National Merit Semifinalists 2018 (Plano, Flower Mound, Southlake: top schools, move to, residential)

[kyam11]

Originally Posted by UnfairPark

As a fact a good number of 7th grader take SAT for Duke TIP and Johns Hopkins CTY talent recognition. This is not a news. Every year good number of Plano ISD students earn recognition or Grand recognition medals. It makes them eligible for online courses or summer programs at these schools. It’s a cool recognition but many parents think it helps with admission at these schools in future which it doesn’t.

Again what is a good number? If it is less than 5% of 7th graders then it is anything but a good number.

Hint: It is less than 5%.

I never said it was news. I said I don't know of one parent who prepares their kids for the PSAT in Carroll ISD, nor do most care about PSAT. SAT is a different matter. Point being you all seem to think people care about this NMSF more than most actually do. I could not care less about my children making this list or not making this list. There is not enough money in it for me to even care even a little bit.

In other words you too have no clue what you are talking about

[BayTexan]

Carroll is a far better school than Plano West. Thanks for the laugh though

On what basis/metric?

Originally Posted by kyam11

There is nothing in there that says they try that hard. They incorporate what is in the test into the curriculum which makes sense since they are basic concepts.

Again thanks for being jealous of the best district overall in DFW. My son is not preparing for the PSAT, but preparing for the SAT. He was asked to take it in the past 2 weeks. I guarantee I know more Carroll parents than you do and I don't know 1 who cares about the PSAT. All care about the SAT or ACT.

BTW he is in 7th grade and no this is not a joke.

Carroll is a far better school than Plano West. Thanks for the laugh though.

[MurphyPl1]

Number of tee shirts sold.

[tcualum]

This pissing match between Plano West and Carroll is both entertaining and annoying for uninterested bystanders. It reeks for insecurity.

The thing I find ridiculous though is the invitation from Duke for 4-6th graders to take the 8/9 PSAT. I presented my older son with the option to take it or not after he got the invitation. He decided to do so out of curiosity. The school where he took it was poorly organized and didn't know what it was doing. I'm still unclear regarding the actual purpose of the test.

[MurphyPl1]

I believe it's for their Talent Identification Program. We have a student here in Murphy who is in it. And I have a friend in Miami who went thru it as a student and speaks highly of the program.

[UnfairPark]

Originally Posted by MurphyPl1

Number of tee shirts sold.

No way! School PTAs arrange T-shirts for whole district, every club and extracurricular gets their T-shirts, hoodies, fleece etc. Each of my son’s had dozens of school related clothing items, if every kid gets even a few then overall probably PISD orders thousands more than Carroll ISD has we are a much larger district.

[synchronicity]

Plano west and Carroll Senior have had similar SAT averages for many years now. IIRC, a slightly higher percentage of all Carroll Sr. students have taken the SAT compared to Plano West (I've got the numbers somewhere from prior years, and anyone who's interested could go to the TEA website and pull the info themselves: https://tea.texas.gov/perfreport/tapr/index.html and https://rptsvr1.tea.texas.gov/perfre...eis/index.html for years prior to 2012-13.) but the differences are very minor.

I believe that historically, in most years a higher percentage of Plano West students have made NMSF compared to Carroll Sr. students, although Carroll may have had the edge there this year. Of course, Plano West does this with somewhat lower SES demographics than Carroll, so one can add that into the equation. As also noted, NMSF is just one stat among many and is highly correlated with SAT average for obvious reasons.

In the end, we're talking about two of the best high schools in the DFW area in terms of academic metrics, which makes these debates very much an "angels dancing on the head of a pin" sort of thing. There are something like 175 open enrollment public high schools with 12th graders in the DFW area (depending on how one defines "the DFW area"). We can argue all we want about which among the top 7 or so are "better" than others, but overall, kids attending any of the Usual Suspects are going to be very well prepared for post-secondary education. Anybody looking at the feeder zones for any of those schools really should just find the area they and their family feel the most comfortable and devote their energies to raising their kids as best they can, because that will have far more impact than the fairly small differences in "school quality" at that level. And in general, if you can afford to live in most of those areas, you're already ahead of the game.

[UnfairPark]

No doubt about both districts being solid. Nobody is contesting that. We are just picking on fine details. Don’t take it seriously.

[synchronicity]

Originally Posted by UnfairPark

No doubt about both districts being solid. Nobody is contesting that. We are just picking on fine details. Don’t take it seriously.

Hey, I even own a bunch of Dragon T-shirts. But I don't have one of those ubiquitous stickers on a bottom corner of the rear window of my car. Then again, I think they're only mandatory on minivans and SUVs.

[jiping]

Originally Posted by synchronicity

Plano west and Carroll Senior have had similar SAT averages for many years now. IIRC, a slightly higher percentage of all Carroll Sr. students have taken the SAT compared to Plano West.

That's correct.
The average SAT score at Plano West Senior High School was 1754/2400, while the average SAT score at Carroll Senior High School was 1748/2400.

However, like I've mentioned, average means nothing. They are one of the garbage data in today's information age.
TTU/UNT has average SAT score of 1650, and UTD has average SAT score of 1850.
So average Plano West and Carroll students with 1750 SAT will be admitted to TTU/UNT, and UTD if they are lucky.
1750/2400 SAT, and in other word, a 75% percentile among all SAT examinees, gets you nowhere beyond that.

Understandably, people spend $$$$$ in good ISD or good private schools want more than UTD.
Great schools like Duke, for example, has average SAT score of 2250 (25th percentile is 2130, 75th percentile is 2370). Average For Rice is 2200.
That translates to 99.0 (97.0-99.9) percentile among all SAT examinees.

See? Only Top 3% (Top 1% for those who doesn't have quota) may be relevant here, when you are targeting at great colleges. How other 97% performs have very little to do with you.
I would argue even the Spelling Bee Semifinalists gives more insight than average SAT/ACT.