Private school note......

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by EDS_

You are misreading ND's policy. The school offers no purely merit based scholarships.


ETA - Actually, digging around it appears ND may offer a few race based merit scholarships.

Then what is the merit-based scholarship for Early Action applicants ND touts on it's website?

[racehorse]

Everyone knows Northwestern is the Harvard of the Midwest.

Go U Northwestern!

[TX75007]

Originally Posted by jennifw

Isn't that part of a numbers game? I think St. Marks has about 1,000 students total. Not sure if that is correct, but I know they aren't graduating hundreds or thousands each year. Plano ISD probably had several thousand seniors this year so it seems logical that they could/would have a high number of NMFs. I am not saying they aren't doing a great job, but you can't compare HUGE schools to smaller privates. Maybe that would be better presented as percentages?

Looking back in time, St Marks is pretty consistent at 15-30% NWSF in a graduating class from 80-90 students.. The last few years, the numbers have dropped off, and the PS, especially Plano, have jumped. Perhaps families are pulling kids out for financial reasons?

To be NMSF, it the top 0.5% of the test takers who make the cut. This represents the top 0.2% of the Junior class nationwide. This is really more about IQ, self-motivation, adequate schooling, and parental decisions at this point, rather than a numbers game.

At Plano ISD, there are about 7000 Seniors, so you would expect 15 NMSF district wide. Usually Plano has about 40.

You see very few NMSF in the Dallas ISD which twice as large as Plano. You should see about 30 NMSF - but you see just two. Ditto Garland which also has a highly touted Magnet program. I'll bet the privates siphon off a lot of kids who might otherwise be in those programs.

What this means for the districts that have large populations of NMSF kids is that these schools can develop and maintain a preponderance of college level programs for the higher grade levels. And exceptional students can get to work at a high level with their intellectual peers.

[TX75007]

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

You're selling the privates short- significantly- if you think they can only prepare a student for a liberal arts college. Greenhill, St Mark's and ESD get boys into MIT, Rice Engineering, Stanford Engineering/ Computer Science, etc every year. I know two St Mark's grads who are software engineers at Google, another who is finishing his PhD in physics or something ridiculous like that at MiT, another who is a surgeon after graduating from Johns Hopkins.

Not knocking TAMS or Plano ISD for a kid interested in science/ computers/ engineering at all as they are excellent schools, too. Just pointing out St Mark's can do far more than prepare a boy for life on Wall Street or at daddy's company.

I just do not see St Marks or the other privates sending kids to MIT or Caltech every year like I do Plano.

I work with people who graduated from St Marks and have coworkers whose kids, very bright kids, go to St Marks. The parents at St Marks tend to be lawyers and business leaders and doctors, not geeks, like the kids in Plano.

Maybe its a parental influence thing.

[Big G]

Originally Posted by TX75007

At Plano ISD, there are about 7000 Seniors, so you would expect 15 NMSF district wide. Usually Plano has about 40.

????

These numbers aren't right. PISD only has about half that number of seniors, and Plano Senior ALONE churns out 40 NMSFs on average.

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by TX75007

Looking back in time, St Marks is pretty consistent at 15-30% NWSF in a graduating class from 80-90 students.. The last few years, the numbers have dropped off, and the PS, especially Plano, have jumped. Perhaps families are pulling kids out for financial reasons?

To be NMSF, it the top 0.5% of the test takers who make the cut. This represents the top 0.2% of the Junior class nationwide. This is really more about IQ, self-motivation, adequate schooling, and parental decisions at this point, rather than a numbers game.

At Plano ISD, there are about 7000 Seniors, so you would expect 15 NMSF district wide. Usually Plano has about 40

Here are the real % of class selected from 2011 National Merit round. (Semi-Finalists). Hockaday & St Mark's crank out way more than any public ISD - and significantly more than any other private schools with a similar sized class. Highland Park, Flower Mound, and Plano Sr are the top 3 public hs, all with over 3% of class. TAMS is way up there, but it's an animal all on its own (since SAT scores are used as admissions criteria, they tend to be pretty damn good).

