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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Another thing YY offers (which no other public school in the DMV does) is Mandarin immersion classes all the way through HS, including the IB Baccalaureate Exam.  [/quote]

OP, we bailed on YY early for College Gardens, now at Herbert Hoover MS in Potomac (partial Mandarin immersion where every student didn't come through College Gardens or Potomac; some were taught at home and in heritage language schools), hoping that DC will test into the Richard Montgomery HS International Baccalaureate Diploma program in Rockville. The program admits around 10% of 8th grade applicants county-wide, but strong Herbert Hoover Chinese students seem to get it. We weren't happy at YY without other immigrant bilingual children, but there were good things about it and most parents seemed to love it.

We live close to the DC-MD line and have close friends with kids at DCI, so we know that IB Diploma studies in their HS will be voluntary. In the strongest suburban IB programs, Richard Montgomery and Washington-Lee HS in Arlington, students are either "in" IB (pursuing the full diploma) or "out" (in AP classes etc.) making for some of the highest IB Diploma pass rates in the world. On a pass rate scale of 24-45 points, the strongest IB Diploma program in the DC public system is currently Banneker HS, with an average points total in the high 20s, the equivalent of around a C-. By contrast, Richard Montgomery's average pass rate is close to 40 points, the equivalent of an A-.  Looks to me like DCI's average pass rate will also be in the high 20s for years, possibly the low 30s, because a school system can't do immersion languages very well without recruiting native speakers, and can't do International Baccalaureate studies very well without requiring students to pursue the full diploma (vs. allowing them dabble in it by taking one or more subject exams).

If you're serious about IB Diploma studies in a public system in the Metro area, you need to look to MoCo, Arlington of Fairfax, or possibly a Deal feeder. Chinese studies are coming along at Deal because the teacher is excellent, and the rest of their program, and facilities, are stronger than DCI's. Mandarin has been offered at Wilson for a couple years by another stellar teacher. But, unfortunately, high AP Mandarin scores no longer impress elite colleges as a general rule because it's a fairly easy test. More than 80% of test takers score 5s, by far the highest of any AP exam.  Top scores (6s and 7s on a scale of 1-7) on IB "Higher Level" Mandarin separate the sheep from the goats. Good luck.

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You seem to have gotten into both YY and College Gardens CI programs. I was thinking it's extremely competitive and I would aim for one, pretty much anticipating I wouldn't get in either. How did you manage to get into both? Also, if you are near the DC boundary, how is transportation for you?

I'm not overly worried about competitiveness to a great extent. I think most of the MoCo high schools in the area will meet my requirements, as well as the DC high schools mentioned. We are also looking at inner NoVa districts as well though.[/quote]

We got into YY some years ago, after the school had begun, when the lottery wasn't nearly as competitive as I imagine it has become.  It's easy to get into College Gardens if your kid speaks decent Chinese (any major dialect) and you're ready to jump in at any point.  In the Rockville immersion programs, admins are accustomed to working w/native speakers, so they grasp that your dialect-speaking kid will pick up on the Mandarin fast, even if they don't start until 2nd, 3rd or 4th grade. They're not only willing to accept bilingual kids to replace dropouts, they're eager. The program provides directed dialect transition support (mostly Cantonese-speaking teachers coaching Cantonese-speaking students on Mandarin pronunciation using a mix of the two dialects, as in China itself). MoCo replaces dropouts with bilingual kids at every step of the way, and many non-native speakers don't stay; around a third leave by upper grades. But your kid can't just understand some Chinese to test in; they have to be able to speak rapidly for a good 20 minutes in an interview, with minimal code mixing.

YY actually offers more cultural bells and whistles than College Gardens, because the school is devoted to Chinese immersion while the latter is a small school-within-a-school program. That said, the kids written and spoken Chinese is a good deal better in MoCo. I put this down to involved families being more affluent overall, and native-speaking admins and extended families keeping standards high. Many parents can and do help with HW, and non-native speakers tend to form HW groups (hiring native-speaking tutors) or host au pairs from China. Many families also pay for immersion summer camps, including abroad, and the county helps low-income students attend. We car pool over.

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