Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

Strange AP Euro history is 10th for our school AP bio usually jr. year

Anonymous wrote:Agree. SLACS were simply larger boarding schools. However, for my colleagues at the larger Phillip Academies in Exeter, NH and Andover, MA, some SLACs became too small too soon in their collegiate experience.

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Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

That’s true. Math, Chem, English, History, and Philosophy also had a reputation for being very difficult. Tutorials were super challenging (but equally rewarding) no matter the subject!

Yes, it’s always fun talking to people from non-lacs and relaying that history was one of, if not the hardest majors at my college too. First semester did an upper level history seminar and got destroyed in the process, but it was a good class

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

That’s true. Math, Chem, English, History, and Philosophy also had a reputation for being very difficult. Tutorials were super challenging (but equally rewarding) no matter the subject!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

But nonsense APs like HUG, Art History and CS Principles aren’t hard and I can’t imagine were required by your school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a colossal reading load in college but learned to read parts closely / skim others / not read parts at all, and I notice that my kid (freshman at a SLAC) doesn’t have those gears yet. It’s a crucial skill in the humanities.

This. Also, my DC who's an English/Poli Sci major has learned to make sure at least one class every semester is less reading-heavy.

I went to one of these schools (but I’m 30s now) and was going to post to this effect. Both my rather intense boarding school high school and my LAC had reading that was near impossible to do in full - but I got good at prioritization. My grades improved most my last two years after major specialization really was underway and graduated with high honors etc

Anonymous wrote:Four classes, none of which are STEM, are typically not overwhelming. My guess is that your dd’s high school was not particularly rigorous and it will take her a a semester or two to catch up, just be patient and support her, she’ll figure it out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.

I think very few people cruise through a physics major in general.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are their experiences like? I have one at one of these schools and she has been extremely busy with assignments and stuff. She was a self-driven, top student in high school with excellent academic records. She hasn't decided on her major yet. This semester she selected a course in philosophy, economics, environmental studies, and a seminar course. What she didn't expect is the amount of reading and writing required for each class. She sleeps maybe 6 hours a night or less during the week. She studies on weekends. She reads while doing laundry. She made quite a few friends, likes many of her teachers, enjoys campus events and a campus job. Her grades are fine, but she has to work so very, very hard I have to watch out for burnout. What are your kids' experience like? Any thoughts or advice? Thanks.

I think if you were to s private high school these SLAC are no big deal and actually easier.

lol. According to previous posters it’s “toxic” to admit this. You have to pretend there’s zero difference in the workload between public and private schools, lest you be accused of being elitest scum, by people who definitely don’t have a chip on their shoulders.

All the top private school people I meet are…mediocre at best. College is full of Lakeside, Harvard Westlake, Choate, Philips Academy, yada yada. So many of them struggle more than those of us who went to Public magnet schools. Private elites are great if you want to slack your way into an elite school through school recognition, but,

I had the experience of being the near bottom middle of my high school class with 19 APs and a 3.8. Private school kids’ jaws drop when they hear about the workload at top magnet schools, because it’s not a paradise for your elite kids to stress about whether they’re going to take up lacrosse or join an extra seminar- magnet schools are an abysmal grind and take real work to get through. Sure, I wasn’t reading 300 pages of Faulkner every night, but college is 12x easier than balancing 9 Ap classes and 2 jobs with school clubs. Overall, college challenges all of us, but it has nice enough amenities everywhere that it doesn’t feel like you do much at all.

How and why do you take 19 AP classes? Is this the Magnet school's approach (similar to Basis)?

Not trying to go into too many details, but yes a lot of magnet schools have very AP-rigorous courseloads, and mine happened to have students who did that many APs very often (nearly that many on average). None of my classes were actual AP classes however- many teachers with masters and PhDs in their subject, so it’s just a familiar course description for colleges to look at.

Just trying to understand how you get there without taking the nonsense AP classes like Psych or Human Geography.

Assuming you can take AP Science starting Frosh…that’s 4, plus 2 English, plus language, plus I assume you just take AP BC and Stats, 5 History/Gov…that’s still only 14.

Maybe AP art and music?

We had a lot of those “nonsense” required classes, but they’re fine for freshman. Here’s how I did it:

Freshman: ApHug

Sophomore: French Lang, Spanish Lang, World History, CS-Applications

Junior: Physics 1/2, Calc Ab, Spanish Lit, Stats, APUSH, English Lang, Chem (never took the exam)

Senior: Bio, Calc BC, European History, Government, Macro/Micro (never took the exam for micro), Physics C:Mech/E&M, English Lit, Art History(didn’t take exam for this one)

The not taking exam part is just me being tired of taking many exams in a row or getting sick.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Big 3 big shit. No comparison to Blair Magnet. My kids worked hard at the latter and are breezing through Swarthmore and Amherst. Both double majors Engineering or Biophysics + Economics. Both athletes all years and team captains both high school and college. They worked hard in high school and college; however, acknowledged the high leg up the received from a nurturing home and in public high school. What's this Big 3 nonsense!

Calm down, Lauren. Nobody is saying that your precious and perfect children missed out on even the tiniest shred of advantage by going to Blair Magnet. You can sleep tonight.

Anonymous wrote:I went to Williams after attending a top MCPS magnet high school. I was told many, many times that college would be easy in comparison. This was NOT true in the end. Granted, I was a physics major, but college was on a very different level even for reading/writing based classes. The majority of my classmates went to normal public high schools and struggled at first, but were on track after a few semesters.