Reply to Please sign this petition to continue countywide magnets

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I will not sign, and my kids have both been in a magnet. One graduated in 2025, and the other is in HS.

It's been a good experience for them, but there's far too much talent in the county to limit the participation to a few hundred students per grade level per year.[/quote]

This. Regional magnet programs are a good idea. [/quote]

+1 The "I got mine" posters are out in force, including hijacking parent chat groups at TPMS.

No. More opportunity is good and if we have to "dilute" classes that only 10 kids per year take in MCPS, so be it.[/quote]
Those classes that only 10 kids take won’t be diluted; they’ll be eliminated because those 10 kids will be distributed among many schools, none of which will have the talent pool to field enough students for these classes. That’s how these STEM programs will be diluted. We’ll have many good programs and no exceptional ones.[/quote]

If the very good programs provide access to 3x the number of students, as long as the delta between exceptional and very good isn't too large, then that is a win from the perspective of maximizing educational benefit across the county.[/quote]
I trust the SMCS teachers to know how big the delta is between very good STEM cohorting and exceptional STEM cohorting.

When we were in a race to develop the atomic bomb first or put a man on the moon first, we needed lots of very smart people to work together and a handful of geniuses to get us across the finish line. It seems like it would be beneficial to cater our educational system to both.[/quote]

Why limit it to Montgomery County then? Why not one magnet for the best and the brightest across the state of Maryland?[/quote]

NC has a fantastic HS residential magnet, but only for 11th and 12th grade. Logistically, and some point the commute is impossible, or it has to be residential, which is a huge life disruption.

Anyway, the obvious answer is that the right geo scope is whatever can fill classes. [/quote]

Virginia has this. It’s called the Governor’s School. Kids are only there half a day and the other half at their home school.

“The Virginia Governor's School Program has been designed to assist divisions as they meet the needs of a small population of students whose learning levels are remarkably different from their age-level peers. The foundation of the Virginia Governor's School Program centers on best practices in the field of gifted education and the presentation of advanced content to able learners.“

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching-learning-assessment/specialized-instruction/governor-s-schools[/quote]

I did that when I was a kid in VA and thought it was so disruptive. I was missing everything at the home school.[/quote]

Yes, what so many people are missing is that kids, even super genius ones, are still kids, who are social beings and part of a community. Their academic needs can be met without taking them out of their normal school community, and it won’t make them dumber or “water down” their academic experience if they’re made to mix with kids who only test at the 95% on a MAP test. I really think most of what MCPS does regarding magnet/gifted programming is about responding to squeaky wheel parents who (a) seem to need a rarefied experience for their kids and (b) can’t handle change. [/quote]
What you’re failing to grasp is that we’re not talking about adding 95th% and 96th% students to programs that are already chock full of 98th% and 99th% students; what is being proposed is spreading out the 98th% and 99th% students among 6 programs instead of 2, while also admitting more students overall. The problem isn’t adding more students; it’s lowering the concentration of the most advanced students in any program. 99th% students will know significantly fewer other 99th% students going forward. Putting these kids together is valuable.[b] Adding 95th% students isn’t harmful, but splitting up the 99th% is.[/b][/quote]

DP - how is the bolded harmful?  Be specific, please.  What research has been done showing that splitting up the 99th percentile kids is harmful?  Showing that it's worth the substantial cost to the rest of the students?  Showing that the excessive focus on academic achievement from a young age benefits these kids in the long run?

I agree with the PP who referenced the breathtaking entitlement of parents who want these programs to continue.  Public education is about meeting the needs of as many kids as possible as well as possible.  Someone who wants something different needs to look elsewhere.[/quote]

What is the "the substantial cost to the rest of the students"? Be specific.

Why are you hell-bent on destruction? Why do you put your trust in the people who have repeatedly failed to educate children, instead of the people who have repeatedly succeeded?

[/quote]

The countywide magnets get a lot of resources, yes?  In terms of special staff, extra bus routes, etc.  Those extra resources go to a very, very small percentage not only of MCPS' overall student population, but the population of kids who could benefit from enriched and accelerated programs.  The latter in particular do not receive the enrichment at their home schools through no fault of their own.  That sucks.

Also, lose the hyperbole.  Why are you (and others) hell-bent on insisting that the only true measure of MCPS' success is in how well it educates the assumed top 0.5% of its students?  That's embarassing.[/quote]

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