from this?

Jump in the pool.
Did you sink or float?
You floated!
You are Proficient at swimming.
You passed the "test".

But you are far from being a swimmer.
And worse, you might now know what a swimmer is.

[Anonymous]

I don't get it. Are children getting Ps even though they are not proficient?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't get it. Are children getting Ps even though they are not proficient?

Great question. What ARE the standards here? Challenging to some kids, most kids, no one?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't get it. Are children getting Ps even though they are not proficient?

Great question. What ARE the standards here? Challenging to some kids, most kids, no one?

I think it is a low bar. Certainly not equal to A as some will say. I think it is probably what I would give a C when I was teaching in the University.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't get it. Are children getting Ps even though they are not proficient?

Great question. What ARE the standards here? Challenging to some kids, most kids, no one?

You can find the standards here:

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/elementary/guides.aspx

And you can find definitions of the marks here:

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/2.0/reportcardfaq.aspx#4

P = Meets the grade-level standard by demonstrating proficiency of the content or processes for the measurement topic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The answer to the original question is that nothing makes Montgomery County great.

Read the stuff that happens before the BOE, County Council, etc. It is a system obsessed with the achievement gap and the easiest way to close it. Oops, almost forgot--the easiest way to close the gap is to hold back the top.

Scary but maybe true

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Howard County (for now) has a different socio-economic make-up than MoCo so you can't compare the schools. They have far fewer English learners and kids who come to K unprepared. That doesn't mean they provide a better education.

That's a good point. The average SAT score in MoCo was 1651 last year and it was 1632 in Howard county. If anything this suggests the education in MoCo is better, perhaps significantly.

I don't think you can make that statement. One school district might have a higher average SAT score because it *attracts* more high-performing students (i.e. MOCO has this hyped up reputation, so parents who are very involved in the education of their kids tend to flock there, and so there is a disproportionate number of top MD students in MOCO).

I really don't think you can use average scores to claim that the education is better. Scores don't tell the entire story. I would wager money that there are a large number of high-scoring students who would score the same on the SATs even if you moved them to an entirely different district, perhaps even an underperforming one.

I don't know. I don't think the vast majority of MoCo comes here with "high performing kids" because of the school system. I and everybody I know came here because it was close(ish) to where we work. Interestingly enough, my wife and I both now work in Howard county and we're thinking of moving for a better commute, so we've done some research on the schools. There are a LOT of poorer ESOL residents in MoCo, especially compared to Howard. Howard is a more affluent county (5th most in the country by last account). Not all of MoCo is like Bethesda and CC; most isn't actually.

Considering the demographics, the disparity in scores between the two would suggest that MoCo does a better job of teaching its students than HoCo does. Certainly it's hard to argue that Howard is doing a better job. That being said, IMO they're both really good school systems.

Well, but if you spend time on these threads, a lot of people steer other people away from the areas in MOCO that are ESOL, and they steer people toward the higher-performing areas of MOCO. there are quite a few Silver Spring threads where people are very severe in their opinion of the schools. Those areas tend to have more affordable housing, because they're the less in-demand schools (my theory). Not all of the schools in MOCO are high performing (just from my layman's perusal of statistics). But people who are obsessed with getting their kid into an Ivy gravitate toward the high-performing schools, and I would argue that those kids get so much motivation/pressure, that that is partly why they perform better. I'm almost certain that MOCO has a higher concentration of wealth than Howard County. In fact, I believe MOCO is one of the wealthiest counties in the country.

My argument is that basically it makes a difference if a kid grows up with the expectation and pressure that he/she is definitely going to college and an elite one at that. If a kid grows up with perfectly good parents but the overall expectation in the community, et cetera, is that college is more of a dream than a reality and that success is defined as passing and finishing high school, those kids aren't going to perform at the same level. (And yes, these are generalizations and don't take into account individual differences, motivations, learning disabilities, but just a sweeping generalization that I still think is relevant and why I don't think test score averages tell the whole story.) I think that in the past few decades, the reputation of MOCO schools have caused a lot of highly motivated parents who raise their kids with the expectation of college to swarm to those MOCO schools with that reputation. So it kind of feeds itself. The SES of the areas that feed to MOCO reflect it as well, as those tend to be wealthier areas. As the reputation picks up, the value of houses goes up, partly because of the school pyramid. Those scores stay high partly (I'm not saying the teachers aren't good) because the school attracts a lot of kids that are getting a lot of motivation and support from home.

I'm not saying they aren't good schools. What I am saying is that I don't know that you can draw the conclusion from scores that one school is better than another. It's sort of like a private school that only admits kids with high scores. Well, that school is then going to have a disproportionate number of high-scoring students, and overall the school will have a higher average of scores. But you can't automatically say it's because the school itself is better. Part of it is that it attracts those students (and in the case of some elite private schools, only admits those students). But I would say in certain areas of MOCO, the price of real estate there is the barrier to entry; it's an indirect way of limiting admittance to those high-performing public schools because only people of certain means can afford to move there.

This is all theory and conjecture on my part. And I am not saying that MOCO isn't great. I just think that scores don't tell the whole story.

+1 Brilliant. I'm in the ES in lower MoCo enough to see it's not all the teachers' doing. Some ARE fantastic. But a huge amount of this is simply the progeny of the best educated city around (Bethesda/CC).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were at a highly regarded MCPS but did not like it due to overcrowding issues primarily. We've since moved to DC and think our public here is WAY better than our MC one. The DC school is so much smaller, 2-3 sections per grade instead of 5-6. We've liked the teachers better and feel that there are more resources overall. I think that there's this perception that DCPS is sub par, so everyone heads for the suburbs, leading to huge overcrowding problems in the schools. Meanwhile they've left some gems in their wake.

I often wonder, if everyone is moving to MOCO for the schools, how is there *not* overcrowding? I mean, unless they're opening a bunch of new schools, it seems like there is this huge migration to MOCO. I can't imagine that the current schools can absorb all of that.

They can't. And with all the new buildings going up in downtown Bethesda, it will just get worse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer to the original question is that nothing makes Montgomery County great.

Read the stuff that happens before the BOE, County Council, etc. It is a system obsessed with the achievement gap and the easiest way to close it. Oops, almost forgot--the easiest way to close the gap is to hold back the top.

Scary but maybe true

Where do you get access to read this?

[Anonymous]

Alot of MCPS is riding on the shirt tails of a few high schools.