Reply to What exactly is the "holistic review"?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We are discussing with DC about TJ application. At the TJ admission information session, students asked about the admission criteria. The lady answered that all applications would go through a holistic review. My current 8th grader knows some students who applied for TJ last school year. He knows them by taking the same class or doing the same club activities. Among the student he knows who got admitted, quite a few weren't strong in math and science, but strong in writing instead. Several students who were not strong in either STEM or writing also got admitted including someone who is a continuous free rider in group work. Surprisingly, some students who earned good rank in math competition and Scioly, science bowl didn't get in. 
DC is strong in math and science. After watching TJ student's Vlog, as parents, we kinda think that DC might be a good fit to TJ. But DC seems not very motivated to apply for TJ. He is passionate in STEM and has perfect GPA. We tried to persuade him to apply. But based on what he observed, he is still hesitating to apply because of the  the ambiguous process and result. 
Does anyone know what type of students TJ are looking for. How does TJ decide whether a student should be admitted? How exactly does the "holistic" process work?[/quote]

The "holistic review" is primarily 2 things:
Experience factors: are you on free/reduced lunch; are you disabled or learning impair3ed; are you an english language learned; etc.  The FARM is probably the biggest thing.
The essays: they will almost always ask something about your demonstrated interest in stem; they will ask one stem related essay questions (last year it was one of those, if a train leaves chicago at 5 pm...); they will ask why you want to go to TJ or what you can contribute to TJ, etc.

The admissions process will try to take a minimum of 1.5% of the students from every middle school.  Between the allocations for other school systems and the 1.5% allocation for each middle school, there are only 100 out of 550 seats left for "merit"

If your child is really into STEM type things, the juice is qworth the squeeze.
I am a Tj parent and I am very opposed to the new admissions process.  But as much as I btch and moan about the racist reasons for changing the admissions process, TJ still manages to collect a large critical mass of like minded students.  The bottom of the class really struggles to keep up and frequently does not return for  group in Northern Virginia, this is it.

If I were to "sell" TJ to a kid like yours, I would focus on:
The overwhelming number of academically related competitions supported by club activity (math team, science olympiads, etc.)
The science labs are almost as good as small college;
The senior research project is a year long research project where you work on a single research project including stuff like particle physics, artificial intelligence, robotics, biotech, nanochem, etc.  The school requires a bunch of pre-requisites and to some extent you chart a course to your desires research project;
If you were ever interested in playing varsity sports, you can probably find a spot on a team here.[/quote]

Another TJ parent here.  Agree with all of this. Believe the "experience factors" account for 40% of a student's total score in the "wholistic review."

My youngest did not have any experience factors.  [b]The factors are not something you as a parent, can just buy for your child, like buying Kumon or Mathnasium tutoring. [/b]

Please note: we did not do those or any other outside tutoring; my child was the one who drove the whole process and really wanted to go, likely due in part to friends/peer group at middle school.

I do not know what they wrote on the essay.  But I believe my child spoke with peer group interested in going to TJ (attended one of the 3 traditional feeder MS).  DC said they found the single math problem really easy (though the wording was apparently confusing).

DC did try out for, and make it onto, the Math Counts team in MS. Math Counts is highly competitive at the 3 traditional feeder middle schools.  Math Counts participation might have been influential, but there is not much in the way of transparency in any individual case.

[/quote]
Another side of the story to balance, my kid get into TJ and we have experience factor and I believe it helps my kid to get in. We are farm and it is not a privilege of being poor. We are farm not by choice and you don’t know every family story. I would gladly exchange the TJ seat over my farms status, in a heartbeat.
Side note, my kid thriving and never been happier at TJ.[/quote]

I'm glad it's working out for your kid but they can implement experience factors without eliminating the test.  Every year there are kids who come in an struggle and would have been better off never coming.  Meanwhile there is some other kid with the exact same income at th3e exact same school that would have flourished at Tj but weren't idnetified because the selection process is such trash.[/quote]

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