Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Depends on what you mean. All mcps schools have more or less the same academic opportunities. The test score averages by which some people rate school quality are just a reflection of an area's overall SES. In HS, that matters a lot less since low and high-performing kids self-segregate.

NP here - can you pls explain this to me; just trying to understand, since we are also looking at both Pyle/ Whitman and Westland/BCC. Why does high SES affect the test score average?
thanks!

There are many reasons why test scores can be affected by SES, among them:

Children from low-SES families are less likely to have experiences that encourage the development of fundamental skills of reading acquisition, such as phonological awareness, vocabulary, and oral language (Buckingham, Wheldall, & Beaman-Wheldall, 2013).

Children’s initial reading competency is correlated with the home literacy environment, number of books owned, and parent distress (Aikens & Barbarin, 2008; Bergen, Zuijen, Bishop, & Jong, 2016). However, poor households have less access to learning materials and experiences, including books, computers, stimulating toys, skill-building lessons, or tutors to create a positive literacy environment (Bradley, Corwyn, McAdoo, & García Coll, 2001; Orr, 2003).

Prospective college students from low-SES backgrounds are less likely to have access to informational resources about college (Brown, Wohn, & Ellison , 2016). Additionally, compared to high-SES counterparts, young adults from low-SES backgrounds are at a higher risk of accruing student loan debt burdens that exceed the national average (Houle, 2014).

https://www.apa.org/pi/ses/resources/publications/education

Thank you, but then I still do not understand -sorry, not from here. Does this then not affect the actual quality of learning/academics at school? People here seem to say that BCC and Whitman are similarly good. But one scores at 7/10 on Greatschools, the other one 9 or 10.

Anonymous wrote:Greetings,
We are relocating this month to the area and will get several months of corporate housing through my partner's job (and eventually will officially relocate to a permanent home.) Job is downtown DC and we have options in BCC, Whitman, and possibly Jackson Reed. All get top scores on Great Schools. We have a rising 9th-grade boy who is coming from a large public school in Florida. Are each of these schools similar in culture & personality? They seem to be similar in size. Leaning towards BCC because of the convenience of the apartment (and extra bathroom) but open. Ideally, we would have done school visits with actual kids in the building. If your kid attends any of the schools mentioned will you tell me something you like about the school? I don't need to hear the bad- all schools are not perfect but we would like to get the lay of the land.

BCC is a great place to lean. We are in the apartments right near the school and it is great set up for the kids. They are able to come home for lunch or open periods (BCC has an open campus).

Anonymous wrote:Greetings,
We are relocating this month to the area and will get several months of corporate housing through my partner's job (and eventually will officially relocate to a permanent home.) Job is downtown DC and we have options in BCC, Whitman, and possibly Jackson Reed. All get top scores on Great Schools. We have a rising 9th-grade boy who is coming from a large public school in Florida. Are each of these schools similar in culture & personality? They seem to be similar in size. Leaning towards BCC because of the convenience of the apartment (and extra bathroom) but open. Ideally, we would have done school visits with actual kids in the building. If your kid attends any of the schools mentioned will you tell me something you like about the school? I don't need to hear the bad- all schools are not perfect but we would like to get the lay of the land.

Without knowing more about the large public school in Florida - hard to compare. Both MCPS schools are top schools for academics - offering a full menu of AP classes, (and IB in the case of BCC), interesting extracurriculars, competitive sports programs (although football is not the same thing as it is down South). BCC has a brand new renovation that is pretty impressive and off-campus lunch. Whitman is in the relative burbs - nowhere to go off-campus. Wilson (Jackson-Reed) is well-known as the best DCPS high school - with good AP offerings and good sports programs. It is more SES diverse than either Whitman or BCC. BCC is more SES diverse than Whitman. Although its dated - the book the Overachievers by Alexandra Robbins is about Whitman in the 1990s. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00JJ9QMWI/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 Although there have been incremental changes - I think this still provides an interesting look at the type of school that Whitman (and to some extent BCC) is.

All of these schools had a much different philosophy regarding COVID than what has been reported for Florida schools - so there was virtual learning (and isolation) for alot longer - and there have been gaps in learning and emotional issues as a result - I think most have caught up/recovered as of last year, but you may see some of that as well.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Depends on what you mean. All mcps schools have more or less the same academic opportunities. The test score averages by which some people rate school quality are just a reflection of an area's overall SES. In HS, that matters a lot less since low and high-performing kids self-segregate.

NP here - can you pls explain this to me; just trying to understand, since we are also looking at both Pyle/ Whitman and Westland/BCC. Why does high SES affect the test score average?
thanks!

There are many reasons why test scores can be affected by SES, among them:

Children from low-SES families are less likely to have experiences that encourage the development of fundamental skills of reading acquisition, such as phonological awareness, vocabulary, and oral language (Buckingham, Wheldall, & Beaman-Wheldall, 2013).

Children’s initial reading competency is correlated with the home literacy environment, number of books owned, and parent distress (Aikens & Barbarin, 2008; Bergen, Zuijen, Bishop, & Jong, 2016). However, poor households have less access to learning materials and experiences, including books, computers, stimulating toys, skill-building lessons, or tutors to create a positive literacy environment (Bradley, Corwyn, McAdoo, & García Coll, 2001; Orr, 2003).

Prospective college students from low-SES backgrounds are less likely to have access to informational resources about college (Brown, Wohn, & Ellison , 2016). Additionally, compared to high-SES counterparts, young adults from low-SES backgrounds are at a higher risk of accruing student loan debt burdens that exceed the national average (Houle, 2014).

https://www.apa.org/pi/ses/resources/publications/education

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Which part of the word "better" you did not understand?
It's OK, we know racists don't like diversity

It’s okay, we know you like to inject racism into everything.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Depends on what you mean. All mcps schools have more or less the same academic opportunities. The test score averages by which some people rate school quality are just a reflection of an area's overall SES. In HS, that matters a lot less since low and high-performing kids self-segregate.

NP here - can you pls explain this to me; just trying to understand, since we are also looking at both Pyle/ Whitman and Westland/BCC. Why does high SES affect the test score average?
thanks!

Anonymous wrote:People move from DC to Moco for Whitman and BCC. No one has ever moved to DC from Moco for Wilson (I bet).

Probably true. But, a lot of people opt to stay in DC instead of moving to Bethesda.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Depends on what you mean. All mcps schools have more or less the same academic opportunities. The test score averages by which some people rate school quality are just a reflection of an area's overall SES. In HS, that matters a lot less since low and high-performing kids self-segregate.

Mother of a rising 10th grader at BCC. We are pretty happy there other than an awful counselor but that was very easy to switch because apparently everyone knew she was awful.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is a 4 x 4 schedule?

half the classes every other day

I believe they just have four classes in their entirety first semester and then four other classes second semester.

https://www.wilsonhs.org/m/bell_schedules/index.jsp?id=8716

Anonymous wrote:What is a 4 x 4 schedule?

half the classes every other day

What is a 4 x 4 schedule?

People move from DC to Moco for Whitman and BCC. No one has ever moved to DC from Moco for Wilson (I bet).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?

Which part of the word "better" you did not understand?
It's OK, we know racists don't like diversity

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County schools are not what they used to be. the great schools are not allowed to be great anymore because everyone has to be equal.

They are better and more diverse

The diverse thing is tired. Is school no longer about academics?