Anonymous wrote:Blair isn't even ranked as a top STEM school by US News anymore, so I don't know what the fuss is all about.

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Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You were told wrong. Stop trying to create a myth.

Parent of a kid in SMCS who doesn’t even know what AOPS or RM are.

Another Blair magnet parent here. It's not totally a myth. Many kids have done these, and some don't. I think magnet leans Asian because Chinese, Korean and Indian cultures place more value on academic advancement in STEM than Humanities. MC, UMC and immigrant families often sacrifice for additional stem enrichment like aops, A++, Dr. Li, Hopkins cty, etc. I know one mom who did those things while on a postdoc salary here on h1 visa from China. There are communal support networks too. Humanities were not an option for many of my kid's cohort in magnet. Not all of course. And, this is a few years ago.
I also see a lot of white umc lawyers in my neighborhood who will drop lots of money for Humanities enrichment.
My magnet kids had significant enrichment in arts because I am a professional in the arts. I also used to tutor math, so I helped them with that (to a point). Stem magnets liked the arts kids who could hold their own at math.
I do wish there wasn't an emphasis on pre program enrichment. I don't know how we really get around that though.

PP whose kid doesn’t know what those programs are, I’m an NP who also has a kid in the Blair magnet who not only didn’t prep but doesn’t know what those programs are. I guess we should be very proud that our kids got in based only on their hard work and not parental pressure and outside tutoring?

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

Furthermore, it's worth noting that Blair has a larger Asian student population, and this may contribute to their strong performance in competitions like the NMSF. Asian students often have a strong focus on academics, a value instilled by their parents, and this dedication to hard work deserves recognition

DC graduated from RMIB last year, and they said it was like 80%Asian, or some such. So, Blair magnet is 80%+ Asian?

My DD said this year around 40% freshmen are Asians, when we tour the Blair, it's like 80%+ Asians

No, Blair tends to have fewer Asian-American students than RMIB because of location. We heard it's about 35-40% so that sounds about equal to RMIB this year. There are still a lot but there is also a significant number of URM students at Blair. We saw fewer URM students at RMIB.

You heard wrong. The Blair magnet is about 80 percent Asian. PP is correct. There is a large contingent of Indian kids among that group. Relatively few white or black kids and very few Latino kids. At the admitted open house earlier this year for the group we were in (a subset of the entire admitted class) there was about 5 percent each of white and black kids, with the rest Asian.

Stop spreading misinformation.
As of 2020-21 before the magnet reforms that led to a reduction of Asian-American students in the magnets Blair magnet was 57% Asian. It has gone down significantly since.

Do you have a kid in the program? You are VERY wrong. Send Mr Ostrander an email and ask about demographics for the current 9th grade class and see. What I said was 100 percent true.

Your logic is childlike. You are basing your numbers on the admitted open house for the group you were in but there were a lot of groups and they seemed to have been created based on your sending school. If you came from a school with a lot of Asian American students or were grouped with kids from another more Asian schools like the Churchill feeders the demographics at that open house probably looked really different than if you came from some of the middle schools that have fewer Asian Americans.

Nope did not. And my observations held true at the admitted students main session in the auditorium, and also at the recent back to school night in the magnet classes. Plus my kid’s observations in their classes at school in the program. But I guess the back to school night representation was just flawed because Asian families are more likely to show up than other groups?!!

Very clear that you don’t have a 9th grader in the magnet.

Your kid counted the number of Asian kids in his classes? Why would someone do that?

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

Furthermore, it's worth noting that Blair has a larger Asian student population, and this may contribute to their strong performance in competitions like the NMSF. Asian students often have a strong focus on academics, a value instilled by their parents, and this dedication to hard work deserves recognition

DC graduated from RMIB last year, and they said it was like 80%Asian, or some such. So, Blair magnet is 80%+ Asian?

My DD said this year around 40% freshmen are Asians, when we tour the Blair, it's like 80%+ Asians

No, Blair tends to have fewer Asian-American students than RMIB because of location. We heard it's about 35-40% so that sounds about equal to RMIB this year. There are still a lot but there is also a significant number of URM students at Blair. We saw fewer URM students at RMIB.

You heard wrong. The Blair magnet is about 80 percent Asian. PP is correct. There is a large contingent of Indian kids among that group. Relatively few white or black kids and very few Latino kids. At the admitted open house earlier this year for the group we were in (a subset of the entire admitted class) there was about 5 percent each of white and black kids, with the rest Asian.

