Reply to Whitman v. BCC?

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Reply to "Whitman v. BCC?"

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[quote=Anonymous]I'm a relatively recent (as in, past 10 years) B-CC graduate and my much-younger sister is a senior there now. I have no direct experience with Whitman, but I can tell you about B-CC and what I perceive to be the salient differences between the two.

- B-CC has the IB program and Whitman does not. The IB is a voluntary opt-in program at B-CC, so anyone who wants to do it can (there are no selection criteria.) This obviously provides an alternative to taking AP classes, and the IB is better suited to some kids. I did the IB when I was there, and my sister is doing it now. We both think it's great. If you're an international family, getting the IB diploma makes it significantly easier to consider and apply to universities outside the United States. B-CC also offers a full array of AP classes, as does Whitman.

- B-CC, for better or for worse, is located in a more central location. This means that students leave the campus for lunch, student parking is very limited (you have to apply for a parking permit), and it's pretty easy to skip class because there are restaurants, Starbucks, etc. nearby. The parking situation could be a consideration if your DC wants to do an internship in 11th or 12th grade that she/he will have to drive to - parking permits are awarded on a case-by-case basis. But on the flip side, B-CC is also a 5 minute walk to the metro, so that option is available if they need to travel to internships or extracurricular activities after school.

- Whitman is more white. B-CC zoning extends to the outer reaches of Silver Spring and includes at least one low-income housing complex, so there is more racial and socioeconomic diversity there. FWIW (again, for better or worse, depending on your perspective), I found that students were pretty self-segregating, both socially and academically. MCPS offers on-level, honors, and AP/IB versions of most courses. In the harder (honors and AP/IB) classes, there is relatively little diversity. From what I understand from my sister, it's still like that. I was actually shocked to see B-CC's statistics on paper (FARMS rate, minority population, etc.) because my experience there did not reflect those facts. In general, it's a wealthy school and the environment/culture reflect that.

- B-CC has a pretty "international" environment. Lots of diplomats and international families send their kids there, partly because of the IB program. This made for some interesting class discussion, especially in my IB classes. B-CC also has an excellent foreign language department; when I was there, they offered Spanish, French, Italian, Latin, Arabic, Chinese, and Russian (but this may have changed.) I can't speak for Whitman, so it's entirely possible that it has a similar environment.

Unless you're set on the IB, I don't think the difference between Whitman and B-CC is that significant for a UMC family. On this site, it seems that most consider B-CC a tier down from the "W" schools, in part because of the greater diversity at B-CC, but I haven't found that to be the case (in terms of class rigor, parent involvement, college outcomes, etc.) I would just choose the house/neighborhood I liked best and let that be the deciding factor.

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