Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 21:55     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Probably because they don't want a situation where a host school has no kids in the actual program creating a "town vs. gown" type of situation where the host community resents the privileged selected few. It makes sense to me.


I could see that if the host school were guaranteed a PROPORTIONAL share of seats. But they were talking about giving 1 school out of 5, not 20% of seats, but 33%.


Yes, exactly. This would make sense. The issue is that people like Jeannie Franklin have somehow internalized the idea that "giving the host school extra seats is best" based on past examples of advanced academic magnets placed in high-FARMS schools, and apparently doesn't have the mental flexibility to realize that applying this to give Whitman more humanities seats than Northwood is outrageous.


What if Whitman doesn’t want a bunch of Northwood kids. There is two groups that need a balance struck.


What if your mom doesn’t want to admit she knows you?


How DCC of you


I saw your mom in the DCC. She told me she’s moving to Wheaton get away from you.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 21:51     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Probably because they don't want a situation where a host school has no kids in the actual program creating a "town vs. gown" type of situation where the host community resents the privileged selected few. It makes sense to me.


I could see that if the host school were guaranteed a PROPORTIONAL share of seats. But they were talking about giving 1 school out of 5, not 20% of seats, but 33%.


Yes, exactly. This would make sense. The issue is that people like Jeannie Franklin have somehow internalized the idea that "giving the host school extra seats is best" based on past examples of advanced academic magnets placed in high-FARMS schools, and apparently doesn't have the mental flexibility to realize that applying this to give Whitman more humanities seats than Northwood is outrageous.


What if Whitman doesn’t want a bunch of Northwood kids. There is two groups that need a balance struck.


Then you send your kids to a private school where you can control who your kids go to school with. Otherwise you share a county and a school district with the rest of us, and you don't get to decide who goes where.

But honestly, as distasteful as what you just said is, we probably all have aligned interests here. None of us want Whitman to host programs that are a highly desirable draw for students from other schools. Tell MCPS you don't want the humanities magnet and stick with some program no one else cares about, and we'll all be happy.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 21:27     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Probably because they don't want a situation where a host school has no kids in the actual program creating a "town vs. gown" type of situation where the host community resents the privileged selected few. It makes sense to me.


I could see that if the host school were guaranteed a PROPORTIONAL share of seats. But they were talking about giving 1 school out of 5, not 20% of seats, but 33%.


Yes, exactly. This would make sense. The issue is that people like Jeannie Franklin have somehow internalized the idea that "giving the host school extra seats is best" based on past examples of advanced academic magnets placed in high-FARMS schools, and apparently doesn't have the mental flexibility to realize that applying this to give Whitman more humanities seats than Northwood is outrageous.


What if Whitman doesn’t want a bunch of Northwood kids. There is two groups that need a balance struck.


What if your mom doesn’t want to admit she knows you?


How DCC of you
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 21:10     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Probably because they don't want a situation where a host school has no kids in the actual program creating a "town vs. gown" type of situation where the host community resents the privileged selected few. It makes sense to me.


I could see that if the host school were guaranteed a PROPORTIONAL share of seats. But they were talking about giving 1 school out of 5, not 20% of seats, but 33%.


Yes, exactly. This would make sense. The issue is that people like Jeannie Franklin have somehow internalized the idea that "giving the host school extra seats is best" based on past examples of advanced academic magnets placed in high-FARMS schools, and apparently doesn't have the mental flexibility to realize that applying this to give Whitman more humanities seats than Northwood is outrageous.


What if Whitman doesn’t want a bunch of Northwood kids. There is two groups that need a balance struck.


What if your mom doesn’t want to admit she knows you?
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 21:07     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Probably because they don't want a situation where a host school has no kids in the actual program creating a "town vs. gown" type of situation where the host community resents the privileged selected few. It makes sense to me.


I could see that if the host school were guaranteed a PROPORTIONAL share of seats. But they were talking about giving 1 school out of 5, not 20% of seats, but 33%.


Yes, exactly. This would make sense. The issue is that people like Jeannie Franklin have somehow internalized the idea that "giving the host school extra seats is best" based on past examples of advanced academic magnets placed in high-FARMS schools, and apparently doesn't have the mental flexibility to realize that applying this to give Whitman more humanities seats than Northwood is outrageous.