Stop spreading misinformation.
As of 2020-21 before the magnet reforms that led to a reduction of Asian-American students in the magnets Blair magnet was 57% Asian. It has gone down significantly since.

Do you have a kid in the program? You are VERY wrong. Send Mr Ostrander an email and ask about demographics for the current 9th grade class and see. What I said was 100 percent true.

Your logic is childlike. You are basing your numbers on the admitted open house for the group you were in but there were a lot of groups and they seemed to have been created based on your sending school. If you came from a school with a lot of Asian American students or were grouped with kids from another more Asian schools like the Churchill feeders the demographics at that open house probably looked really different than if you came from some of the middle schools that have fewer Asian Americans.

Nope did not. And my observations held true at the admitted students main session in the auditorium, and also at the recent back to school night in the magnet classes. Plus my kid’s observations in their classes at school in the program. But I guess the back to school night representation was just flawed because Asian families are more likely to show up than other groups?!!

Very clear that you don’t have a 9th grader in the magnet.

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

My kid got offers from Blair magnet, CAP, both Wheaton programs and RMIB. Chose Blair magnet. As did everyone he knew with the choice. Your anecdote is no more useful than mine.

In my DD’s school, 5 kids got multiple offer chose RMIB, 2 kids chose Blair

Your child did not get in to Blair though. I know who you are and why you are pushing this anecdotal data over and over again.

It's funny! I've been using this thread for a while, but this is my first post. Let me share what I know. No need to sugarcoat it. Blair seems to outperform RMIB in NMSF and SAT, perhaps due to its larger Asian student population. Initially, we favored Blair for our child, but she changed her mind after a shadow day at RM. I even know a boy who picked Blair immediately after a shadow day, despite his mom's preference for Blair. In my daughter's middle school, more students chose Blair than RMIB for the Class of 2026. Preferences do seem to shift each year.

It's normal for kids to make different choices, and I'll never blame others for that. Claiming people are lying just because they didn't choose Blair is amusing. I feel sorry for your bigotry. School decisions are personal. In the Class of 2022, RMIB had strong college acceptance results, and Wootton seemed very poor. But this year, Blair performed better, and Wootton turned out to be amazing. Why? Because things change all the time. It's important to have open and respectful conversations.

I share what I know based on my DD’s school data, but you present your knowledge as the ultimate truth in the whole school system . That's where our differences lie.

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

Furthermore, it's worth noting that Blair has a larger Asian student population, and this may contribute to their strong performance in competitions like the NMSF. Asian students often have a strong focus on academics, a value instilled by their parents, and this dedication to hard work deserves recognition

DC graduated from RMIB last year, and they said it was like 80%Asian, or some such. So, Blair magnet is 80%+ Asian?

My DD said this year around 40% freshmen are Asians, when we tour the Blair, it's like 80%+ Asians

No, Blair tends to have fewer Asian-American students than RMIB because of location. We heard it's about 35-40% so that sounds about equal to RMIB this year. There are still a lot but there is also a significant number of URM students at Blair. We saw fewer URM students at RMIB.

You heard wrong. The Blair magnet is about 80 percent Asian. PP is correct. There is a large contingent of Indian kids among that group. Relatively few white or black kids and very few Latino kids. At the admitted open house earlier this year for the group we were in (a subset of the entire admitted class) there was about 5 percent each of white and black kids, with the rest Asian.

Stop spreading misinformation.
As of 2020-21 before the magnet reforms that led to a reduction of Asian-American students in the magnets Blair magnet was 57% Asian. It has gone down significantly since.

Do you have a kid in the program? You are VERY wrong. Send Mr Ostrander an email and ask about demographics for the current 9th grade class and see. What I said was 100 percent true.

Your logic is childlike. You are basing your numbers on the admitted open house for the group you were in but there were a lot of groups and they seemed to have been created based on your sending school. If you came from a school with a lot of Asian American students or were grouped with kids from another more Asian schools like the Churchill feeders the demographics at that open house probably looked really different than if you came from some of the middle schools that have fewer Asian Americans.

Nope did not. And my observations held true at the admitted students main session in the auditorium, and also at the recent back to school night in the magnet classes. Plus my kid’s observations in their classes at school in the program. But I guess the back to school night representation was just flawed because Asian families are more likely to show up than other groups?!!

Very clear that you don’t have a 9th grader in the magnet.

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

My kid got offers from Blair magnet, CAP, both Wheaton programs and RMIB. Chose Blair magnet. As did everyone he knew with the choice. Your anecdote is no more useful than mine.

