Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you want out of it. I am not interested in my kids necessarily getting into a Top 20 school. I am interested in them being prepared for college and being in an environment where striving to do well in school and being academic aren't mocked.

I will say that this is a huge plus of TJ. The kids all take academics seriously, they are all around great kids, there is some really cool diversity from international to neurodivergence. I've heard absolutely zero issues with bullying. Even the "weird" kids are included and treated with respect.

I'm the PP and this is exactly what I want for my kid.

I admit I am biased--I went to a HYPSM college after attending a high school in a town where academic pursuits were seriously looked down on and mocked. I remember doing certain activities and being told by coaches and teachers NOT to care about school and that kids the year ahead of me who cared a lot about school and went away to college were "losers" and "dorks" and going to good college was "overrated"--imagine being told that by TEACHERS. Not just other students, but teachers and administrators. I learned to hide caring about school because I had to do it in order to basically not get treated poorly by other kids and even teachers.

Obviously my experience is pretty extreme but If I could trade going to that HYPSM school for spending the formative years of my life in an environment that supported academic achievement, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you want out of it. I am not interested in my kids necessarily getting into a Top 20 school. I am interested in them being prepared for college and being in an environment where striving to do well in school and being academic aren't mocked.

I will say that this is a huge plus of TJ. The kids all take academics seriously, they are all around great kids, there is some really cool diversity from international to neurodivergence. I've heard absolutely zero issues with bullying. Even the "weird" kids are included and treated with respect.

I'm the PP and this is exactly what I want for my kid.

I admit I am biased--I went to a HYPSM college after attending a high school in a town where academic pursuits were seriously looked down on and mocked. I remember doing certain activities and being told by coaches and teachers NOT to care about school and that kids the year ahead of me who cared a lot about school and went away to college were "losers" and "dorks" and going to good college was "overrated"--imagine being told that by TEACHERS. Not just other students, but teachers and administrators. I learned to hide caring about school because I had to do it in order to basically not get treated poorly by other kids and even teachers.

Obviously my experience is pretty extreme but If I could trade going to that HYPSM school for spending the formative years of my life in an environment that supported academic achievement, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Anonymous wrote:local HS is a decent one, I can assume the kid will surely be in top 5%

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you want out of it. I am not interested in my kids necessarily getting into a Top 20 school. I am interested in them being prepared for college and being in an environment where striving to do well in school and being academic aren't mocked.

I will say that this is a huge plus of TJ. The kids all take academics seriously, they are all around great kids, there is some really cool diversity from international to neurodivergence. I've heard absolutely zero issues with bullying. Even the "weird" kids are included and treated with respect.

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you want out of it. I am not interested in my kids necessarily getting into a Top 20 school. I am interested in them being prepared for college and being in an environment where striving to do well in school and being academic aren't mocked.

Anonymous wrote:

You know you can always take them back to base.
My kid never had to work hard to get A's so he never really developed good study habits and was not a very hard worker but he learned how to work hard at TJ.

Good poiint. One thing I believe is if he has a few friends going to TJ, and he also wants to go (if accepted), he probably won't do too bad there. Because he must has some idea how he is compared with others and he certainly don't want to be looked down by his friends.

You know you can always take them back to base.
My kid never had to work hard to get A's so he never really developed good study habits and was not a very hard worker but he learned how to work hard at TJ.

Anonymous wrote:DO NOT send a not self motivated kid to TJ. You will be dragging them through the school. It's not fun - this is me today.

The warnings don't come out of nowhere, they are usually responses to questions.
I think most of this is good advice.
TJ academic rigor is no joke. You are likely to get Bs or even Cs at TJ where you might have coasted through your base high school with straight As.
College admissions for maybe 80% of students are NOT better from TJ than base school. Not necessarily worse, but not better.
If UVA is your target, TJ is not the best pathway to get there. But places like purdue, pitt, uiuc stem programs might be easier from TJ because you have more opportunities to show a stem focus.

However, you will get no better preparation for college than TJ if you can handle the rigor.
I would say that a kid that doesn't usually work hard might find themselves forced to work hard.
And THAT might be valuable in itself.
Once again, IF you can handle the rigor.

Anonymous wrote:It's nice to see that folks are already lining up the narratives to get their kids into TJ off the waitlist.

It's almost a comforting rhythm - a flood of TJ sh!tposting right around the application deadlines to depress competition, and another flood gearing up for the admissions notices going out on mid-March to incentivize decline rates.

So much thirst.