Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

+1 I think most parents would be fine if MCPS got rid of the magnets (or some of the magnets) but also reinstated differentiated and cohorted instruction beginning in 6th grade. Right now, any kid who wants an above-the-baseline education needs to get into a magnet because MCPS doesn't offer differentiated instruction until 11th grade.

If MCPS would like to change that stance, and go back to magnets only for the absolute most advanced/hardest working kids, it would be controversial but ultimately fine. The problem is that MCPS is headed in the direction of MORE Honors for All, not LESS.

Sure they do. It’s called Honors and AP classes and electives. More importantly, all HS, including private have core classes that are expected to be taken and most students tackle those in 9th and 10th grade. That’s not some MCPS failing.

Honors is neither accelerated nor cohorted at this point. It's on-level. So your only choice is AP, which is not always available to 9th and 10th graders.

Anonymous wrote:I wonder if MCPS has given thought to reducing its HS magnet and special programs offerings. There are certainly a lot of benefits that could be had from doing so.

It's no different than special eduction. All children deserve to be taught at an appropriate level.

Anonymous wrote:While they’re at it, they can break up mcps—it’s too big. And widen access to sports—it is unfair that so few can be on the team. And increase the quality of ELA in MS so that it’s rigorous and challenging. Offer vouchers so students aren’t stuck in a classroom full of disruptive students where little learning can be done, or with a bad teacher, etc.

Listen if you're mad that your kid can't get into a magnet or get on to even a JV sports team, move to someplace like Charles, Calvert, or Carroll. Your kid will be top of the pile and never have to learn that not everyone gets to do everything until they're 18, and the real world comes crashing down.

If they get rid of magnets and special programs, the school district will go down the tubes even further and quickly. You'll see more educated parents pull their kids out and put them in private, or move (I'd move; we both wfh). Test scores will go down even more. If you think spending an additional $2K per child is going to raise test scores, you are deluded.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

MCPS is a lot bigger than either of those districts. There are a lot of educated parents around here with high achieving students, but also a lot of low income students who not only can't perform at grade level but whose parents don't speak English, and a ton of kids in between.

There is no way to have high standards for all without causing even more students to not be able to achieve at grade level. HoCo can do have high standards because they have lower FARMS population compared to MCPS.

Taking away magnet programs hurts the high achieving students. We moved here specifically for the magnets because the wealthy school district we moved from lacked the population size to have gifted programs; it was a tiny school district, and the state kept cutting school funding (CA). Despite being wealthy, there weren't that many gifted students.

Very glad that MCPS has magnet programs. I have a lot of criticism for MCPS, but the special programs isn't one of them. Rather, I think they should have more so even more kids who can and want to can have the opportunity to be in those special programs.

But you clearly highlighted the problem. How is it you expect MCPS to have more programs despite not being a homogeneous population of wealth or even UMC? Further it’s a school district like any other that faces budget cuts and policies it must follow. Not to mention the general mandate to educate all kids in the district to a pre-determined state basic level.

They managed to open up the regional IBs. They are going to put some special program in Woodward and Crown.

They seem to be able to figure it out.

"Educating" students seems to be a loose term to some. Lowering the bar is still "educating" all students, but is that what a top notch school district should be aiming for?

As a PP stated, if all schools can provide actual differentiation in the classroom, then you might have a point. But, that's not what's happening. The Global Humanities program that MCPS tried to provide as a conciliation prize for the MS magnet lottery is a joke. My kid was in it. And some schools have such a small high achieving group there is no way to provide such differentiation instruction; they don't have the space or the staff to do so.

So, tell me how MCPS could provide the type of differentiation instruction in all schools without increasing the budget for staff and space?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

+1 I think most parents would be fine if MCPS got rid of the magnets (or some of the magnets) but also reinstated differentiated and cohorted instruction beginning in 6th grade. Right now, any kid who wants an above-the-baseline education needs to get into a magnet because MCPS doesn't offer differentiated instruction until 11th grade.

If MCPS would like to change that stance, and go back to magnets only for the absolute most advanced/hardest working kids, it would be controversial but ultimately fine. The problem is that MCPS is headed in the direction of MORE Honors for All, not LESS.

Sure they do. It’s called Honors and AP classes and electives. More importantly, all HS, including private have core classes that are expected to be taken and most students tackle those in 9th and 10th grade. That’s not some MCPS failing.

Honors is a joke. Please don't say that in public, or you'll get laughed at.

But, APs, I agree with. However, freshman and sophomores have limited APs that they can take. Opens up more once they hit junior year.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

MCPS is a lot bigger than either of those districts. There are a lot of educated parents around here with high achieving students, but also a lot of low income students who not only can't perform at grade level but whose parents don't speak English, and a ton of kids in between.

There is no way to have high standards for all without causing even more students to not be able to achieve at grade level. HoCo can do have high standards because they have lower FARMS population compared to MCPS.

Taking away magnet programs hurts the high achieving students. We moved here specifically for the magnets because the wealthy school district we moved from lacked the population size to have gifted programs; it was a tiny school district, and the state kept cutting school funding (CA). Despite being wealthy, there weren't that many gifted students.

Very glad that MCPS has magnet programs. I have a lot of criticism for MCPS, but the special programs isn't one of them. Rather, I think they should have more so even more kids who can and want to can have the opportunity to be in those special programs.

But you clearly highlighted the problem. How is it you expect MCPS to have more programs despite not being a homogeneous population of wealth or even UMC? Further it’s a school district like any other that faces budget cuts and policies it must follow. Not to mention the general mandate to educate all kids in the district to a pre-determined state basic level.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

+1 I think most parents would be fine if MCPS got rid of the magnets (or some of the magnets) but also reinstated differentiated and cohorted instruction beginning in 6th grade. Right now, any kid who wants an above-the-baseline education needs to get into a magnet because MCPS doesn't offer differentiated instruction until 11th grade.