In my DD’s school, 5 kids got multiple offer chose RMIB, 2 kids chose Blair

Your child did not get in to Blair though. I know who you are and why you are pushing this anecdotal data over and over again.

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Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You were told wrong. Stop trying to create a myth.

Parent of a kid in SMCS who doesn’t even know what AOPS or RM are.

Another Blair magnet parent here. It's not totally a myth. Many kids have done these, and some don't. I think magnet leans Asian because Chinese, Korean and Indian cultures place more value on academic advancement in STEM than Humanities. MC, UMC and immigrant families often sacrifice for additional stem enrichment like aops, A++, Dr. Li, Hopkins cty, etc. I know one mom who did those things while on a postdoc salary here on h1 visa from China. There are communal support networks too. Humanities were not an option for many of my kid's cohort in magnet. Not all of course. And, this is a few years ago.
I also see a lot of white umc lawyers in my neighborhood who will drop lots of money for Humanities enrichment.
My magnet kids had significant enrichment in arts because I am a professional in the arts. I also used to tutor math, so I helped them with that (to a point). Stem magnets liked the arts kids who could hold their own at math.
I do wish there wasn't an emphasis on pre program enrichment. I don't know how we really get around that though.

PP whose kid doesn’t know what those programs are, I’m an NP who also has a kid in the Blair magnet who not only didn’t prep but doesn’t know what those programs are. I guess we should be very proud that our kids got in based only on their hard work and not parental pressure and outside tutoring?

Do you really think the kids who went to those programs did not do hard work? Many of the kids we know who did not do outside tutoring have parents who have STEM jobs and taught them themselves. I'm not sure why it makes such a difference to you and why you would be more "proud" if a child did not go to the programs. My child did not attend these programs but her friends who went to them are the hardest working in the magnet and the most successful over the two years she has been there.

I think that it’s a much bigger achievement for a kid without all that extra help through tutoring and outside programs to get in to a magnet than a kid who got in due to considerable extra help. Surely that’s obvious?

So help me understand.. why does this type of comparison matter so much to you (and many others on these threads)? Both types of kids worked hard and should be commended for their efforts.. Or are you suggesting that it's a much bigger achievement NOT to work hard at something?

It matters only because some posters here claim that all kids in these programs are there because they gamed the system. It’s not true. And yes it is a bigger achievement to have been selected without additional help and privileges.

Well that's news! So what you're saying is, a kid who didn't need to work to figure stuff out and got in on talent is "higher achieving" than one who had to work at it? Are you sure it's not the other way around?

No I’m saying that a kid who got there because their family has resources has significantly more privilege than a kid who didn’t have access to those resources but excelled anyway. That kid has to work harder, not the one who has a bunch of math programs thrown at them.

How do you know who had to work harder? How can you compare? Maybe the kids who made use of the programs they had access to, had to work really hard to get in. Why compare and single them out as privileged? The same argument can be made about other kids who had other resources such as parents, great teachers, good peer group, etc. Were they not privileged? Or the kids who are bright enough to be able to grasp ideas and didn't need to put much effort in, are they not also privileged to be smart? And what about other kids who also worked hard but didn't get in because there are only x number of spots, are they privileged? Or shall we label them as suckers? What is the point of comparing like this??

Look, access to tutors and “enrichment” programs is a privilege that advantages some kids over others. That’s a fact. I’m not continuing this argument beyond that.

Some kids succeed without that kind of parental or special help - that’s impressive. Not the kid who has been hothoused since birth.

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Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You were told wrong. Stop trying to create a myth.

Parent of a kid in SMCS who doesn’t even know what AOPS or RM are.

Another Blair magnet parent here. It's not totally a myth. Many kids have done these, and some don't. I think magnet leans Asian because Chinese, Korean and Indian cultures place more value on academic advancement in STEM than Humanities. MC, UMC and immigrant families often sacrifice for additional stem enrichment like aops, A++, Dr. Li, Hopkins cty, etc. I know one mom who did those things while on a postdoc salary here on h1 visa from China. There are communal support networks too. Humanities were not an option for many of my kid's cohort in magnet. Not all of course. And, this is a few years ago.
I also see a lot of white umc lawyers in my neighborhood who will drop lots of money for Humanities enrichment.
My magnet kids had significant enrichment in arts because I am a professional in the arts. I also used to tutor math, so I helped them with that (to a point). Stem magnets liked the arts kids who could hold their own at math.
I do wish there wasn't an emphasis on pre program enrichment. I don't know how we really get around that though.

