What are the chances that all the positive comments are coming from parents of Ws (including "honorary" BCC), Blair/Poolesville magnets or RMIB? The OP/topic clearly is system-wide, and we know MCPS doesn't provide equitable experiences across clusters.

MCPS is an enormous school district. Asking about the district is sometimes less relevant than asking about the school. My kids' ES had a lackluster principal when my oldest started, and now has a terrific one, and I've seen how quickly the environment and quality of teachers has changed for the better.

Unfortunately, my kids' MS has had the opposite trajectory for a similar reason (new principal and AP, both not particularly good/competent.)

MCPS is a huge, diverse school system. It's not really helpful to talk about the system as a whole - OP will get more helpful answers asking about specific schools/clusters.

For some kids the “problems” start in kindergarten. Many kids are just on screens all the time and parents have not been speaking or reading with them enough since parents are stuck on their own screens. These kids have very little emotional regulation, social skills, or interest in non-screen activities.

For others the problems seem to start after 3rd grade. That’s when they often begin to push back against teachers more and cling to peer groups rather than seek adult attention. It’s also when it’s obvious some kids are way behind and would rather be the “bad” kid than be the “dumb” kid.

By the time they get to middle school a lot of this is ingrained thinking. It’s very to turn around and becomes very visible in complex social and academic situations like middle school. It’s unfair to expect math teachers to get kids caught up on algebra when some kids can’t even do basic math facts. Teachers ask for help and admin says no. Same for ESL or kids who have interrupted education. They just get passed on to high school and are still way behind. At that point the goal is to just manage them and wait for graduation. Very, very hard to address the specific needs of these kids especially when mainstreaming has been adopted at all levels for a variety of reasons.

Over 50% of students across the country are low SES and eligible for free and reduced school lunch. No school system has been really successful in turning things around. Changes in the economy to favor service industries, Covid and increase screen technology use has really exacerbated the differences. None of this is the fault of MCPS. Even systems that didn’t shut down for Covid have had these issues.

Anonymous wrote:The haters, the wannabes have been pushing this narrative for the last 15+ years, but they still cannot compete with MCPS. They cannot even compete with MCPS in the "it's academic" competition.

Seriously. It's Academic is the hat you're hanging MCPS's reputation on? Despite ALL of the other things people pointed out are broken in this thread, your rebuttal is, "But we're unmatched on 'It's Academic"!"

Unreal.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. My kids are 20 and 15 and have been in MCPS since K.

I am very unhappy with the English curriculum, because it's frankly abysmal, but the STEM is great, and better than in any DC area private school.

Agree with this. STEM is good for the smart kids in advanced classes. But English is weak. History is cursory.

What seems to be the most important thing is peer group. And that is very school dependent.

English is weak but AP Lang was a game changer for my kid's writing. That class is a must for anyone. They are taking AP Lit this year so I will report back.

Stem has been great and I've been super impressed with the high school teachers. Elementary teachers were pretty great too, with only an occasional dud. Middle school teachers were kind of meh but you couldn't pay me enough to teach middle school so I get it.

Same experience with AP Lang. I edit others’ writing for a living and I can unequivocally state that my DD’s writing is better than that of many professionals thanks to her teachers.

Agree with AP Lang. My child was finally pushed to write strong essays. Also agree that you need a strong teacher to make it happen, which is actually why I am not in favor of the regional magnet models. We don't have enough trained teachers to make the classes work.

DCUM is like any online review site--the most vocal are the unhappiest and the happiest, more often the unhappiest from what I've seen on this board.

You asked how college outcomes have changed. Bethesda Magazine compiles them every year and publishes them. Not sure if anyone has analyzed how they changed. On teachers, I don't know how you'd look at changes in teacher quality. I do know a lot of experienced teachers quit during COVID, but that was part of a national trend.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. My kids are 20 and 15 and have been in MCPS since K.

I am very unhappy with the English curriculum, because it's frankly abysmal, but the STEM is great, and better than in any DC area private school.

Agree with this. STEM is good for the smart kids in advanced classes. But English is weak. History is cursory.

What seems to be the most important thing is peer group. And that is very school dependent.

English is weak but AP Lang was a game changer for my kid's writing. That class is a must for anyone. They are taking AP Lit this year so I will report back.

Stem has been great and I've been super impressed with the high school teachers. Elementary teachers were pretty great too, with only an occasional dud. Middle school teachers were kind of meh but you couldn't pay me enough to teach middle school so I get it.

Same experience with AP Lang. I edit others’ writing for a living and I can unequivocally state that my DD’s writing is better than that of many professionals thanks to her teachers.

Anonymous wrote:The haters, the wannabes have been pushing this narrative for the last 15+ years, but they still cannot compete with MCPS. They cannot even compete with MCPS in the "it's academic" competition.

idiotic post. no one is talking about "competing". this is about problems within MCPS

Mcps has no value in education or teaching kids. Teachers- when your admin comes in to try to throw coverups androadblocks at you. Just say in an email to them that " you are not going to do said questionable or illegal activity. Then tag your personal email on it to so you have a file of documentation if admin starts trying to harass or fire you.

Churchill cluster from k-12 was fantastic for my twins who just graduated in the past couple of years. They were safe and challenged. They started taking AP classes in 9th. One had an IEP and was well supported, even in the higher level classes. Freshman year in college went as well as we could have hoped. Clearly the curriculum worked.

But I am not ignorant enough to realize that we lived in a bubble. All of their friends came from educated parents, and the kids knew from kindergarten that they were expected to be respectful and go to college.

The county wants to make an idyllic world for all of the students which is such an amazing goal, but truthfully schools can’t fix everything. Our county has so many disadvantaged children. We can provide food and curriculum but we can’t change home life.

What about the W high schools? We have an incoming ninth grader.... cut and run now? can't afford private anymore...where is better?? switch to an IB high school like BCC?

It seems so many here are unhappy with MCPS but I have a different take. I attended MCPS as did my husband in the 70s and 80s and our kids have by far had a more rigorous education. They found college easy when they arrived which shocked them as adults always implied college would be so difficult. They were well prepared. This is not to say everything was perfect. When DD went to middle school long ago she had huge gaps in her math knowledge and we had to hire tutors to fill them. That curriculum is long gone though and it was not an issue in higher level math or for #2 in later years. The biggest issue we had was a lack of accountability for special education. Services were hard to come by and not always appropriate to our kids needs. It was always a fight. We did lots on the outside but I think you’ll find that to be a common theme in most districts. With that said, all my kids were mainstreamed and we didn’t have issues with teachers or disruptive classrooms except on a very rare occasion. We had two awful ES teachers along the way but the majority of teachers were better than ok, they were terrific. #3 is in HS and feels very safe at school and academically challenged. I think that any large school district has issues and because it’s public school it will never be an exact fit. You have to do private for that and I wish we could have afforded it. But when my friend shares about her experience with Broward Public Schools in FL or I hear from friends and family in CO, I can see MCPS is quite good by comparison.

When new teachers work at the bad schools admin will fire them the next year when teachers are not able to fix it. Admin is not supportive and runs around like their job is to make a case to frame the teachers as bad

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. My kids are 20 and 15 and have been in MCPS since K.

I am very unhappy with the English curriculum, because it's frankly abysmal, but the STEM is great, and better than in any DC area private school.

That's saying a lot. To must be in a magnet?

PP your replied to. No, our kids attend/attended two Bethesda-area high schools. We're scientists and are happy with the STEM offerings of MCPS: it provides a solid start in science. Half our neighbors send their kids to privates like Sidwell and Landon, so I can compare. The MCPS STEM magnet teaches science differently, and in my opinion even better, but we didn't want the commute.

The English curriculum is problematic because teachers have too many students to provide adequate feedback on writing skills. Students don't write enough long form essays, and thus they are not that well prepared for college writing. MCPS also doesn't have students read enough classics, in my opinion as a classics lover. It's all well and good to want to add contemporary works from minority authors, etc, but the point is to contrast and compare with the canon, otherwise all the debates over cultural sensitivities, racism, misogyny, religious and sexual control gets lost on students. Kids these days have a reduced attention span due to the nature of their online world, and need extra training in reading long passages, with rich vocab and complex grammar they would otherwise not encounter in their daily lives.