<p>If any of your kids did the Duke Tip program in 7th grade, how did it impact their education? Did it help with their college admissions or anything else?</p>
<p>All 3 of mine were Duke TIP kids. The oldest is in college the other 2 are in 10th and 8th grade. All it did was show us how well they could take the ACT or SAT and what colleges they could get into with those scores. I think it’s good to have them take it and that way when they take it for real they won’t get stressed out. There are summer programs they can do however they were always out of our price range. It did not help with college admissions. </p>
<p>"I think it’s good to have them take it and that way when they take it for real they won’t get stressed out. " You can also find kids on here who took it in middle school and then spent years stressing out about their scores. I don’t think it makes sense to test a kid on things they haven’t learned. Unless there is something like a program they want to enroll in that would require this testing, I don’t see much point. There’s enough anxiety and stress in the college admissions process already. Why inflict that on a 12 year old? </p>
<p>My kids thought it was fun. Not stressful at all.</p>
<p>My kids did Northwestern’s Center for Talent Development, which is the midwest version of Duke TIP. No pressure. They thought it was fun to live on a college campus, have the “supervised freedom” of doing so, and really enjoyed it. My D went for 2 years, my S for 4 or 5. It certainly couldn’t hurt for admissions, but it wasn’t any silver bullet IMO.</p>
<p>Both of my kids took the Johns Hopkins version. One spent three summers doing JHU programs and the other did none. It certainly didn’t hurt my older son during the application process. It might have helped that he’d earned 14 college credits. </p>
<p>My son went to Duke TIP. It did nothing for college application, nor did he receive any credit for it. what was important is that he spent time on a college campus. He went with his group to the deli on weekends and had other organized activities. He debated philosphy with a grad student, a funny tale that he used for essay on common application. I guess that was a big help. </p>
<p>I’m sure it would have been better if he had gotten into a course he really wanted, or if he had a MS friend with him.</p>
<p>Both my kids took the SAT for CTY (similar to TIP). I think it helped them demystify the test. They enjoyed freaking out the older students and getting scores that were better than the average senior. (Way better in the older son’s case.) Older son did 3 CTY programs. They didn’t help with college in any direct way, but kept him happy during the summer. He did Cryptographhy one year and Probability and Game Theory, both of which were great. The last year he did fastpaced high school chemistry in order to free up his schedule. It made it easier for him to take three science APs so I suppose it did help him with colleges a bit.</p>
<p>The fact that he’d seen three different college campuses made him convinced that all college dorms are alike and he was not very interested in visiting colleges!</p>
<p>" I don’t think it makes sense to test a kid on things they haven’t learned. "</p>
<p>Most Duke TIP kids are gifted so they usually have been in advanced classes and already can score higher than the average senior. So they aren’t really being tested for things they haven’t learned any more than a number of the high school students taking the test. Please note I’m talking about the average high school seniors scores NOT the CC high school senior scores.</p>
<p>The average ACT in 2013 was 20.9… The average SAT scores were Critical reading:496,Mathematics: 514,Writing: 488.</p>
<p>High school seniors have been taught algebra and geometry. Whether or not they learned it is another question. Very few 7th graders, even honor students, have already completed algebra1, much less geometry. In our school system, which is an above-average school that is more aggressive and permissive than most schools about middle school math acceleration, fewer than 1% of 7th graders have already completed algebra1 and fewer than 0.05% have completed geometry. </p>
<p>What purpose is served by comparing a highly gifted kid who hasn’t studied the material yet with the average senior who never understood it properly, has half-forgotten it, and likely didn’t even study for the SAT, because many kids don’t? </p>
<p>I appreciate the info all. All this is a great help as we figure out which direction to take. I will return with questions as we proceed</p>
<p>D was a Duke TIP finalist, but the summer programs were way out of our budget. The recognition ceremony was held some distance away on a date she was still in school, so they mailed her certificate. Her HS had kids take a practice PSAT fall of sophomore year, which served the purpose of demystifying the test. So in her case, I didn’t see a benefit, but YMMV.</p>
<p>Keep in mind also that the SAT will be a different test by the time your child takes it. If you think you might want to send your child to one of the programs, of course you need to participate, but what if your child qualifies and then you say, sorry I know you spent those hours taking that test when you could have been doing something fun, but that was just to take a test and I’m not going to pay for that program you want to go to and qualified for. Will your child be ok with that?</p>