PP whose kid doesn’t know what those programs are, I’m an NP who also has a kid in the Blair magnet who not only didn’t prep but doesn’t know what those programs are. I guess we should be very proud that our kids got in based only on their hard work and not parental pressure and outside tutoring?

Do you really think the kids who went to those programs did not do hard work? Many of the kids we know who did not do outside tutoring have parents who have STEM jobs and taught them themselves. I'm not sure why it makes such a difference to you and why you would be more "proud" if a child did not go to the programs. My child did not attend these programs but her friends who went to them are the hardest working in the magnet and the most successful over the two years she has been there.

I think that it’s a much bigger achievement for a kid without all that extra help through tutoring and outside programs to get in to a magnet than a kid who got in due to considerable extra help. Surely that’s obvious?

So help me understand.. why does this type of comparison matter so much to you (and many others on these threads)? Both types of kids worked hard and should be commended for their efforts.. Or are you suggesting that it's a much bigger achievement NOT to work hard at something?

It matters only because some posters here claim that all kids in these programs are there because they gamed the system. It’s not true. And yes it is a bigger achievement to have been selected without additional help and privileges.

Well that's news! So what you're saying is, a kid who didn't need to work to figure stuff out and got in on talent is "higher achieving" than one who had to work at it? Are you sure it's not the other way around?

No I’m saying that a kid who got there because their family has resources has significantly more privilege than a kid who didn’t have access to those resources but excelled anyway. That kid has to work harder, not the one who has a bunch of math programs thrown at them.

How do you know who had to work harder? How can you compare? Maybe the kids who made use of the programs they had access to, had to work really hard to get in. Why compare and single them out as privileged? The same argument can be made about other kids who had other resources such as parents, great teachers, good peer group, etc. Were they not privileged? Or the kids who are bright enough to be able to grasp ideas and didn't need to put much effort in, are they not also privileged to be smart? And what about other kids who also worked hard but didn't get in because there are only x number of spots, are they privileged? Or shall we label them as suckers? What is the point of comparing like this??

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Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

Furthermore, it's worth noting that Blair has a larger Asian student population, and this may contribute to their strong performance in competitions like the NMSF. Asian students often have a strong focus on academics, a value instilled by their parents, and this dedication to hard work deserves recognition

DC graduated from RMIB last year, and they said it was like 80%Asian, or some such. So, Blair magnet is 80%+ Asian?

My DD said this year around 40% freshmen are Asians, when we tour the Blair, it's like 80%+ Asians

No, Blair tends to have fewer Asian-American students than RMIB because of location. We heard it's about 35-40% so that sounds about equal to RMIB this year. There are still a lot but there is also a significant number of URM students at Blair. We saw fewer URM students at RMIB.

You heard wrong. The Blair magnet is about 80 percent Asian. PP is correct. There is a large contingent of Indian kids among that group. Relatively few white or black kids and very few Latino kids. At the admitted open house earlier this year for the group we were in (a subset of the entire admitted class) there was about 5 percent each of white and black kids, with the rest Asian.

Stop spreading misinformation.
As of 2020-21 before the magnet reforms that led to a reduction of Asian-American students in the magnets Blair magnet was 57% Asian. It has gone down significantly since.

Do you have a kid in the program? You are VERY wrong. Send Mr Ostrander an email and ask about demographics for the current 9th grade class and see. What I said was 100 percent true.

Your logic is childlike. You are basing your numbers on the admitted open house for the group you were in but there were a lot of groups and they seemed to have been created based on your sending school. If you came from a school with a lot of Asian American students or were grouped with kids from another more Asian schools like the Churchill feeders the demographics at that open house probably looked really different than if you came from some of the middle schools that have fewer Asian Americans.

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pettifogger wrote:

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pettifogger wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not exactly “personalities” but there are some very obvious demographic differences between CAP (largely upper middle class, white students) and magnet (many from Indian, Chinese, Korean and other Asian backgrounds often children of immigrants including the few who are white) at Blair. Nice kids either way.

Why is this? Why are there so few wealthy white families in SMCS relative to CAP, and why so many in CAP? Are the upper middle class white kids not as good in STEM or are their families less interested?

Both Blair magnet and CAP are predominantly UMC. This is not NYC, where the test-in magnets are dominated by working class first-generation kids whose parents work in restaurants and dry cleaners. The parents of both sets of kids tend to be feds, or journalists, or attorneys, or scientists, or college professors.

I have an upperclassman in CAP who attended the TPMS STEM magnet, so some visibility on both groups and while Blair magnet does have more first and second generation immigrant kids, they are just as wealthy or wealthier than the CAP kids.

