Reply to Any high MAP+M(290+), straight As, and strong stem honor/award kids did not get in PHS/Blair SMACS?

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Reply to "Any high MAP+M(290+), straight As, and strong stem honor/award kids did not get in PHS/Blair SMACS?"

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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]Yes. Nothing is a guarantee. Especially if the committee thinks the application is written by a striver mom, not the kid.

"290+" is a mid score, unless that "+" is doing a lot of work. [/quote]

Or the committee thinks that the test score was lucky and not consistent with the rest of performance across other areas of evaluation.[/quote]

It’s probably pretty rare to reject such students with strong stem awards and high MAP M. Outliers always exist but maybe with some reasons 
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There aren’t that many “strong STEM honors/awards” available to middle schoolers. So if the kids have them at that age, that’s more indicative of parental resources.  [/quote]

There are. Math Kangaroo, mathcount, mathleague, science bowl, AMC 8, Montgomery Blair math tournament, etc [/quote]

These must be pay to play.  Never heard of them. [/quote]

They’re not exactly pay to play in that you need thousands to enter.  But without some extra coaching (which could be $$), most kids wouldn’t be able to stand out. And Montgomery Blair math tournament and science bowl are team competitions.  You’d need a cohort of fellow smart students.  My kid’s MCPS MS  doesn’t send kids to science bowl and it requires a faculty sponsor so it’s not like a team of kids can enter on their own. [/quote]

They are pay to play.  Many MCPS schools don't offer or support stem.  There are plenty of schools with a cohort, but people like you like to pretend that these other kids aren't qualified.  But, that's MCPS equity for you which is why they probably stopped using the term, but unleashing potential is a joke when they hold our kids back.[/quote]

Free admission + free lunch isn't "pay to play"

https://mbmt.mbhs.edu/info/

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Both schools my kids are at don't have math teams, so how exactly would they do that?[/quote]

Exactly.  Same for my kid’s school for science bowl.  Opportunities are equally spread throughout MCPS schools. And if you can’t show you excelled at opportunities that your kid didn’t have offered in MS, you are at a competitive disadvantage for selective programs like Blair for HS.

This is compounded by the admissions criteria which stupidly puts a high weight on a single MAP-M score, which is a test of exposure to academic concepts to which many kids are not exposed rather than a test of cognitive ability.  [/quote]

Our MS and HS doesn't have math teams, science teams or science bowls.  No stem clubs.[/quote]

My son is at NBMS. They have a math club sponsored by the teacher. They go to all the competitions, Math Count, Montgomery Blair Math competition, etc. There is a very active parent of a highly gifted child that registeres for some other random math competes and she drives the interest of other student and parents.

The school also has a Science Olympiad Team that is 99% dependent on parent volunteering the coaching sessions. Its a very big time commitment for both students and parents. The school is mostly hands off. Other than registering for the actual competitions, they do not do much. We asked the school for more help but the red tape and "equity" consideration is what we get in replies.

We the parents need to ask for more. I am thinking that if next year we do not have parents involved in science Olympiad, we might loose the team altogether. Its unfortunate because students wants this sort of competitions and when we go to state competes, Howard County schools are gathering all the prizes. They value stem education much more than MCPS.[/quote]

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