What if Whitman doesn’t want a bunch of Northwood kids. There is two groups that need a balance struck.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 20:11     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me the rationale for host school "set-asides" for seats in magnet programs? I believe for example the Richard Montgomery IB program currently does this for in-bound students. But to my knowledge, Blair's SMCS program does not - do I have that right?

I was kind of gobsmacked to hear at today's BoE meeting that they want to continue this practice, which seems totally inequitable to me, in the future 6 region model. It was kind of hard to follow with numbers being thrown around quickly without a lot of discussion on it, but what I think I caught was that they were thinking of having ~30 seats per program allocated to the host school for in-boundary students, and then another ~60 seats allocated for the 4 other schools in a particular reason. So you'd have twice the odds of admittance if you live in-boundary for that school's program. That seems to go against the entire idea of what they say they want to do, which is reduce the current inequitable access to magnet programs.


Your numbers are slightly off. They said 25-30 for this particular program in this particular school would be for home school students, which is I think is loosely based on whatever the current proportion is now of students in that school so those folks don’t lose or gain seats. That region only has 4 schools so each of the 3 other schools would get 20 seats although it’s unclear whether it’s a quota or just an estimate to arrive at a total. The difference between 20 seats and 25-30 seats is not huge/significant and may just reflect what they assume will be greater interest by kids who are already zoned and don’t want to move schools.

But yeah, the set asides thing has always been unfair and I am so tired of MCPS using unfair ways of selecting kids when they have more logical tools.


If the kids are at this particular school they can often just access the classes which makes it unfair.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 17:44     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:Currently, MCPS uses school-blind admissions for everyone but the home school applicants. As a result, a quarter of the kids in Blair’s SMCS program are from Wooton. Churchill and Wooton each have disproportionate representation at RM.

MCPS hasn’t said anything about per-cluster parity in the new programs. It could turn into situation where one or two middle schools in a region get most or all of the available seats.

that's because more students from those schools apply.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 16:01     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me the rationale for host school "set-asides" for seats in magnet programs? I believe for example the Richard Montgomery IB program currently does this for in-bound students. But to my knowledge, Blair's SMCS program does not - do I have that right?

I was kind of gobsmacked to hear at today's BoE meeting that they want to continue this practice, which seems totally inequitable to me, in the future 6 region model. It was kind of hard to follow with numbers being thrown around quickly without a lot of discussion on it, but what I think I caught was that they were thinking of having ~30 seats per program allocated to the host school for in-boundary students, and then another ~60 seats allocated for the 4 other schools in a particular reason. So you'd have twice the odds of admittance if you live in-boundary for that school's program. That seems to go against the entire idea of what they say they want to do, which is reduce the current inequitable access to magnet programs.


Your numbers are slightly off. They said 25-30 for this particular program in this particular school would be for home school students, which is I think is loosely based on whatever the current proportion is now of students in that school so those folks don’t lose or gain seats. That region only has 4 schools so each of the 3 other schools would get 20 seats although it’s unclear whether it’s a quota or just an estimate to arrive at a total. The difference between 20 seats and 25-30 seats is not huge/significant and may just reflect what they assume will be greater interest by kids who are already zoned and don’t want to move schools.

But yeah, the set asides thing has always been unfair and I am so tired of MCPS using unfair ways of selecting kids when they have more logical tools.


MCPS only uses a single data point for MaP-R or Map-M to select kids (along with their grades but there isn’t that much variation in grades as we know.) so it’s not like they are choosing robust ways to select kids anyway-even if they didn’t have set asides that some people consider “unfair.”

Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 13:31     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me the rationale for host school "set-asides" for seats in magnet programs? I believe for example the Richard Montgomery IB program currently does this for in-bound students. But to my knowledge, Blair's SMCS program does not - do I have that right?

I was kind of gobsmacked to hear at today's BoE meeting that they want to continue this practice, which seems totally inequitable to me, in the future 6 region model. It was kind of hard to follow with numbers being thrown around quickly without a lot of discussion on it, but what I think I caught was that they were thinking of having ~30 seats per program allocated to the host school for in-boundary students, and then another ~60 seats allocated for the 4 other schools in a particular reason. So you'd have twice the odds of admittance if you live in-boundary for that school's program. That seems to go against the entire idea of what they say they want to do, which is reduce the current inequitable access to magnet programs.