Agree only the wealthiest families can afford to prep their kids sufficiently to get into these programs. I'm told it takes years of AoPS or RM to get to where one might have a shot at SMCS.

You were told wrong. Stop trying to create a myth.

Parent of a kid in SMCS who doesn’t even know what AOPS or RM are.

Another Blair magnet parent here. It's not totally a myth. Many kids have done these, and some don't. I think magnet leans Asian because Chinese, Korean and Indian cultures place more value on academic advancement in STEM than Humanities. MC, UMC and immigrant families often sacrifice for additional stem enrichment like aops, A++, Dr. Li, Hopkins cty, etc. I know one mom who did those things while on a postdoc salary here on h1 visa from China. There are communal support networks too. Humanities were not an option for many of my kid's cohort in magnet. Not all of course. And, this is a few years ago.
I also see a lot of white umc lawyers in my neighborhood who will drop lots of money for Humanities enrichment.
My magnet kids had significant enrichment in arts because I am a professional in the arts. I also used to tutor math, so I helped them with that (to a point). Stem magnets liked the arts kids who could hold their own at math.
I do wish there wasn't an emphasis on pre program enrichment. I don't know how we really get around that though.

PP whose kid doesn’t know what those programs are, I’m an NP who also has a kid in the Blair magnet who not only didn’t prep but doesn’t know what those programs are. I guess we should be very proud that our kids got in based only on their hard work and not parental pressure and outside tutoring?

Do you really think the kids who went to those programs did not do hard work? Many of the kids we know who did not do outside tutoring have parents who have STEM jobs and taught them themselves. I'm not sure why it makes such a difference to you and why you would be more "proud" if a child did not go to the programs. My child did not attend these programs but her friends who went to them are the hardest working in the magnet and the most successful over the two years she has been there.

I think that it’s a much bigger achievement for a kid without all that extra help through tutoring and outside programs to get in to a magnet than a kid who got in due to considerable extra help. Surely that’s obvious?

So help me understand.. why does this type of comparison matter so much to you (and many others on these threads)? Both types of kids worked hard and should be commended for their efforts.. Or are you suggesting that it's a much bigger achievement NOT to work hard at something?

It matters only because some posters here claim that all kids in these programs are there because they gamed the system. It’s not true. And yes it is a bigger achievement to have been selected without additional help and privileges.

Well that's news! So what you're saying is, a kid who didn't need to work to figure stuff out and got in on talent is "higher achieving" than one who had to work at it? Are you sure it's not the other way around?

No I’m saying that a kid who got there because their family has resources has significantly more privilege than a kid who didn’t have access to those resources but excelled anyway. That kid has to work harder, not the one who has a bunch of math programs thrown at them.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD received offers from Blair, RMIB, and Poolesville this year. She ultimately chose RMIB. Interestingly, most of her classmates who had multiple offers made the same choice, with only a few opting for Blair. It's important to note that each year, students may make different decisions. Perhaps in previous years, the majority of students chose Blair. Additionally, my daughter mentioned that the math program at RMIB may not be as competitive as she expected. So, while it's not accurate to say that Blair is definitively better than RMIB, individual preferences and program strengths certainly play a role in these choices

Furthermore, it's worth noting that Blair has a larger Asian student population, and this may contribute to their strong performance in competitions like the NMSF. Asian students often have a strong focus on academics, a value instilled by their parents, and this dedication to hard work deserves recognition

DC graduated from RMIB last year, and they said it was like 80%Asian, or some such. So, Blair magnet is 80%+ Asian?

My DD said this year around 40% freshmen are Asians, when we tour the Blair, it's like 80%+ Asians

No, Blair tends to have fewer Asian-American students than RMIB because of location. We heard it's about 35-40% so that sounds about equal to RMIB this year. There are still a lot but there is also a significant number of URM students at Blair. We saw fewer URM students at RMIB.

You heard wrong. The Blair magnet is about 80 percent Asian. PP is correct. There is a large contingent of Indian kids among that group. Relatively few white or black kids and very few Latino kids. At the admitted open house earlier this year for the group we were in (a subset of the entire admitted class) there was about 5 percent each of white and black kids, with the rest Asian.

Stop spreading misinformation.
As of 2020-21 before the magnet reforms that led to a reduction of Asian-American students in the magnets Blair magnet was 57% Asian. It has gone down significantly since.

Do you have a kid in the program? You are VERY wrong. Send Mr Ostrander an email and ask about demographics for the current 9th grade class and see. What I said was 100 percent true.