Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

FCPS is about 40% white.
A disproportionate number of non-pool kids that get into AAP are white.
The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined.
The number of school designated AAP students are also disproportionately white.
White students are slightly less likely to make it out of pool than other groups (particularly URM groups)
White students are disproportionately more likely to appeal whether they make it into pool or not.

I'm sure this is true county-wide, but my white child is by far the minority in his AAP program and is the only white child in the classroom. DC is now showing interest in Cricket, so starting to research finding youth leagues for that!

However on your statistics above, 40% white (the highest %) and "The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined." doesn't sound unreasonable. That's barely skewed at all...

Your bottom 2 stats also go hand-in-hand... If they're less likely to make it into AAP after being in-pool, they should be the most likely to appeal.

Not sure what you're trying to represent with those stats, but it's coming off to me as "whites aren't being equally treated and minorities (under-represented or otherwise) are given an advantage/priority"

I don't necessarily think that's true, but those statements/statistics can be interpreted different ways.

I would guess that a lot of the kids who are in pool are kids receiving Level II services because they were identified on the NNAT or are likely to have higher iReadys. That means they are on the AARTs radar and the Teachers have some idea that they are ahead. That could influence GBRS/HOPE scores and means that they kids have different types of work samples to draw from.

Anonymous wrote:My understanding is that it doesn't really improve one's chances and children can be in pool and not get into AAP.

In pool kids are guaranteed consideration, not guaranteed admissions. The "holistic" process, which I'm sure everyone has heard about, then kicks in and the kids are reviewed in totality based on HOPE, samples, scores. (And, most importantly, the # of LIV kids a center can accommodate. Everyone will tell you this isn't the case, but it very much so is the case for anyone who has dug into this in detail.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In-Pool means that a child is guaranteed to be considered, regardless of a parent’s choosing to submit an application. It is meant to catch kids whose parents don’t know about AAP for whatever reason.

I believe the last audit of the program showed something like 2/3 of the kids in-pool were accepted into AAP. The kids are in-pool because they meet at least one of the basic criteria for admittance, in this case it is the test scores.

That said, a good number of kids are accepted into AAP who are parent referred but the likelihood of acceptance from that group of kids is less then the kids in-pool.

Does it matter? Yes, for the kids whose parents don’t know about AAP, it matters because they will be looked at and could be placed in a more challenging environment. The in-pool kids have a greater chance of being accepted because they have higher test scores. Is it the end all and be all? No.

Not surprising because these testing instrument are suppose to assess who will do well in AAP. But then they say 70% of the screened kids come from teacher or parent referrals (see link upthread). They don't make it clear if there is overlap between the two groups, but there surely is. Since parents don't know if their kids are in-pool until it's too late to referral, a whole lot of unnecessary referrals are made. Sure, parents might provide additional information not known to the school, but I think a lot of it is superfluous, irrelevant, or just not given as much weight as the school's info, work samples, etc. If we knew the CogAT score, the HOPE "score," and the in-pool designation earlier, we might choose not to "parent refer" as the outcome should be predictable if you have "HOPE" and the test scores. Let the parents who need to rebut the HOPE do the parent referrals and save everyone a lot of work.

Our AART said absolutely even if you know in advance your kid is in pool you should provide the parent information. This board used to be convinced (like you) that parent referrals and work samples weren't given much weight, but I feel like that has shifted in the past 2 years or so. There have just been so many stories of kids with below-pool-cutoff scores who got in with strong parent referrals versus kids whose parents didn't do anything who had high scores and didn't.

I think the answer is that ever ES in the county sends people to the central committee and you really never know how those 6 people who review your school's packets tend to think that year.

I started a thread a few years ago about my kid getting rejected with a 99th percentile cogat. He was already receiving AAP services. I assumed he would get in and did not do any parent supplements. He was rejected. I assumed he had a bad GBRS but I got the packet and his teacher gave him high praise. The work samples the school submitted on his behalf were terrible. My son has had handwriting and did not show his best work. I’m still not sure if it was an error but there was a math worksheet that was included that had wrong answers on it. Seems wrong to include a math worksheet as his best work when it included incorrect work. Shrug .

He got in on appeal.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

FCPS is about 40% white.
A disproportionate number of non-pool kids that get into AAP are white.
The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined.
The number of school designated AAP students are also disproportionately white.
White students are slightly less likely to make it out of pool than other groups (particularly URM groups)
White students are disproportionately more likely to appeal whether they make it into pool or not.

Sounds likely, but are these stats going back to 2020, or do you have another source to share?

This is all from 2020.

