Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:8 APs sounds very normal to me for a good student. 1 freshman year; 1-2 sophomore year; around 3 in both junior and senior years. I'm not saying everyone should do this, but I wouldn't think this kind of schedule would reflect an outlier.

Yes it is normal at Churchill...but not at other private high schools. The courses at my DC's school are very rigorous even though they are not "AP." And the college admissions people know this. In fact a freshman at our school doesn't even have the option to take an AP until sophomore year, and there is only one available. So a kid with 4 AP classes in our private will easily compete against a kid with 8 at Churchill.

NP here - My Churchill kid got a 35 on the ACT and 36 Super-Score. Left private because it wasn't hard enough. Xoxo

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It considers PARCC pass rate, AP / IB pass rate and percentage of students taking them and how well disadvantaged students do relative to the state average.

magnet schools are ranked separately.

AP / IB data is from 14-15.

Except Poolesville included in the whole, and neither Blair Magnet programs nor Thomas Jefferson seem to be included in Magnet schools. Strange.

TJ is #6 nationally.

Blair Magnet isn't going to be scored separately from Blair High School.

As a whole, Blair has too big a disparity between the wealthy students and the poor students to be ranked. A wide achievement gap hurts with this methodology

I love a methodolgy that ignores reality.

What's the reality in your mind?

Yes there are many ways to have a challenging curriculum that does not follow the AP. Blair and Poolesville kids have their own curriculum. They can sit for AP exams..though sometimes they have to self study certain topics.

Anonymous wrote:8 APs sounds very normal to me for a good student. 1 freshman year; 1-2 sophomore year; around 3 in both junior and senior years. I'm not saying everyone should do this, but I wouldn't think this kind of schedule would reflect an outlier.

Yes it is normal at Churchill...but not at other private high schools. The courses at my DC's school are very rigorous even though they are not "AP." And the college admissions people know this. In fact a freshman at our school doesn't even have the option to take an AP until sophomore year, and there is only one available. So a kid with 4 AP classes in our private will easily compete against a kid with 8 at Churchill.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DC not enrolled at Churchill because we are in private...but I am happy for this report cause it only helps our home value. Yay!!

Money well spent on private! (oops)

Yes very well spent. I would never expose my child to that pressure cooker environment. My fears about this school were confirmed when I learned recently that to get into top university, Churchill student is taking 8 APs. My DS will never take that many but will still be competitive and better educated without the stress. Very happy with our choice.

DP.. I've no doubt your kid is getting a good education, but your kid is also going to be competing with Churchill and other MCPS kids, and really, from kids all over. A college applicant taking 8 AP classes would probably get a boost over a similar student not taking that many AP classes.

Nope you are wrong. The admissions people look at a student's academic profile within a particular school. The non AP classes in my child's high school are known to be just as rigorous or more rigorous than some public school AP courses. The admissions people know this. So my kid with 4 AP courses is just as qualified as your kid with 8 AP courses. I know this because I heard it from a well respected college consultant. So Yale will take 2 kids from Churchill and 2 kids from DC's private school. They won't pit my kid against yours. They will pit my kid against other Yale applicants within DC's private school. The admissions folks are also very aware of grade inflation in Churchill...so that is also a consideration.

8 APs sounds very normal to me for a good student. 1 freshman year; 1-2 sophomore year; around 3 in both junior and senior years. I'm not saying everyone should do this, but I wouldn't think this kind of schedule would reflect an outlier.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DC not enrolled at Churchill because we are in private...but I am happy for this report cause it only helps our home value. Yay!!

Money well spent on private! (oops)

Yes very well spent. I would never expose my child to that pressure cooker environment. My fears about this school were confirmed when I learned recently that to get into top university, Churchill student is taking 8 APs. My DS will never take that many but will still be competitive and better educated without the stress. Very happy with our choice.

DP.. I've no doubt your kid is getting a good education, but your kid is also going to be competing with Churchill and other MCPS kids, and really, from kids all over. A college applicant taking 8 AP classes would probably get a boost over a similar student not taking that many AP classes.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It considers PARCC pass rate, AP / IB pass rate and percentage of students taking them and how well disadvantaged students do relative to the state average.

magnet schools are ranked separately.

AP / IB data is from 14-15.