26.2% 11/42 - Cistercian, Irving (private)
25.0% 5/20 - Cambridge School, Dallas (private)
24.2% 46/190 - TX Academy of Math & Science - Denton (charter, selective, residential at UNT)
21.7% 18/83 - St. Marks, Dallas (private)

15.0% 15/100 - Hockaday, Dallas (private)

5.5% 6/110 - Greenhill, Addison (private)

4.8% 12/250 - Jesuit, Dallas (private)
4.4% 34/770 - Flower Mound (Lewisville ISD)

3.3% 16/480 - Highland Park (Highland Park ISD)
3.0% 6/200 - Ursuline, Dallas (private)
3.0% 39/1320 - Plano Sr. (Plano ISD)

2.6% 18/700 - Marcus (Lewisville ISD)
2.5% 26/1020 - Plano West (Plano ISD)
2.5% 13/518 - Robert L. Paschal High School (Fort Worth)
2.1% 15/710 - Coppell (Coppell ISD)

1.5% 6/400 - Frisco (Frisco ISD)
1.5% 21/1440 - Plano East (Plano ISD)
1.3% 6/480 - JJ Pearce (Richardson ISD)
1.2% 6/500 - McKinney (McKinney ISD)
1.1% 8/700 - Hebron (Lewisville ISD)
1.1% 6/550 - Grapevine (Grapevine-Colleyville ISD)
1.0% 12/1200 - Allen (Allen ISD)
1.0% 6/620 - Southlake Carroll (Carroll ISD)

[Big G]

Originally Posted by TX75007

I just do not see St Marks or the other privates sending kids to MIT or Caltech every year like I do Plano.

I work with people who graduated from St Marks and have coworkers whose kids, very bright kids, go to St Marks. The parents at St Marks tend to be lawyers and business leaders and doctors, not geeks, like the kids in Plano.

Maybe its a parental influence thing.

Here's a relevant quote (somewhat dated, but likely still accurate)

MIT has traditionally boasted a high percentage of first-generation college students, kids from lower-middle- and middle-class families who see science and engineering as a way of getting a leg up. Seventy-nine percent of MIT's undergraduates come from public high schools, which is high for universities in its academic league. At Harvard, it's 65 percent and at Yale, 53 percent, according to the Princeton Review Complete Book of Colleges: 1999.

MIT and Caltech don't much care what high school you attended. They just care that you got high grades and SATs and, more importantly, ripped off straight 4s and 5s on AP Calc, AP Physics, etc. That is, as long as you can demonstrate ability and preparedness, who your daddy knows is irrelevant.

What does that mean in practical terms?

Let's postulate a male student who can perform at or near the top of a public school class in a decent DFW district.

If he wants to go to, say, Yale, he would be well served by attending St. Mark's. If he wants to go to, say, Caltech, going to St. Mark's would be money flushed down the toilet. It wouldn't help his admissions chances (as long as he can still learn the needed material at his public school and perform well on AP exams).

Therefore, the student body at St. Mark's becomes self-selected away from those aiming for a technical higher education.

[Big G]

Originally Posted by TX75007

The parents at St Marks tend to be lawyers and business leaders and doctors, not geeks, like the kids in Plano.

Hey, I resemble that remark!

[TX75007]

Originally Posted by Big G

If he wants to go to, say, Yale, he would be well served by attending St. Mark's. If he wants to go to, say, Caltech, going to St. Mark's would be money flushed down the toilet. It wouldn't help his admissions chances (as long as he can still learn the needed material at his public school and perform well on AP exams)..

Caltech is a bit different than MIT. My interviews there were WAY more interesting that those for any other school.

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

Here are the real % of class selected from 2011 National Merit round. (Semi-Finalists). Hockaday & St Mark's crank out way more than any public ISD - and significantly more than any other private schools with a similar sized class. Highland Park, Flower Mound, and Plano Sr are the top 3 public hs, all with over 3% of class. TAMS is way up there, but it's an animal all on its own (since SAT scores are used as admissions criteria, they tend to be pretty damn good).

You beat me to it.

Can you run these numbers for the last 20 years? It would be interesting to see a time series...

I was one of just two NMSF in my HS. All of my HS honors classmates went on to amazing careers, though. I cannot imagine what it would be like to have had 40 classmates as NMSF.

Originally Posted by Big G

Hey, I resemble that remark!

What do you call a geek when he or she is 40?

Boss!!

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Right now our dilemma is what to do with our son. He's 3 and can read fluently in two languages and is socially advanced. The private school he is at skipped him into PreK and said he really belonged in K. But no one takes 4 year olds into first grade and it looks like almost no one takes 5 year olds into first grade either.