Reply to HB Woodlawn provides unfair advantage to students for college since no intensified classes

Forum Index » VA Public Schools other than FCPS

Reply to "HB Woodlawn provides unfair advantage to students for college since no intensified classes"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don't think its a good idea for kids to take this many APs, anyhow. If they are really college-level classes, albeit spread over 2 semesters, that's a lot of work. I--like most people--took 4 college level classes per semester in college, and was not juggling 2 or 3 OTHER classes that had homework, papers, tests, etc. I never took higher level math, a lab science, reading and paper-heavy English and social science, and a language in the same semester. [/quote]
This is LITERALLY OP’s point.

The arms race for most AP and IB courses is exhausting, but if you don’t compete with your peers, you are no longer “most rigorous path”.

Meanwhile over at HB, kids don’t have to kill themselves because their peers simply can’t load up and escalate the AP course load. 
[/quote]

No I'm saying I never took higher level math + a lab science + reading and paper-heavy English + a social science + a language in the same semester [u]in college[/u] and I think it's kind of crazy that kids would do AP-level classes for all of those plus 2 or 3 other classes. For what? Read the college boards on Reddit, many of the kids doing this are miserable and the chances of getting in a top college are basically a crapshoot anyhow. Let them do a couple AP classes a year if they need/want the challenge but this loading up just to get their GPA up another tenth of a point or to go from "more rigorous" to "most rigorous" is crazy.

--mom of an H-b 11th grader and a current college student [/quote]
Look, if you expect a kid who takes 2-3 APs to be compared equally to a kid that has taken 10-12, you are delusional.  The kid taking the 10-12 APs either has higher aptitude or stronger work ethic (likely both) than the other kid.  If you want to get into a t-20 school, you're going to have to suck it up and play the game.  If t-20 isn't your goal, then you can relax a bit and not take such a demanding course load.  It is all about choices.  Don't be mad at the ambitious kids.  FYI - the ambitious kids at ANY of the APS high schools do just fine.  I don't really believe that any APS individual school gives a measurable advantage as far as I've seen.[/quote]
The point is the ambitious kids at HB don’t have take the boatload of AP because they don’t have peers trying to. So not an advantage for admission per se, but they get same opportunities with less effort. [/quote]

[b]Who are you talking to at HB?[/b] I have a senior there now and there is plenty of pressure for kids to take a boatload of AP classes. Most of my child's friends and academic peers will have taken 11-14 AP classes by the time they graduate. Is that not a big enough boatload for you to consider them peers to kids at other schools? [/quote]

This person isn't talking to anyone. They just have a beef about HB.[/quote]

OP has a point though. [b]The pressure to be a “top” student at WL is a lot higher than at HB, simply by the fact there are far fewer AP (and no IB) classes which means there is no advanced class arms race.[/b] Look at the PP, there are HB kids taking 6 APs, out of 14; you don’t think there are WL kids doing 6 AP/IB for much longer since they have like 40 advanced classes to mix and match. [/quote]

I've been to WL. This is not why it's a greater pressure cooker. It's just in the air there. You feel it when you walk in the door. Those kids are stressed and it's not all coming from the school. The kids do it to themselves, their parents contribute. The presence of IB there does add to it when you compare to the other schools; but it's a MUCH MUCH larger school - which makes it harder to be at the top right off the bat -  with a community constantly touting how incredibly great and top-notch and successful the school is yadda yadda.

Part of the lure of HBW program is precisely the "freedom" students have - the atmosphere is much more casual and relaxed. That doesn't mean students aren't taking a substantial courseload, or a workload less than high achieving students at YHS or WHS. The only difference is WL because of IB, making it the school with the most rigorous offerings. However, I would argue AT is a very demanding program and gets shafted in this whole debate.

Nevertheless, I'd say the problem is WL. It's the one with higher expectations and greater pressure on its students. E[b]liminate the ability of any WL student to access individual IB classes and see what impact that has. Make IB a truly separate program. [/b]OP is wrong. Non-full IB WL students are the ones with the advantages, if anyone.[/quote]

I don't think this would really make much difference. [b]WL already offers AP versions of most of the IB classes. There are just a few that are only IB and if it became IB-only-for-diploma students, there would be pressure for those teachers to just do another section as AP.[/b] Both my kids only took 1 IB class + the rest AP. Those were IBs that didn't have an AP alternative offered -- Economics, and Environmental Science. But AP alternatives do exist and WL could choose to offer those if there was enough demand.

I do think the pressure mostly comes from more high-achieving kids transferring in for the IB program, which ratchets things up for everyone. Even if the IB students took all their classes together in 11-12th, not with other WL students, they are all mixed together in 9-10th. I insisted my kids limit to 3 APs in junior year (they have ADHD) and they thought that was seen as a really light schedule, which is ridiculous. We also did not focus on talking about college, pushing for prestigious schools, etc. but DD still absorbed that from her peers. I realized in 10th grade we need to start being a lot more explicit about how there are many colleges where she could get a great education for her interests while still taking a healthy-for-her schedule. [/quote]

Then it doesn't seem IB is worth continuing. Not many graduate with an IB diploma, and you're saying there aren't many IB-only classes anyway. Save the money and eliminate the program.

I don't think it's fair or right to blame the relative handful of IB transfer students for the pressure. That's ludicrous. If you don't let the outsiders in, things would be fine? I don't buy that for a minute.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics