Anonymous wrote:Enrichment is enrichment, it will improve grades and test scores, just like introducing academic topics at home will. Both practices are reasonably normal in many families.

Buying a book or enrolling in a class to study for a specific test is prep. SAT prep was new when I was in HS and many people thought it was problematic. Over time it has become normalized. Prepping kids for intelligence exams is not likely to be normalized and the CoGAT and NNAT is a proxy for an intelligence exams. They have diminished in their importance in AAP selection because a large enough group are prepping g for them. Classes are openly advertised and books are sold at HMART and other stores.

Plenty of kids with scores in the 130’s and strong iReady scores are accepted. People don’t believe scores in the 140’s and iReadys in the 90th-95th percentile, the scores don’t match and point to prep.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Enrichment is enrichment, it will improve grades and test scores, just like introducing academic topics at home will. Both practices are reasonably normal in many families.

Buying a book or enrolling in a class to study for a specific test is prep. SAT prep was new when I was in HS and many people thought it was problematic. Over time it has become normalized. Prepping kids for intelligence exams is not likely to be normalized and the CoGAT and NNAT is a proxy for an intelligence exams. They have diminished in their importance in AAP selection because a large enough group are prepping g for them. Classes are openly advertised and books are sold at HMART and other stores.

Plenty of kids with scores in the 130’s and strong iReady scores are accepted. People don’t believe scores in the 140’s and iReadys in the 90th-95th percentile, the scores don’t match and point to prep.

Huh, my kid last year had low-ish iReadys (mid-80th percentile, not even high enough to get into level II at our school) and CogAT in the high 130s and she was accepted.

Most of you people who talk about how the committee can spot prep a mile away are full of it. You have no idea how the committee works and should admit it.

And yeah, we prepped. We got a book and did it. No regrets that my kid understood how the questions worked. We "prepped" in other ways in that we introduced her to logic games early, built math skills into her early childhood, taught her to read ourselves, and taught her spelling over the summer. Parents are, after all, a child's first and primary teachers.

This isn't what people mean by 'prep' ffs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Enrichment is enrichment, it will improve grades and test scores, just like introducing academic topics at home will. Both practices are reasonably normal in many families.

Buying a book or enrolling in a class to study for a specific test is prep. SAT prep was new when I was in HS and many people thought it was problematic. Over time it has become normalized. Prepping kids for intelligence exams is not likely to be normalized and the CoGAT and NNAT is a proxy for an intelligence exams. They have diminished in their importance in AAP selection because a large enough group are prepping g for them. Classes are openly advertised and books are sold at HMART and other stores.

Plenty of kids with scores in the 130’s and strong iReady scores are accepted. People don’t believe scores in the 140’s and iReadys in the 90th-95th percentile, the scores don’t match and point to prep.

Huh, my kid last year had low-ish iReadys (mid-80th percentile, not even high enough to get into level II at our school) and CogAT in the high 130s and she was accepted.

Most of you people who talk about how the committee can spot prep a mile away are full of it. You have no idea how the committee works and should admit it.

And yeah, we prepped. We got a book and did it. No regrets that my kid understood how the questions worked. We "prepped" in other ways in that we introduced her to logic games early, built math skills into her early childhood, taught her to read ourselves, and taught her spelling over the summer. Parents are, after all, a child's first and primary teachers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Enrichment is enrichment, it will improve grades and test scores, just like introducing academic topics at home will. Both practices are reasonably normal in many families.

Buying a book or enrolling in a class to study for a specific test is prep. SAT prep was new when I was in HS and many people thought it was problematic. Over time it has become normalized. Prepping kids for intelligence exams is not likely to be normalized and the CoGAT and NNAT is a proxy for an intelligence exams. They have diminished in their importance in AAP selection because a large enough group are prepping g for them. Classes are openly advertised and books are sold at HMART and other stores.

Plenty of kids with scores in the 130’s and strong iReady scores are accepted. People don’t believe scores in the 140’s and iReadys in the 90th-95th percentile, the scores don’t match and point to prep.

Huh, my kid last year had low-ish iReadys (mid-80th percentile, not even high enough to get into level II at our school) and CogAT in the high 130s and she was accepted.