It's a very poor idea to have a set aside for host school. Let it be fair for all kids irrespective of thier home address. Kids have no control over where they live and where these programs are placed.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 13:13     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me the rationale for host school "set-asides" for seats in magnet programs? I believe for example the Richard Montgomery IB program currently does this for in-bound students. But to my knowledge, Blair's SMCS program does not - do I have that right?

I was kind of gobsmacked to hear at today's BoE meeting that they want to continue this practice, which seems totally inequitable to me, in the future 6 region model. It was kind of hard to follow with numbers being thrown around quickly without a lot of discussion on it, but what I think I caught was that they were thinking of having ~30 seats per program allocated to the host school for in-boundary students, and then another ~60 seats allocated for the 4 other schools in a particular reason. So you'd have twice the odds of admittance if you live in-boundary for that school's program. That seems to go against the entire idea of what they say they want to do, which is reduce the current inequitable access to magnet programs.


Your numbers are slightly off. They said 25-30 for this particular program in this particular school would be for home school students, which is I think is loosely based on whatever the current proportion is now of students in that school so those folks don’t lose or gain seats. That region only has 4 schools so each of the 3 other schools would get 20 seats although it’s unclear whether it’s a quota or just an estimate to arrive at a total. The difference between 20 seats and 25-30 seats is not huge/significant and may just reflect what they assume will be greater interest by kids who are already zoned and don’t want to move schools.

But yeah, the set asides thing has always been unfair and I am so tired of MCPS using unfair ways of selecting kids when they have more logical tools.


Thanks for correcting my numbers -- that does make it better after factoring in that the example was a region with 4 HSs. I assume that means that for the 5-school regions, there'd be something like 30 host-school seats, and maybe 80 for the other 4 schools? I also don't know whether the set-aside is a minimum, maximum, or both.

I know you also have to consider that host-school students would be a) more like to apply, and b) more likely to attend if accepted, given the lack of transportation barrier. So they'd naturally have more than their share in the program naturally, but I don't think there's a need for an "admissions boost" so to speak for students who are in-bounds at the school where the program happens to be.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 08:47     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:Currently, MCPS uses school-blind admissions for everyone but the home school applicants. As a result, a quarter of the kids in Blair’s SMCS program are from Wooton. Churchill and Wooton each have disproportionate representation at RM.

MCPS hasn’t said anything about per-cluster parity in the new programs. It could turn into situation where one or two middle schools in a region get most or all of the available seats.


Yes, and they are also race blind, because that is the law. Laura Stewart was talking about getting diversity/demographic numbers and data but the truth is that you must be race blind for admissions or you are asking for a lawsuit. MCPS should realize the can of worms they opened with the opt out situation.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 07:12     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Currently, MCPS uses school-blind admissions for everyone but the home school applicants. As a result, a quarter of the kids in Blair’s SMCS program are from Wooton. Churchill and Wooton each have disproportionate representation at RM.

MCPS hasn’t said anything about per-cluster parity in the new programs. It could turn into situation where one or two middle schools in a region get most or all of the available seats.
Anonymous
Post 10/17/2025 02:40     Subject: Host school set-asides for magnet programs
Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me the rationale for host school "set-asides" for seats in magnet programs? I believe for example the Richard Montgomery IB program currently does this for in-bound students. But to my knowledge, Blair's SMCS program does not - do I have that right?

I was kind of gobsmacked to hear at today's BoE meeting that they want to continue this practice, which seems totally inequitable to me, in the future 6 region model. It was kind of hard to follow with numbers being thrown around quickly without a lot of discussion on it, but what I think I caught was that they were thinking of having ~30 seats per program allocated to the host school for in-boundary students, and then another ~60 seats allocated for the 4 other schools in a particular reason. So you'd have twice the odds of admittance if you live in-boundary for that school's program. That seems to go against the entire idea of what they say they want to do, which is reduce the current inequitable access to magnet programs.


Your numbers are slightly off. They said 25-30 for this particular program in this particular school would be for home school students, which is I think is loosely based on whatever the current proportion is now of students in that school so those folks don’t lose or gain seats. That region only has 4 schools so each of the 3 other schools would get 20 seats although it’s unclear whether it’s a quota or just an estimate to arrive at a total. The difference between 20 seats and 25-30 seats is not huge/significant and may just reflect what they assume will be greater interest by kids who are already zoned and don’t want to move schools.

But yeah, the set asides thing has always been unfair and I am so tired of MCPS using unfair ways of selecting kids when they have more logical tools.