2016 National Merit Semi-Finalists (Dallas, Plano, Allen: real estate, apartment, rent)

[gsoy]

Hockaday 11

[richard88]

Frisco ISD ?

[jennifw]

Ursuline has 2 this year.

[theloneranger]

Jesuit had 13.

[theloneranger]

Originally Posted by BabyDoctor77

Greenhill? Hockaday?

Results for various city of Dallas high schools + Greenhill.

St. Mark's 28
HPHS 16
Jesuit 13
Hockaday 11
TAG 8
Greenhill 7
SEM 5
ESD 3
Parish 2
Booker T. Washington 1
Bishop Lynch 1
Bishop Dunne 1
Cambridge 1
Richland Collegiate (charter) 1

National Merit program announces scholarship semifinalists | Dallas Morning News

[DitsyD]

Originally Posted by theloneranger

Results for various city of Dallas high schools + Greenhill.

St. Mark's 28
HPHS 16
Jesuit 13
Hockaday 11
TAG 8
Greenhill 7
SEM 5
ESD 3
Parish 2
Booker T. Washington 1
Bishop Lynch 1
Bishop Dunne 1
Cambridge 1
Richland Collegiate (charter) 1

National Merit program announces scholarship semifinalists | Dallas Morning News

That story is for SEMIFINALISTS. The question is now about FINALISTS. Not every school has released those numbers.

[Malcolm787]

We just moved into our home in central plano and boy am I bummed at seeing the decrease in #s for plano senior.


We were looking in west plano for several months, but didn't find anything. Granted, it was supposed to the 'off-season' before the spring market where more homes are supposed to come up. Our realtor was great - she gave us a list of homes that sold in the area last year to give us an idea of how many homes and the types of homes to expect in the spring. Our range was 400-500k. We quickly realized that a home zoned to west plano at that price would require another 50-75k of updates...extra money we didn't have.


A home came up in central plano a couple of months ago that we purchased because we figured that a bird in the hand is better than waiting till the spring when prices could be higher/bidding war since more buyers in the market. The home ticked all of our boxes (450k, layout, updates, etc) EXCEPT that it's not W. Plano. I figured that as a whole, the Plano ISD is good, and we could use the money we save to enroll our kids in extracurricular activities and tutoring down the road as we push a balance of social skills and academics at home; son is in 2nd grade and daughter will attend kindergarten at Matthews. Then Schimelpfenig - Clark - Senior.


I tossed and turned last night, and cried multiple times because I feel that we let our kids down big time.
I even had to pause during this multiple times. I love the home, love Mattthews, love the area, love the people, etc....but I feel that we chose a home over our kids' education. We could have bought a home in west plano, gone without the updates and sent our kids to much better middle and high schools...schools that appear to have higher achieving kids that would have also motivated our kids to step up their game. I'm so ashamed of myself. I took away an opportunity from them to attend better middle/high schools in the future, with peers that would have driven them even more. I suppose we'll have to consider our options in the future around selling or hope that they rezone us back to rice, jasper, plano west in the future. so ashamed of myself.

Originally Posted by BayTexan

Thanks for posting Plano numbers. Plano West did great as usual but the drop off in Plano Senior's numbers since the rezoning is amazing... they used to be neck and neck with Plano West and now have the same numbers as Plano East.

[Johnhw2]

I think Plano Sr High is a strong school. It was an elite but still very strong. I doubt there is a lot of difference in learning environment or competition due to the shift. Still a high number of high achieving students just a smaller pool of them. I think your caring so much about your kids makes a big difference in how they can do with your encouragement and the good system.


I think you are beating yourself up more than warranted by a mile here. YMMV

[2URGSE]

@Malcolm787: I think you're beating yourself up too much. Plano Senior is still a very strong school. Don't forget that it is still in PISD system, and you will be around other kids/involved parents who want their kids to succeed.
Your kids will not be getting a cut-rate education compared to the "West" zoned schools.

[synchronicity]

Originally Posted by Malcolm787

We just moved into our home in central plano and boy am I bummed at seeing the decrease in #s for plano senior.

We were looking in west plano for several months, but didn't find anything. Granted, it was supposed to the 'off-season' before the spring market where more homes are supposed to come up. Our realtor was great - she gave us a list of homes that sold in the area last year to give us an idea of how many homes and the types of homes to expect in the spring. Our range was 400-500k. We quickly realized that a home zoned to west plano at that price would require another 50-75k of updates...extra money we didn't have.

A home came up in central plano a couple of months ago that we purchased because we figured that a bird in the hand is better than waiting till the spring when prices could be higher/bidding war since more buyers in the market. The home ticked all of our boxes (450k, layout, updates, etc) EXCEPT that it's not W. Plano. I figured that as a whole, the Plano ISD is good, and we could use the money we save to enroll our kids in extracurricular activities and tutoring down the road as we push a balance of social skills and academics at home; son is in 2nd grade and daughter will attend kindergarten at Matthews. Then Schimelpfenig - Clark - Senior.

I tossed and turned last night, and cried multiple times because I feel that we let our kids down big time.
I even had to pause during this multiple times. I love the home, love Mattthews, love the area, love the people, etc....but I feel that we chose a home over our kids' education. We could have bought a home in west plano, gone without the updates and sent our kids to much better middle and high schools...schools that appear to have higher achieving kids that would have also motivated our kids to step up their game. I'm so ashamed of myself. I took away an opportunity from them to attend better middle/high schools in the future, with peers that would have driven them even more. I suppose we'll have to consider our options in the future around selling or hope that they rezone us back to rice, jasper, plano west in the future. so ashamed of myself.

Don't beat yourself up over this. Remember that we're basically going over the best of the best here, and also remember that most of the difference in performance for kids is based on their abilities and their home environment. Schools do help, of course, but the delta between Plano Senior and Plano West is still really small, even with the rezoning.

Also, there are lots of other factors that go into how much a school can help a student. If you love the area and the people and you're still in a school that is one of the top 10 if not top 5 in all of DFW for open enrollment publics (which is about where Plano Senior is. I mean, what schools other than West are "better"? Highland Park, Carroll...maybe Coppell and Flower Mound? The latter two have high NMSF but averages that are slightly lower than Senior IIRC), then your kids will likely feel comfortable and happy with their environment as well. I'm sure they will continue to be driven to achieve.

On this board, we tend to analyze things to the Nth degree, plus this board skews high in socioeconomic and educational status. Anyone attending one of the "Usual Suspects" schools has the wind at their back, and yes, Plano Senior remains one of the top high schools by achievement metrics in the entire area. There are many, many things more important for success in life than a <20 point difference in SAT scores. Being happy with where you are and who you're around are among those things.