Except Poolesville included in the whole, and neither Blair Magnet programs nor Thomas Jefferson seem to be included in Magnet schools. Strange.

TJ is #6 nationally.

Blair Magnet isn't going to be scored separately from Blair High School.

As a whole, Blair has too big a disparity between the wealthy students and the poor students to be ranked. A wide achievement gap hurts with this methodology

I love a methodolgy that ignores reality.

Anonymous wrote:Churchill #1
Wootton #2
Poolsville #3
Walter Johnson #4
RM #5
Magruder #6
Damascus #19
Paint Branch #22
Wheaton #27

I do not know what they are measuring? LOL. BCC, Whitman, Blair, QO, Northwest nowhere on the list.

You can bet the tiger moms over there are happy!!! The list is just click-bait for the tiger moms.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rankings mean nothing to me. We have all seen and heard what a mess Churchill is. If a school with an ineffective, disconnected principal, where Xanax is being sold in the bathrooms, with rich white kids who feel the pressure of their self absorbed elitist parents, where racist and vulgar remarks are spray painted on the walls, and have stabbings in the school ranks #1 for schools, there is a huge disconnect between what I value and what this ranking means.

Wow, that sounds like someone who is really disgruntled that the competition won.

Luckily, the people who are in college admissions will not know from any of the complaints you have lodged, but instead will know that the children who went there were immersed in the most competitive high school environment in the state of Maryland. And that is what will matter in the end.

It would have been nice to hear a "congratulations" from those who aren't at Churchill but it sounds like the rivalry runs very deep. I cannot imagine being so bitter if my school hadn't ranked.

Actually, we don't use these rankings. I'm glad they give your ego a boost, but they really don't matter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DC not enrolled at Churchill because we are in private...but I am happy for this report cause it only helps our home value. Yay!!

Money well spent on private! (oops)

Yes very well spent. I would never expose my child to that pressure cooker environment. My fears about this school were confirmed when I learned recently that to get into top university, Churchill student is taking 8 APs. My DS will never take that many but will still be competitive and better educated without the stress. Very happy with our choice.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It considers PARCC pass rate, AP / IB pass rate and percentage of students taking them and how well disadvantaged students do relative to the state average.

magnet schools are ranked separately.

AP / IB data is from 14-15.

Except Poolesville included in the whole, and neither Blair Magnet programs nor Thomas Jefferson seem to be included in Magnet schools. Strange.

TJ is #6 nationally.

Blair Magnet isn't going to be scored separately from Blair High School.

As a whole, Blair has too big a disparity between the wealthy students and the poor students to be ranked. A wide achievement gap hurts with this methodology

Anonymous wrote:The rankings mean nothing to me. We have all seen and heard what a mess Churchill is. If a school with an ineffective, disconnected principal, where Xanax is being sold in the bathrooms, with rich white kids who feel the pressure of their self absorbed elitist parents, where racist and vulgar remarks are spray painted on the walls, and have stabbings in the school ranks #1 for schools, there is a huge disconnect between what I value and what this ranking means.

Wow, that sounds like someone who is really disgruntled that the competition won.

Luckily, the people who are in college admissions will not know from any of the complaints you have lodged, but instead will know that the children who went there were immersed in the most competitive high school environment in the state of Maryland. And that is what will matter in the end.

It would have been nice to hear a "congratulations" from those who aren't at Churchill but it sounds like the rivalry runs very deep. I cannot imagine being so bitter if my school hadn't ranked.

The rankings mean nothing to me. We have all seen and heard what a mess Churchill is. If a school with an ineffective, disconnected principal, where Xanax is being sold in the bathrooms, with rich white kids who feel the pressure of their self absorbed elitist parents, where racist and vulgar remarks are spray painted on the walls, and have stabbings in the school ranks #1 for schools, there is a huge disconnect between what I value and what this ranking means.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Eleanor Roosevelt in *gasp* PG County is ranked #23

Have at it, it could be ranked super duper and it is still in PG

Roosevelt has a couple of programs like the magnet program and they used to have a special language program too, not sure about now.

This was all discussed within a couple of years ago, probably around the same time as the rankings came out. ie people were comparing against Blair and there was a listing of number of students going to which colleges, etc.