Most of you people who talk about how the committee can spot prep a mile away are full of it. You have no idea how the committee works and should admit it.

And yeah, we prepped. We got a book and did it. No regrets that my kid understood how the questions worked. We "prepped" in other ways in that we introduced her to logic games early, built math skills into her early childhood, taught her to read ourselves, and taught her spelling over the summer. Parents are, after all, a child's first and primary teachers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP. I'm laughing at the idea that FCPS needs to guess which kids might have been prepped and misuse a teacher profile tool (HOPE) to keep them out of AAP.

Kids who are prepped have involved parents who value academics. They're going to be the ones in enrichment classes. If they struggle, the parents will get tutors. They can handle the program just fine.

Since AAP is at best a mildly accelerated program, it should be available for any kid who can handle it. That would include the kids with high scores on the CogAT or NNAT, prepped or otherwise. It would also include kids with high iready scores, whether or not they're in enrichment. And it should include the kids that the teachers think belong. There's no reason to restrict access.

Keep rationalizing your craziness!

Keep rationalizing your misuse of the HOPE scale. The NAGC documentation provided earlier in this thread and again here says:
"In other words, some students scored high on the achievement measure, but did not receive high teacher ratings on the HOPE Scale. Perhaps such students have negative behaviors, and they may be at risk of underachievement and not being placed in a program if the program requires high scores and teacher recommendations. We believe that their high scores on either measure should result in placement."
https://davis.agendaonline.net/public/Meeting/Attachments/DisplayAttachment.aspx?AttachmentID=238383&IsArchive=0

In the same paper, they advocate using HOPE for inclusion rather than exclusion, meaning HOPE should be used to lift kids into AAP who otherwise don't have the stats. It's not intended to keep kids out who do.

The HOPE scale was never designed to detect possible test preppers or exclude kids from receiving gifted services who otherwise seem to have the stats. It's purely a tool to lift kids into programs like AAP who show potential and who might have otherwise been overlooked.

I never said it was used to detect test preppers WTF. You must be talking to someone else from upthread.

The HOPE and other variables are increasingly considered in order to have a comprehensive picture of the kid. In an ideal world, test scores would suffice and would be reliable because people would not be enrolling in ACTUAL COURSES to improve their kids probably pathetic pre-prep test scores.

You're living in fantasy lala land if you think there are people extensively prepping their kids for CogAT but not also putting them in pretty hardcore academic enrichment programs. The kids who are heavily prepped for CogAT are also going to have high iready scores and will likely be favorably viewed by their teachers. Those kids are absolutely getting admitted to AAP. The kids with high CogAT scores and much lower achievement scores or ability scores are usually the ones with undiagnosed LDs or with minimal parental support at home. While I'm not sure that AAP in its current form is the right placement for kids with high CogAT and lower achievement, some sort of intervention is indicated.

For the most part, the prepped kids that I know still didn't have especially high CogAT scores, but were above grade level in reading and were given perfect GBRS scores. It's almost a FCPS trope that if you see a kid who is UMC, above grade level in reading but not drastically so, does pretty work, is eager to please the teacher/do more worksheets, is a "pleasure to have in class," and gets around a 120-130 CogAT score, the kid is at best a somewhat above average, heavily enriched kid.

None of this justifies FCPS' use of HOPE to exclude kids who have 98th percentile+ (heck, even 95th percentile+) scores in both CogAT and iready.

If a child is heavily enriched there is no need to complete a course to prep for the CoGAT. We are talking about a certain cohort of mostly east asian families who do not necessarily have funds or background for heavy enrichment but can pay up for CogAT prep classes.

95th percentile on I-Ready isn't actually that good in this area.

My guess is a lot of the kids who are heavily prepped and do not get in actually are not great readers and don't have much creativity and intellectual intensity, hence the low HOPE ratings.

To me, if a kid gets enrichment at home and in activities and scores respectably on tests without much if any prep, there is no question they belong in AAP. If a kid is getting prepped and this doesn't reflect their actual abilities, as evidenced by uneven presentation across the various indices, that tells me they are cheating and should just do advanced math or something.

The accusations of test prep and cheating is always against Asians. It is the same for TJ, except for TJ, people often say they are the rich Asians prepping and cheating.

There is a very tiny portion of people sending their kids to cogat class. There isn’t some secret strategy getting these Asian kids into AAP. You aren’t getting a dumb kid to score 150. What is more likely is a kid who may take the test cold and get a 120, may move that score to a 130.

You are just making this up to justify your cheating. The classes exist and they fill up, with mostly asian kids. Just look up Sunshine Academy. There's also Testing Mom and the like. The CogAT is a short and not particularly good test. I have no doubt someone with lower reading scores could be prepped to a high score on it.

Cheating implies taking a short cut. But no, sacrifice were made for these kids to test prep.

Test-prep is heavily engrained in East Asian academic culture. For those who grew up in China/HK/Taiwan/Japan/Korea, you'd understand the various institutions (補習班，塾、hagwon, you name it). You won't find it surprising these immigrant families want to set up the best future for their young child by mimicking what worked for them back in their home countries--hence businesses like Sunshine Academy. These kids take classes for 3-5 hours every weekend for academic prep (math, reading, test prep etc.).

On the other hand, they very likely miss out on other activities such as sports, hobbies, hanging out with friends/family, going on hike, etc. To call out this behavior as "cheating" is unfair to these families who are doing the most (and most of the time the only thing they know) to set up their kids for their future.

Yes, you may disagree with this philosophy because you may be depriving the next greatest athlete/artist/cultural engineer, but you need to understand academic is above all in Asian families.

At the end of the day, nobody is gaming the [CoGAT] system, it's the test that is flawed. Until somebody could develop an evaluation that cannot be prepped, this is all fair game.

And one more thing to add: first I'm not a Vivek, a conservative, or a Republican sympathizer but the bolded is exactly what Vivek meant in his tweet that ended his positioning under the current Administration.

Well no his problems came when he went on to insult American culture. It's ironic that he praises the hard work ethic grinding away at intellectual endeavors but his lack of soft skills quickly stopped him in his tracks. It will take a while before he and those like him understand this.

These are the kids with low HOPE scores who go on to hit a glass ceiling in life/their careers because they have the emotional intelligence of a dishrag. They don't understand there is more to success than high standardized test scores.

Anonymous wrote:Enrichment is enrichment, it will improve grades and test scores, just like introducing academic topics at home will. Both practices are reasonably normal in many families.

Buying a book or enrolling in a class to study for a specific test is prep. SAT prep was new when I was in HS and many people thought it was problematic. Over time it has become normalized. Prepping kids for intelligence exams is not likely to be normalized and the CoGAT and NNAT is a proxy for an intelligence exams. They have diminished in their importance in AAP selection because a large enough group are prepping g for them. Classes are openly advertised and books are sold at HMART and other stores.

Plenty of kids with scores in the 130’s and strong iReady scores are accepted. People don’t believe scores in the 140’s and iReadys in the 90th-95th percentile, the scores don’t match and point to prep.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP. I'm laughing at the idea that FCPS needs to guess which kids might have been prepped and misuse a teacher profile tool (HOPE) to keep them out of AAP.

Kids who are prepped have involved parents who value academics. They're going to be the ones in enrichment classes. If they struggle, the parents will get tutors. They can handle the program just fine.

Since AAP is at best a mildly accelerated program, it should be available for any kid who can handle it. That would include the kids with high scores on the CogAT or NNAT, prepped or otherwise. It would also include kids with high iready scores, whether or not they're in enrichment. And it should include the kids that the teachers think belong. There's no reason to restrict access.

Keep rationalizing your craziness!

Keep rationalizing your misuse of the HOPE scale. The NAGC documentation provided earlier in this thread and again here says:
"In other words, some students scored high on the achievement measure, but did not receive high teacher ratings on the HOPE Scale. Perhaps such students have negative behaviors, and they may be at risk of underachievement and not being placed in a program if the program requires high scores and teacher recommendations. We believe that their high scores on either measure should result in placement."
https://davis.agendaonline.net/public/Meeting/Attachments/DisplayAttachment.aspx?AttachmentID=238383&IsArchive=0

In the same paper, they advocate using HOPE for inclusion rather than exclusion, meaning HOPE should be used to lift kids into AAP who otherwise don't have the stats. It's not intended to keep kids out who do.

The HOPE scale was never designed to detect possible test preppers or exclude kids from receiving gifted services who otherwise seem to have the stats. It's purely a tool to lift kids into programs like AAP who show potential and who might have otherwise been overlooked.

I never said it was used to detect test preppers WTF. You must be talking to someone else from upthread.

The HOPE and other variables are increasingly considered in order to have a comprehensive picture of the kid. In an ideal world, test scores would suffice and would be reliable because people would not be enrolling in ACTUAL COURSES to improve their kids probably pathetic pre-prep test scores.

You're living in fantasy lala land if you think there are people extensively prepping their kids for CogAT but not also putting them in pretty hardcore academic enrichment programs. The kids who are heavily prepped for CogAT are also going to have high iready scores and will likely be favorably viewed by their teachers. Those kids are absolutely getting admitted to AAP. The kids with high CogAT scores and much lower achievement scores or ability scores are usually the ones with undiagnosed LDs or with minimal parental support at home. While I'm not sure that AAP in its current form is the right placement for kids with high CogAT and lower achievement, some sort of intervention is indicated.

For the most part, the prepped kids that I know still didn't have especially high CogAT scores, but were above grade level in reading and were given perfect GBRS scores. It's almost a FCPS trope that if you see a kid who is UMC, above grade level in reading but not drastically so, does pretty work, is eager to please the teacher/do more worksheets, is a "pleasure to have in class," and gets around a 120-130 CogAT score, the kid is at best a somewhat above average, heavily enriched kid.

None of this justifies FCPS' use of HOPE to exclude kids who have 98th percentile+ (heck, even 95th percentile+) scores in both CogAT and iready.

If a child is heavily enriched there is no need to complete a course to prep for the CoGAT. We are talking about a certain cohort of mostly east asian families who do not necessarily have funds or background for heavy enrichment but can pay up for CogAT prep classes.

95th percentile on I-Ready isn't actually that good in this area.

My guess is a lot of the kids who are heavily prepped and do not get in actually are not great readers and don't have much creativity and intellectual intensity, hence the low HOPE ratings.

To me, if a kid gets enrichment at home and in activities and scores respectably on tests without much if any prep, there is no question they belong in AAP. If a kid is getting prepped and this doesn't reflect their actual abilities, as evidenced by uneven presentation across the various indices, that tells me they are cheating and should just do advanced math or something.

The accusations of test prep and cheating is always against Asians. It is the same for TJ, except for TJ, people often say they are the rich Asians prepping and cheating.

There is a very tiny portion of people sending their kids to cogat class. There isn’t some secret strategy getting these Asian kids into AAP. You aren’t getting a dumb kid to score 150. What is more likely is a kid who may take the test cold and get a 120, may move that score to a 130.

You are just making this up to justify your cheating. The classes exist and they fill up, with mostly asian kids. Just look up Sunshine Academy. There's also Testing Mom and the like. The CogAT is a short and not particularly good test. I have no doubt someone with lower reading scores could be prepped to a high score on it.

Cheating implies taking a short cut. But no, sacrifice were made for these kids to test prep.

Test-prep is heavily engrained in East Asian academic culture. For those who grew up in China/HK/Taiwan/Japan/Korea, you'd understand the various institutions (補習班，塾、hagwon, you name it). You won't find it surprising these immigrant families want to set up the best future for their young child by mimicking what worked for them back in their home countries--hence businesses like Sunshine Academy. These kids take classes for 3-5 hours every weekend for academic prep (math, reading, test prep etc.).

On the other hand, they very likely miss out on other activities such as sports, hobbies, hanging out with friends/family, going on hike, etc. To call out this behavior as "cheating" is unfair to these families who are doing the most (and most of the time the only thing they know) to set up their kids for their future.

Yes, you may disagree with this philosophy because you may be depriving the next greatest athlete/artist/cultural engineer, but you need to understand academic is above all in Asian families.

At the end of the day, nobody is gaming the [CoGAT] system, it's the test that is flawed. Until somebody could develop an evaluation that cannot be prepped, this is all fair game.

And one more thing to add: first I'm not a Vivek, a conservative, or a Republican sympathizer but the bolded is exactly what Vivek meant in his tweet that ended his positioning under the current Administration.

Well no his problems came when he went on to insult American culture. It's ironic that he praises the hard work ethic grinding away at intellectual endeavors but his lack of soft skills quickly stopped him in his tracks. It will take a while before he and those like him understand this.

These are the kids with low HOPE scores who go on to hit a glass ceiling in life/their careers because they have the emotional intelligence of a dishrag. They don't understand there is more to success than high standardized test scores.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP. I'm laughing at the idea that FCPS needs to guess which kids might have been prepped and misuse a teacher profile tool (HOPE) to keep them out of AAP.

Kids who are prepped have involved parents who value academics. They're going to be the ones in enrichment classes. If they struggle, the parents will get tutors. They can handle the program just fine.

Since AAP is at best a mildly accelerated program, it should be available for any kid who can handle it. That would include the kids with high scores on the CogAT or NNAT, prepped or otherwise. It would also include kids with high iready scores, whether or not they're in enrichment. And it should include the kids that the teachers think belong. There's no reason to restrict access.

Keep rationalizing your craziness!

Keep rationalizing your misuse of the HOPE scale. The NAGC documentation provided earlier in this thread and again here says:
"In other words, some students scored high on the achievement measure, but did not receive high teacher ratings on the HOPE Scale. Perhaps such students have negative behaviors, and they may be at risk of underachievement and not being placed in a program if the program requires high scores and teacher recommendations. We believe that their high scores on either measure should result in placement."
https://davis.agendaonline.net/public/Meeting/Attachments/DisplayAttachment.aspx?AttachmentID=238383&IsArchive=0

In the same paper, they advocate using HOPE for inclusion rather than exclusion, meaning HOPE should be used to lift kids into AAP who otherwise don't have the stats. It's not intended to keep kids out who do.

The HOPE scale was never designed to detect possible test preppers or exclude kids from receiving gifted services who otherwise seem to have the stats. It's purely a tool to lift kids into programs like AAP who show potential and who might have otherwise been overlooked.

I never said it was used to detect test preppers WTF. You must be talking to someone else from upthread.

The HOPE and other variables are increasingly considered in order to have a comprehensive picture of the kid. In an ideal world, test scores would suffice and would be reliable because people would not be enrolling in ACTUAL COURSES to improve their kids probably pathetic pre-prep test scores.

You're living in fantasy lala land if you think there are people extensively prepping their kids for CogAT but not also putting them in pretty hardcore academic enrichment programs. The kids who are heavily prepped for CogAT are also going to have high iready scores and will likely be favorably viewed by their teachers. Those kids are absolutely getting admitted to AAP. The kids with high CogAT scores and much lower achievement scores or ability scores are usually the ones with undiagnosed LDs or with minimal parental support at home. While I'm not sure that AAP in its current form is the right placement for kids with high CogAT and lower achievement, some sort of intervention is indicated.

For the most part, the prepped kids that I know still didn't have especially high CogAT scores, but were above grade level in reading and were given perfect GBRS scores. It's almost a FCPS trope that if you see a kid who is UMC, above grade level in reading but not drastically so, does pretty work, is eager to please the teacher/do more worksheets, is a "pleasure to have in class," and gets around a 120-130 CogAT score, the kid is at best a somewhat above average, heavily enriched kid.

None of this justifies FCPS' use of HOPE to exclude kids who have 98th percentile+ (heck, even 95th percentile+) scores in both CogAT and iready.

If a child is heavily enriched there is no need to complete a course to prep for the CoGAT. We are talking about a certain cohort of mostly east asian families who do not necessarily have funds or background for heavy enrichment but can pay up for CogAT prep classes.

95th percentile on I-Ready isn't actually that good in this area.

My guess is a lot of the kids who are heavily prepped and do not get in actually are not great readers and don't have much creativity and intellectual intensity, hence the low HOPE ratings.

To me, if a kid gets enrichment at home and in activities and scores respectably on tests without much if any prep, there is no question they belong in AAP. If a kid is getting prepped and this doesn't reflect their actual abilities, as evidenced by uneven presentation across the various indices, that tells me they are cheating and should just do advanced math or something.

The accusations of test prep and cheating is always against Asians. It is the same for TJ, except for TJ, people often say they are the rich Asians prepping and cheating.

There is a very tiny portion of people sending their kids to cogat class. There isn’t some secret strategy getting these Asian kids into AAP. You aren’t getting a dumb kid to score 150. What is more likely is a kid who may take the test cold and get a 120, may move that score to a 130.

You are just making this up to justify your cheating. The classes exist and they fill up, with mostly asian kids. Just look up Sunshine Academy. There's also Testing Mom and the like. The CogAT is a short and not particularly good test. I have no doubt someone with lower reading scores could be prepped to a high score on it.

Cheating implies taking a short cut. But no, sacrifice were made for these kids to test prep.

Test-prep is heavily engrained in East Asian academic culture. For those who grew up in China/HK/Taiwan/Japan/Korea, you'd understand the various institutions (補習班，塾、hagwon, you name it). You won't find it surprising these immigrant families want to set up the best future for their young child by mimicking what worked for them back in their home countries--hence businesses like Sunshine Academy. These kids take classes for 3-5 hours every weekend for academic prep (math, reading, test prep etc.).

On the other hand, they very likely miss out on other activities such as sports, hobbies, hanging out with friends/family, going on hike, etc. To call out this behavior as "cheating" is unfair to these families who are doing the most (and most of the time the only thing they know) to set up their kids for their future.

Yes, you may disagree with this philosophy because you may be depriving the next greatest athlete/artist/cultural engineer, but you need to understand academic is above all in Asian families.

At the end of the day, nobody is gaming the [CoGAT] system, it's the test that is flawed. Until somebody could develop an evaluation that cannot be prepped, this is all fair game.

Anonymous wrote:The test is only one part of the AAP packet. Teacher HOPE score is most important so those 7 year old kids you are accusing of prepping and cheating also need to have a teacher give them a high hope score. The kids also need to have work samples from school and maybe home.

I got a book off Amazon. We went over a few questions my kids got wrong. Yes, this would have raised my kid’s score a few points. My kids practice, train and get coached 100x more in their sports. These few hours for cogat practice was like an hour on the weekend for a few weekends before the test. Any parent who cares could and would have also bought the same book off Amazon that we did.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP. I'm laughing at the idea that FCPS needs to guess which kids might have been prepped and misuse a teacher profile tool (HOPE) to keep them out of AAP.

Kids who are prepped have involved parents who value academics. They're going to be the ones in enrichment classes. If they struggle, the parents will get tutors. They can handle the program just fine.

Since AAP is at best a mildly accelerated program, it should be available for any kid who can handle it. That would include the kids with high scores on the CogAT or NNAT, prepped or otherwise. It would also include kids with high iready scores, whether or not they're in enrichment. And it should include the kids that the teachers think belong. There's no reason to restrict access.

Keep rationalizing your craziness!

Keep rationalizing your misuse of the HOPE scale. The NAGC documentation provided earlier in this thread and again here says:
"In other words, some students scored high on the achievement measure, but did not receive high teacher ratings on the HOPE Scale. Perhaps such students have negative behaviors, and they may be at risk of underachievement and not being placed in a program if the program requires high scores and teacher recommendations. We believe that their high scores on either measure should result in placement."
https://davis.agendaonline.net/public/Meeting/Attachments/DisplayAttachment.aspx?AttachmentID=238383&IsArchive=0

In the same paper, they advocate using HOPE for inclusion rather than exclusion, meaning HOPE should be used to lift kids into AAP who otherwise don't have the stats. It's not intended to keep kids out who do.

The HOPE scale was never designed to detect possible test preppers or exclude kids from receiving gifted services who otherwise seem to have the stats. It's purely a tool to lift kids into programs like AAP who show potential and who might have otherwise been overlooked.

I never said it was used to detect test preppers WTF. You must be talking to someone else from upthread.

The HOPE and other variables are increasingly considered in order to have a comprehensive picture of the kid. In an ideal world, test scores would suffice and would be reliable because people would not be enrolling in ACTUAL COURSES to improve their kids probably pathetic pre-prep test scores.

