Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Define qualified...if you want to have a program for the top students, there is always a group at the top.

This is the fundamental misunderstanding of the CES program. It is not supposed to be for the "top students" in the school system. It was designed to meet the academic needs of students whose needs couldn't be met in their home elementary school. This really doesn't mean the top academic performers, it means students who learn differently, at a faster pace than their peers, and who thrive on independence and complex thinking. As more and more students over the years demonstrated they would benefit from the enriched curriculum, they began offering that curriculum at home schools, rather than shipping an entire class of 4th graders to a different school.

If parents stopped treating the CES as a coveted prize to be won by a select few students, and instead focused on advocating for better enriched curriculum (and GT trained teachers) at their school, everyone would be better off.

+1 If most students are at a more accelerated pace, the teacher can go through the curriculum quicker. But if it's like at my DC's school where she's one of a tiny group of more advanced students, so that the teacher has to go at a slower pace, it makes more sense that tiny group of students who are not being challenged at all to get sent to an accelerated program.

Also, the lottery is in place in part because demand far exceeds supply, and opens up the program to students whose parents or guardians are not as much "in the know." Diversity benefits the accelerated program.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s really a bummer they can just do leveled classrooms anymore. Then kids stay in their homeschools and get enriched instruction there. Sorting by ability is out though, sadly. It’s a mess.

Our ES essentially does this because of compacted math and ELC. There are some kids in the one and not the other, but mostly it's a cohort. And at the lower levels they do group kids of similar performance levels into classroom clusters so that they can small-group or enrich together. Parents at our ES often actually tend to turn down CES invitations because so many things (to be clear, not all) from the CES curriculum are already going on inside our regular school. Our admin also works at all levels (including the littles) to identify kids who are good candidates for enrichment or faster study and to meet their needs.

I bring this up because I think it is a good middle course between a not-feasible massive size expansion of the CES programs and the near impossibility of conducting a completely fair and constructive assessment of students from a wide variety of personal circumstances. It requires, however, a really strong leadership team that is constantly re-inventing how to best serve the families. How we do things at our school changes in big and little ways pretty much every year.

Anonymous wrote:DCUM is so nice right now without all the trolls.

Anonymous wrote:But I thought ‘all the schools are great’ was the clarion call in MoCo. I am truly gobsmacked this isn’t true...

Anonymous wrote:Any MCPS kid that can perform anywhere near the top X% ~WITHOUT good parenting at home~ should absolutely be allowed into the magnets.

Not everyone supplements with those CoGAT prep schools. Not everyone has parents home on the weekends or even evenings. There are MANY kids going home and feeding themselves and taking care of their schoolwork while their parent(s) work(s) until 9PM or later.

When those kids can get anywhere near succeeding then MCPS should be celebrated for at least putting their names in the lottery hat

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s really a bummer they can just do leveled classrooms anymore. Then kids stay in their homeschools and get enriched instruction there. Sorting by ability is out though, sadly. It’s a mess.

Our ES essentially does this because of compacted math and ELC. There are some kids in the one and not the other, but mostly it's a cohort. And at the lower levels they do group kids of similar performance levels into classroom clusters so that they can small-group or enrich together. Parents at our ES often actually tend to turn down CES invitations because so many things (to be clear, not all) from the CES curriculum are already going on inside our regular school. Our admin also works at all levels (including the littles) to identify kids who are good candidates for enrichment or faster study and to meet their needs.

I bring this up because I think it is a good middle course between a not-feasible massive size expansion of the CES programs and the near impossibility of conducting a completely fair and constructive assessment of students from a wide variety of personal circumstances. It requires, however, a really strong leadership team that is constantly re-inventing how to best serve the families. How we do things at our school changes in big and little ways pretty much every year.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They don’t want to get sued.

They do not want to get sued for what? Is this a relavent post?

Yes, it is. They want to avoid the legal problems of TJ and Harvard. I recall there also was similar legal action against TPMS the first year they changed the criteria.

I wonder what happened to those lawsuits. But MCPS is going equity over excellence route.

Really confusion though. Are they doing televised lottery or someone in the basement decide

Huh? Translation, please. Into English, please.

troll alert

This thread was started as a trolling effort.

Every week or so. Same person(s)? Same strawman arguements... lotteries for sports, etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Too many Asian and white kids. Not “enough” black and Latino kids who can match Asian/white kids performance

Exactly:

https://bethesdamagazine.com/bethesda-beat/schools/mcps-files-to-dismiss-magnet-admissions-lawsuit/

MCPS didn't like the outcome of the existing process, so they changed it to a lottery to achieve an outcome they wanted.

+1 The lottery was to ensure MCPS could weasel out of pending lawsuits. I believe they were caught tampering with the admissions criteria of the 2020 class, which helped motivate moving towards a lottery system. Can't claim its discrimination if it's a completely random selection.

Based on the article, it looks like Montgomery county schools are not the place for highly talented anymore. I wonder why enrollments in MCPS schools are down this year. I guess people are going private schools. May be time to move to Virginia and pay our taxes there

Don't let the door hit you on the way out! Oh, and it really wouldn't hurt you to improve your grammar.

MCPS never disclose how they select the students for the lotttery. The criteria is a moving target, depending on your skin color and where you live. MCPD said there is a national rank and there is a adjusted MCPS rank. For. A student who ranked at 90% nationally, he or she could be a 75% students or a 99% student. Some students who ranked at 75% nationally could be in the pool for lottery but others in 97% may not be selected for the pool.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Define qualified...if you want to have a program for the top students, there is always a group at the top.

This is the fundamental misunderstanding of the CES program. It is not supposed to be for the "top students" in the school system. It was designed to meet the academic needs of students whose needs couldn't be met in their home elementary school. This really doesn't mean the top academic performers, it means students who learn differently, at a faster pace than their peers, and who thrive on independence and complex thinking. As more and more students over the years demonstrated they would benefit from the enriched curriculum, they began offering that curriculum at home schools, rather than shipping an entire class of 4th graders to a different school.

If parents stopped treating the CES as a coveted prize to be won by a select few students, and instead focused on advocating for better enriched curriculum (and GT trained teachers) at their school, everyone would be better off.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They don’t want to get sued.

They do not want to get sued for what? Is this a relavent post?

Yes, it is. They want to avoid the legal problems of TJ and Harvard. I recall there also was similar legal action against TPMS the first year they changed the criteria.

I wonder what happened to those lawsuits. But MCPS is going equity over excellence route.

Really confusion though. Are they doing televised lottery or someone in the basement decide

Huh? Translation, please. Into English, please.

troll alert

This thread was started as a trolling effort.

Anonymous wrote:It’s really a bummer they can just do leveled classrooms anymore. Then kids stay in their homeschools and get enriched instruction there. Sorting by ability is out though, sadly. It’s a mess.