I wish they would release new stats, post-local norms and other changes, to see if it helped them with their goal of increasing URMs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

FCPS is about 40% white.
A disproportionate number of non-pool kids that get into AAP are white.
The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined.
The number of school designated AAP students are also disproportionately white.
White students are slightly less likely to make it out of pool than other groups (particularly URM groups)
White students are disproportionately more likely to appeal whether they make it into pool or not.

Sounds likely, but are these stats going back to 2020, or do you have another source to share?

This is all from 2020.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Ok, so if it doesn't matter at all, what is the point in notifying us about it? We will already know our child's scores.

The automatic referral system is designed to refer all eligible kids, regardless the family is aware of AAP process or not. Let's say there is a prodigy in a family that has no bandwidth or language ability to care about AAP selection, that child meet the in-pool criteria and will be referred regardless family did anything or not. Of course if the child is referred as in-pool, the family needs to be notified in case the child was later accepted for AAP.

That is all. The notification and in-pool referral is not meant for upper middle class family that is common on DCUM. Of course you'd say what's the point?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

FCPS is about 40% white.
A disproportionate number of non-pool kids that get into AAP are white.
The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined.
The number of school designated AAP students are also disproportionately white.
White students are slightly less likely to make it out of pool than other groups (particularly URM groups)
White students are disproportionately more likely to appeal whether they make it into pool or not.

Sounds likely, but are these stats going back to 2020, or do you have another source to share?

Anonymous wrote:It means nothing. Many kids get into AAP with lower test score not in pool. Many in pool kids do not get in. These days teacher info and iready seem to be the biggest factors.

The iReady part is DCUM speculation. The teacher rating (GBRS before, now HOPE) being the biggest factor was proven via stats in the external review conducted in 2020 - and was not something that review recommended changing, so it's probably still the case.

It means nothing. Many kids get into AAP with lower test score not in pool. Many in pool kids do not get in. These days teacher info and iready seem to be the biggest factors.

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

FCPS is about 40% white.
A disproportionate number of non-pool kids that get into AAP are white.
The number of white parental referrals for their non-pool kids is as much as the rest of the county combined.
The number of school designated AAP students are also disproportionately white.
White students are slightly less likely to make it out of pool than other groups (particularly URM groups)
White students are disproportionately more likely to appeal whether they make it into pool or not.

Anonymous wrote:The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

Hah! That about sums it up!

The benefit of being in-pool is that you can be lazy and not have to submit a package for your child.

In addition, if your child doesn't get in, you can be indignant and complain about DEI efforts that are watering down what should be a qualification based approach, and start the 1000th fight here on DCUM over again.

On a positive, I guess it does give an opportunity for a lot of "new" info for the appeal at least.

Single data point, but neither of my AAP kids were in pool.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In-Pool means that a child is guaranteed to be considered, regardless of a parent’s choosing to submit an application. It is meant to catch kids whose parents don’t know about AAP for whatever reason.

I believe the last audit of the program showed something like 2/3 of the kids in-pool were accepted into AAP. The kids are in-pool because they meet at least one of the basic criteria for admittance, in this case it is the test scores.

That said, a good number of kids are accepted into AAP who are parent referred but the likelihood of acceptance from that group of kids is less then the kids in-pool.

Does it matter? Yes, for the kids whose parents don’t know about AAP, it matters because they will be looked at and could be placed in a more challenging environment. The in-pool kids have a greater chance of being accepted because they have higher test scores. Is it the end all and be all? No.

Not surprising because these testing instrument are suppose to assess who will do well in AAP. But then they say 70% of the screened kids come from teacher or parent referrals (see link upthread). They don't make it clear if there is overlap between the two groups, but there surely is. Since parents don't know if their kids are in-pool until it's too late to referral, a whole lot of unnecessary referrals are made. Sure, parents might provide additional information not known to the school, but I think a lot of it is superfluous, irrelevant, or just not given as much weight as the school's info, work samples, etc. If we knew the CogAT score, the HOPE "score," and the in-pool designation earlier, we might choose not to "parent refer" as the outcome should be predictable if you have "HOPE" and the test scores. Let the parents who need to rebut the HOPE do the parent referrals and save everyone a lot of work.

Our AART said absolutely even if you know in advance your kid is in pool you should provide the parent information. This board used to be convinced (like you) that parent referrals and work samples weren't given much weight, but I feel like that has shifted in the past 2 years or so. There have just been so many stories of kids with below-pool-cutoff scores who got in with strong parent referrals versus kids whose parents didn't do anything who had high scores and didn't.

I think the answer is that ever ES in the county sends people to the central committee and you really never know how those 6 people who review your school's packets tend to think that year.