You're living in fantasy lala land if you think there are people extensively prepping their kids for CogAT but not also putting them in pretty hardcore academic enrichment programs. The kids who are heavily prepped for CogAT are also going to have high iready scores and will likely be favorably viewed by their teachers. Those kids are absolutely getting admitted to AAP. The kids with high CogAT scores and much lower achievement scores or ability scores are usually the ones with undiagnosed LDs or with minimal parental support at home. While I'm not sure that AAP in its current form is the right placement for kids with high CogAT and lower achievement, some sort of intervention is indicated.

For the most part, the prepped kids that I know still didn't have especially high CogAT scores, but were above grade level in reading and were given perfect GBRS scores. It's almost a FCPS trope that if you see a kid who is UMC, above grade level in reading but not drastically so, does pretty work, is eager to please the teacher/do more worksheets, is a "pleasure to have in class," and gets around a 120-130 CogAT score, the kid is at best a somewhat above average, heavily enriched kid.

None of this justifies FCPS' use of HOPE to exclude kids who have 98th percentile+ (heck, even 95th percentile+) scores in both CogAT and iready.

If a child is heavily enriched there is no need to complete a course to prep for the CoGAT. We are talking about a certain cohort of mostly east asian families who do not necessarily have funds or background for heavy enrichment but can pay up for CogAT prep classes.

95th percentile on I-Ready isn't actually that good in this area.

My guess is a lot of the kids who are heavily prepped and do not get in actually are not great readers and don't have much creativity and intellectual intensity, hence the low HOPE ratings.

To me, if a kid gets enrichment at home and in activities and scores respectably on tests without much if any prep, there is no question they belong in AAP. If a kid is getting prepped and this doesn't reflect their actual abilities, as evidenced by uneven presentation across the various indices, that tells me they are cheating and should just do advanced math or something.

The accusations of test prep and cheating is always against Asians. It is the same for TJ, except for TJ, people often say they are the rich Asians prepping and cheating.

There is a very tiny portion of people sending their kids to cogat class. There isn’t some secret strategy getting these Asian kids into AAP. You aren’t getting a dumb kid to score 150. What is more likely is a kid who may take the test cold and get a 120, may move that score to a 130.

You are just making this up to justify your cheating. The classes exist and they fill up, with mostly asian kids. Just look up Sunshine Academy. There's also Testing Mom and the like. The CogAT is a short and not particularly good test. I have no doubt someone with lower reading scores could be prepped to a high score on it.

Cheating implies taking a short cut. But no, sacrifice were made for these kids to test prep.

Test-prep is heavily engrained in East Asian academic culture. For those who grew up in China/HK/Taiwan/Japan/Korea, you'd understand the various institutions (補習班，塾、hagwon, you name it). You won't find it surprising these immigrant families want to set up the best future for their young child by mimicking what worked for them back in their home countries--hence businesses like Sunshine Academy. These kids take classes for 3-5 hours every weekend for academic prep (math, reading, test prep etc.).

On the other hand, they very likely miss out on other activities such as sports, hobbies, hanging out with friends/family, going on hike, etc. To call out this behavior as "cheating" is unfair to these families who are doing the most (and most of the time the only thing they know) to set up their kids for their future.

Yes, you may disagree with this philosophy because you may be depriving the next greatest athlete/artist/cultural engineer, but you need to understand academic is above all in Asian families.

At the end of the day, nobody is gaming the [CoGAT] system, it's the test that is flawed. Until somebody could develop an evaluation that cannot be prepped, this is all fair game.

And one more thing to add: first I'm not a Vivek, a conservative, or a Republican sympathizer but the bolded is exactly what Vivek meant in his tweet that ended his positioning under the current Administration.

Anonymous wrote:The test is only one part of the AAP packet. Teacher HOPE score is most important so those 7 year old kids you are accusing of prepping and cheating also need to have a teacher give them a high hope score. The kids also need to have work samples from school and maybe home.

I got a book off Amazon. We went over a few questions my kids got wrong. Yes, this would have raised my kid’s score a few points. My kids practice, train and get coached 100x more in their sports. These few hours for cogat practice was like an hour on the weekend for a few weekends before the test. Any parent who cares could and would have also bought the same book off Amazon that we did.