If MCPS would like to change that stance, and go back to magnets only for the absolute most advanced/hardest working kids, it would be controversial but ultimately fine. The problem is that MCPS is headed in the direction of MORE Honors for All, not LESS.

Sure they do. It’s called Honors and AP classes and electives. More importantly, all HS, including private have core classes that are expected to be taken and most students tackle those in 9th and 10th grade. That’s not some MCPS failing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

+1 I think most parents would be fine if MCPS got rid of the magnets (or some of the magnets) but also reinstated differentiated and cohorted instruction beginning in 6th grade. Right now, any kid who wants an above-the-baseline education needs to get into a magnet because MCPS doesn't offer differentiated instruction until 11th grade.

If MCPS would like to change that stance, and go back to magnets only for the absolute most advanced/hardest working kids, it would be controversial but ultimately fine. The problem is that MCPS is headed in the direction of MORE Honors for All, not LESS.

But that would probably not be feasible, because you'd need to replicate magnet instruction in every school and hire a ton more teachers who are capable of teaching to that level - please be aware that a lot of teachers aren't that bright, and MCPS has difficulty hiring to begin with! The magnets deal with that problem by centralizing accelerated instruction so that it costs less and you don't need that many gifted teachers.

Not saying I wouldn't like home school "magnets" - it would be wonderful to not have a longer commute to a far-away school, and be able to stay with one's friends at the home school! But I think it's a slippery slope, because the school system might promise an equally ambitious program of instruction for the top performers in every school, and then predictably fail to follow through due to the reasons I mentioned above.

So... buyer beware!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

MCPS is a lot bigger than either of those districts. There are a lot of educated parents around here with high achieving students, but also a lot of low income students who not only can't perform at grade level but whose parents don't speak English, and a ton of kids in between.

There is no way to have high standards for all without causing even more students to not be able to achieve at grade level. HoCo can do have high standards because they have lower FARMS population compared to MCPS.

Taking away magnet programs hurts the high achieving students. We moved here specifically for the magnets because the wealthy school district we moved from lacked the population size to have gifted programs; it was a tiny school district, and the state kept cutting school funding (CA). Despite being wealthy, there weren't that many gifted students.

Very glad that MCPS has magnet programs. I have a lot of criticism for MCPS, but the special programs isn't one of them. Rather, I think they should have more so even more kids who can and want to can have the opportunity to be in those special programs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

+1 I think most parents would be fine if MCPS got rid of the magnets (or some of the magnets) but also reinstated differentiated and cohorted instruction beginning in 6th grade. Right now, any kid who wants an above-the-baseline education needs to get into a magnet because MCPS doesn't offer differentiated instruction until 11th grade.

If MCPS would like to change that stance, and go back to magnets only for the absolute most advanced/hardest working kids, it would be controversial but ultimately fine. The problem is that MCPS is headed in the direction of MORE Honors for All, not LESS.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Howard and Frederick county schools have more homogeneous student populations.
It's easier ***and cheaper*** to teach fewer levels of instruction when your students are less diverse in their origins, culture and background knowledge.

MCPS has more highly driven, intelligent students from highly-educated wealthy families working in close-in DC wisely deciding to forego private school, and more kids coming from truly indigent/war-torn backgrounds, and needs to reconcile instruction for all of them. Also, the educated families know to identify special needs early on and request special programs, services and accommodations. It creates a huge demand for all types of customization of instruction, hence the development of all sorts of support for gifted/accelerated/special needs/bilingual needs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

You cannot compare MCPS to Howard and Frederick. PG and Baltimore Counties both have over 100,000 students. MCPS has over 160,000. Compare MCPS to a similarly sized system. Howard and Frederick are roughly a third the size in student population.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Disagree. They should have more.

-parent of former RMIB student

Why should there be more of them? Most districts in the county don’t have as many special and magnet programs. Folks here complain about cost, not focusing on the basics, bussing, etc etc. Getting rid of these extra programs would allow more teachers to focus on “the basics” and lower the cost of transportation because kids wouldn’t be going to programs all across the county.

Howard and Frederick county don’t have all these specialized and magnet programs but are supposedly great school districts. Why should MCPS keep this up?

Because we ALL know that cancelling these programs would not result in a sudden improvement of curriculum and teaching at all schools. Instead, everyone would have low-level expectations and there would be no pathways for academic achievers who were not zoned for the affluent W schools. It would be incredibly regressive to cancel Blair or RMIB. If you authentically want to transition to a home-school model then you need to discuss how to ensure that each school has a rigorous and differentiated curriculum.

THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH MAGNET SEATS OR SPECIAL PROGRAM SUPPORT TO BEGIN WITH.

Gifted and special needs programs have had their funding cut over the years. Middle school magnets in particular are ridiculously inadequate for the number of very competent kids who would benefit. MCPS has pushed to reduce the number of accelerated kids in their home schools.

Finally, we need more alternative schools for violent kids. There are way too many sexual and physical assaults reported in MCPS schools because offenders are transferred from school to school, and keep on re-offending. There is one very inadequate alternative school where they can be placed for a short period of time, but due to lack of seats, they are rotated back into mainstream schools, where the cycle begins again. Pushing them out of the system entirely guarantees a life of crime, so we need more alternative schools to keep these kids until they get a high school diploma.

Central Office needs to lose the DEI and frou-frou PR stuff it spends millions on every single blasted year, and actually spend money where the kids need it!!!!

And if you're a shill from Central Office, get that message back to your overlords.