<p>In our school, all sophomores take the PSAT. They take it again as juniors. So, by the time they take the SAT, they’ve already taken two similar tests, not to mention the 20 or so other standardized tests they’ve been through in recent years. I do think that it’s important to learn the format and how to pace on such a time-critical test, but I question whether doing this as a 7th grader is in any way helpful to taking the test for real 4 years later, especially when the questions and format will be different by then anyhow.</p>
<p>First, not every kid should take the test. Only kids already show advanced reasoning skills (identified by GATE program in school or by parental observation) should take the test. They don’t need to labor hard to prepare for the test. Kids don’t need to finish algebra 1 or geometry to take test. My D took the test when she was in the first semester of algebra1. A kid who is not advanced in math but has high CR skills can still take the test.</p>
<p>I think it’s good for the kids to be in a dorm to have some experience of living with others away from home. This will help when they actually move to college after HS. There are many threads on CC saying my son or daugther cries and wants to go home after just less than 1 week in college. </p>
<p>Op,
My kids went thru Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth (JHU-CTY) which is similar to Duke TIP. Kids who scored in the top 3% of a standardized test were invited to take the JHU-CTY test. Both took an ACT and an SAT in middle school, no prep, although my kids did the little booklet with a practice test just before. Took the tests, no stress, then go to an amusement park. I did it to get them exposed to the test in a fun fashion. While their scores qualified to take the classes at JHU-CTY, my kids did not take any, preferring either to go to summer camp, or in programs in film, video game design, and animation whereby they live on college campuses. Taking the summer classes at TIP or CTY does NOT boost an app by taking the classes, but it boosts a kid’s interest in something which then can reflect well on an app, in the same way that, say, a summer program in film does. My 99%ile scoring DKs continue to be interested in becoming a film producer and an animator or video game designer.</p>
<p>“but what if your child qualifies and then you say, sorry I know you spent those hours taking that test when you could have been doing something fun, but that was just to take a test and I’m not going to pay for that program you want to go to and qualified for. Will your child be ok with that?”</p>
<p>My kids were fine with it. They know we can’t spend thousands of dollars on a summer program. Plus it’s not like they studied for the test and it only took 1 Saturday morning. It’s really not any different than telling them they have to spend Saturday morning doing yard work.</p>
<p>The point of participating in the screening by taking the SAT, IMO,
is for practice, for qualification for enrichment programs/classes, or perhaps for information for a districts gifted programs.
Its cheaper than an educational psychologist administered IQ test, although our medical insurance paid for our kids to be tested, as they were participating in an university study.</p>
<p>One D tested as having an IQ upward of 160, however she didnt qualify for our district program, using their group administered achievement test. I didn’t feel like contesting it. ( we kept her in private school)
She took the SAT in 7th gd alongside a younger friend. D then did a snail mail enrichment program, but her school really had plenty of challenge for her, and she didnt continue after a year. Her friend had a transition year then entered a flagship university.</p>
<p>D didnt mention it on her college apps.</p>
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<p>No kids here. To put things in perspective, at my middle school it would have taken a massive letdown for anyone NOT to qualify for the Duke. The qualification bar is not set too high. </p>
<p>As far as further participation the few kids who were pushed by their parents found the residential programs entertaining. Just as other summer programs appeal to the right type of kids. Remember there are people who profess that the four letter scam programs in DC are beneficial! </p>
<p>As far as admission or educational boost, the answer has to be an impact of zilch to none. All in all, those programs are much ado about nothing. This said, for some it might be a wake-up call that the Lake Wobegon kids ain’t that special after all. </p>
<p>If one take a practice ACT / SAT at home, then you can see how well they can do on a real test. There is no reason doing it in 7th grade. There is no reason doing it until couple weeks before the test. It is unreasonable to assume that all As kid will do poorly or all Cs kid will do fine, So you can esitmate using common sense. List of colleges should be compiled based on the personal fit and not ranking anyway. </p>
<p>MiamiDAP, I guess that they did not give it at your D’s school? This was part of the regular day a la PSAT … no special effort needed. </p>
<p>As far as “There is no reason doing it until couple weeks before the test” I hope you realize how nebulous that “advice” is. And how bad that might be for the hordes of kids who are told to wait until their Junior year to look at the SAT – if not senior year! </p>