Relocating from United Kingdom (Scotland)
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scotcitz
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| Hi, is there anyone else there who has recently relocated from the United Kingdom (Glasgow in our case). I'd love to 'share the experience' ... we just put one at Montgomery Blair and another at Takoma Park. The toughest thing has been transferring the credits (and the grades) from Scottish high school -- it seems Montgomery County just makes it up as they go along ... any help from other 'international' parents appreciated! |
Anonymous
What kind of help are you looking for? |
Anonymous
| MoCo has some of the best schools in the county. Transferring credits is a drag regardless because they need to review if the courses meet up with what is being taught here. Granted, Blair isn't one of the best unless you are in the magnet program but the courses are the same throughout the county in terms of learning standards. |
scotcitz
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| hi, on a practical note, I could use some help in how to translate grades and whether others have had trouble with this -- the county gave my daughter very low marks for her Scottish GSCEs. I will go back to them and dispute, but any help/experience from others appreciated. Also, if anyone has made it through the first year or two post-move from the UK, I would be interested in how colleges etc viewed Scottish grades, any tips on how to help Scottish/British students adapt. I am not looking forward to standardized testing. I am American myself, as is my husband, but high school was a loooooong time ago for us. |
Anonymous
Hmmm. The first place I might contact if I were you is actually the both the British school of Washington (http://britishschoolofwashington.org/) to see if they can help you "translate" those courses and grades to Blair. It's a long shot, but they might be able to lend a hand. Also, there's a DC brits meetup - perhaps one of them might have some ideas for you? http://www.meetup.com/dcbrits/ |
Anonymous
| For the post above, I would have been pleased if they had used any actual information on Scottish courses, they only had information on English courses and they are quite different -- and they didn't seem to use those as intended or in a consistent way (I first got told that my 15-year-old should be a junior and now apparently she is short a few credits as a Sophomore). I need to go back and talk to them about this and I've gotten some documentation (from the NCAA etc about mark translation). The thing I've found just really intense is the school comparison thing. Blair has some great students and some students who face significant challenges, it has a huge spectrum. I believe many schools in other parts of the county (Bethesda, Chevy Chase) have fewer kids with challenges ... but I heard so much negative about Blair that it started to be a bit odd. Blair has a significant number of kids that go on to Ivies and other highly competitive schools (as per Naviance) -- I would imagine that places in Bethesda and Chevy Chase have a higher percentage of kids going to top colleges, but that's more down to intake than what they do with the kids once they hit campus. So it's not so much school reputation etc -- that ship has sailed anyway because the older one is just not going through another big adjustment at this point -- but I am interested in how Scottish/British kids seem to settle in over time or what other issues to maybe expect if anyone has had that experience. I would note I'm an educator by the way, so maybe have a slightly different take on things ... |
scotcitz
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| hi thanks that is very useful on the meetup! |
scotcitz
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| And yes I have cunningly called the British School in DC ... but haven't really gotten down the layers I need ... |
Anonymous
I suspect it's mayhem over there given the start of the year. I would expect you might have better luck in a few weeks. What about the British consulate? Might be worth a phone call to see what they do with their own staff's kids. |
scotcitz
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| That's a good idea too and I hadn't thought of that, thanks so much. Yeah, I'm waiting a bit before tackling the county etc on the credits -- since I teach myself, I know that start of term is the most hectic time of the year. Meanwhile just gathering info ... and hoping there isn't some weird 'statute of limitations' but what the heck. |
Anonymous
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At BCC there is an international family committee. Maybe there's something similar at Blair?
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/schools/bcchs/parents/news/news.aspx?id=250380 |
Anonymous
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Blair has a magnet program, a school within a school, for kids who are gifted in math and science. It's hugely competitive to get into, it attracts the children of NIH scientists from all over the county, and the kids are usually doing math and science courses equivalent to second or third year university courses. I think those are the kids who get into Ivies.
I've been an alumni interviewer for my former undergraduate school for a while, and I've represented them at college information nights etc. Honestly, particularly if your daughter is aiming for a US university, I would try to get her classified as a sophomore. The more time she has to build up her transcript with challenging courses, and explore extracurricular activities, preferably with leadership roles, the better. A lot of people who transfer to a new secondary school get caught up in the number of credits needed for graduation. For a student preparing for university, credits needed for high school graduation aren't that relevant . What universities care about is whether you have taken challenging courses (AP, IB etc) and excelled at them. They want to see four years of English including AP English Lit, 4 years of math including Calculus etc. Your daughter would be best served by making sure that she has time to take those challenging courses. Top universities understand the Scottish Highers system. I don't know what they will do with a transcript for someone who didn't complete the system. However, if you think your daughter's marks have been translated incorrectly, you can certainly attach her Scottish transcript to her application and ask that her US and Scottish transcripts be evaluated separately. I think they will be willing to do that. They will have a lot more experience with that than Montgomery County. In MC's defense, Scotland is a small country. I would be surprised if MCPS got a transfer student from Scotland once every 5 years, so I'm not surprised that they don't have a good system for determining equivalence in place. |
Anonymous
PP here. Great advice. At 15 she would certainly be among the youngest juniors in her class - not sure that's to her advantage either. I would take the transcript advice here, then see how she does as a sophomore. If she's bored stiff in a month, then consider petitioning her for the gifted programs... |
Anonymous
| Thanks for helpful advice. Oh yes, she is a sophomore -- it would have been madness not to give her that extra year in the system, I completely agree with the posters ... would that we had another year (: ... will see if there is an international community at Blair etc |
Anonymous
| We too had difficulty when we moved our kid from private school to MoCo, although both schools are in the DC area. We ended up showing the MoCo school the actual books and tests DC had taken in the private school, and this worked. Understand also that the first instinct of any MoCo administrator is to say "no" to avoid setting precedents, keeping the barn door closed, and all the rest. So you need to wear them down. Persistence, combined with copies of text book pages, worked for us. |