Reply to Who are the kids that get into TJ from the lower ranking middle schools?

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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 have a child at poorly performing MS which, prior to the admission policy change, typically did not have any students admitted to TJ. DC is truly a brilliant and hardworking kid - the top student in honors geometry (near perfect average), acing the rest of their all honors courses, all advanced pass or perfect SOL scores, etc. DC is white and we do not qualify for free/reduced priced meals.

I'm curious to know what the admittance pool looks like at a school like ours?  Do we have a shot or are the spots typically offered to high performing students with one or more "experience factors"?

I hope to keep the conversation civil and am genuinely asking out of curiosity. TIA![/quote]

One from ours was such an outlier. Real genius even. Don't think they would've stood a chance with the old system though since their family is low-income and wouldn't even consider prep classes that were required to be competitive then.[/quote]

Prep was never necessary.  My two kids and many others did no prep.  Stop with those lies.

OP, your kid should do well coming from a low performing school.  It’s the kids like yours at high performing schools that are getting rejected.[/quote]

It is not a lie that kids prepped. Prep programs posted the names of kids who were accepted into TJ and similar schools. And they posted them for many years, you used to be able to look at the roster for many years back.

Were there kids who were accepted who did not prep? Yes. Was there a large percentage of kids who did prep? Yes. By the time they were dropping the Quant test, there were more kids who had participated in prep programs then had not.

The reality is that parents who are very invested in their kids attending TJ will look at what seems to work and replicate that. Prep worked, so you saw that practice grow. The prep now is shifting from the Quant test and to essay prep, people are discussing it and the prep programs, like Currie, are more focused on the writing portion in their write ups. If moving schools seems to work I would guess that you will see more families do that. If you can afford the cost of the prep programs, and they do run in the 10,000-20,000 range for 7th and 8th grade, then you can rent a cheap apartment and drive your kid to school for a year or two.

The kids whose parents are looking to game the system are not the majority of the school but they are a significant percentage of the school. I am sure it sucks for the kids who didn’t go to the prep schools or look to game the system but it doesn’t change the fact that it did happen and is continuing to happen today. [/quote]

You said prep was “required.”  It was not.  Choose your words more carefully rather than buying into the TJ bashing.[/quote]

I did not post that prep was required. This is an anonymous board, people with different opinions are going to post and quote posts. Don't assume that you are talking to the same person because you are not.

There are kids who prepped and there are kids who did not. There seem to be folks on both side of the debate that are 100% stuck on one particular line and unable to see the middle ground. There are a few posters who keep screaming that every kid prepped, and that is BS. There are a few posters who claim no one prepped and that there was no cheating on the Quant test, and that is BS. There is plenty of evidence that there are kids who prepped, and that the number of prepped kids increased as people saw that it worked, and that there are prep schools that had test banks that provided an advantage to kids who attended the prep programs. There are also kids who were accepted into TJ who did not attend those prep programs and who did not have advanced access to the tests.

Also, saying that kids prepped and that some used test banks is not bashing TJ. I  taught at the University level for 10 years. The Greek Houses had test banks that their members studied out of, it is common knowledge. I enjoyed screwing with those kids because I knew it was happening. It is a fact that test banks exist at many schools, regardless of the level so HS and College. The test administrators for TJ should have been aware of that and adjusted the test just like I did when I taught. There were Professors who didn't adjust their tests and were, essentially, fine with the knowledge that students were cheating in their classes. TJ decided to get rid of the test instead of taking the time to adjust the test. I don't agree with that, I think it is lazy.

Saying that the admissions practices for TJ need to shift is not bashing TJ. It is saying that I think that TJ should reflect the County it is based in. I like the MS distribution of seats. I like that the application no longer takes into consideration extra activities outside of school opportunities available to all kids. I would be fine with letters of recommendations and a test that was re-written every year to avoid the issues with cheating. I think that requirements could be shifted to require honors classes or AAP classes in all core classes, geometry by the end of 8th grade, and a higher GPA.

That is not bashing TJ but wanting to have a program that is accessible to more students and were kids have a chance to participate across the County.

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TJ is a regional Governor's School, not a county public works program.

Does every other county that participates in TJ now make seats available on the same basis as FCPS does now, with middle school set-asides?

No one objects when a few schools like Westfield, Hayfield, and South County tend to dominate in athletics, but somehow it's "unfair" and has to be corrected if some middle schools have stronger kids academically.   [/quote]

DP. Gonna address a couple of issues here.

1) Yes, every other county's middle schools are subject to the 1.5% allocation. That's how there are so many students who are attending TJ from Prince William County now. The number used to be in the 10-20s year over year, and now it's closer to 60-70.

2) It's not "unfair" that some middle schools have stronger kids academically. That's the nature of life when you have AAP offerings and centers and magnet programs and the like - and even more so when you have disparate resources in different areas of the county. It is problematic when you have schools that literally send no students to the county's flagship school for decades - not the least of which is the fact that striving for that flagship school ceases to become part of the culture of that school.

3) Carson, Rocky Run, and Longfellow are still going to send huge numbers of kids to TJ every year - far more than other, less well-represented schools. And they should - they have a larger number of stronger kids. The kids from those schools who are qualified for TJ will be exposed to a much more diverse environment than they would have been regardless of whether or not they get in, because TJ will look a little more like their base school than it used to. Which, in turn, will be better for their overall education.[/quote]

The thing is they're not stronger academically just have had more outside enrichment which is a different thing. [/quote]
Sherlock, if they've had enrichment they are much stronger academically, that's almost a definitional given. You might be confusing the word enrichment with remediation.. two totally different things.[/quote]

More enrichment does not mean stronger academically. More enrichment means more exposure and more practice. This allows a child to move ahead. A child whose parent never reads to them and barely talks to them is going to be behind a child whose parents read to them and spoke to them a lot as babies and toddlers. The children could share the same IQ but one appears to be smarter because one had the advantage of an involved parent from an early age.

The same holds true for all academic areas. A child whose parents have actively sought out enrichment is likely to be in a better place then a child who has not had the same experience. But that doesn’t mean that the child who has not been offered those experiences is less intelligent or capable. Denying kids entrance to a school like TJ because a bright kid has had less exposure and practice, through no fault of their own, because a kid who has had the advantage of enrichment is wrong. You are effectively denying kids an opportunity because they had parents who were not able to afford enrichment or had parents who were uninvolved. [/quote]
More enrichment, assuming kids took advantage of it, definitely means stronger academically. Kids who have learned more, are then able to understand more, it's like a positive feedback loop. On the other hand the kids who were exposed with the bare minimum in a school, are effectively handicapped without some serious assistance or private tutoring. The movie Stand and Deliver while great, is just not realistic. The situation is sad, but that's life in literally every profession. The folks who have learned, who have put effort and studied, have expanded their mind to a much larger degree than those who have not had the time and opportunity to do that. The others who have been academically left behind can catch up but they badly need time to be on their side. And in the arms race to TJ, time is the greatest enemy of all.[/quote]

DP. Honestly, FCPS should be investing in ways to provide that additional support to bright students who have received less enrichment. [/quote]
Exactly right. But again, who will pay for it? No question that schools will not support this. But it is the right thing to do, identify "talented" kids in late elementary and give them a solid foundation starting in 7th grade, at the latest. Then the expectation would be that those who thrive would be fine applying to TJ, if they're still interested. But right now there's just no way our culture will support and want to pay for underrepresented kids to do serious academics beyond what is found in their schools. So if anything like this will exist, it will require outside help/foundation/etc. For example BEAM does exactly this, this is their mission.   [url]https://www.beammath.org[/url]

[/quote]

Dividing the TJ seats among schools based on their population is the fairest realistic measure.[/quote]

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