<ol>
<li><p>Neighborhood HS. Good, competitive, rigid, no flexibility. For example, she has to attend Spanish classes, although, she knows Spanish better than her teacher. Nice school, but little flexibility to learn subjects that she needs, instead of subjects that are on the schedule. Boring, yet consumes a lot of time. Busy work.</p></li>
<li><p>Magnet HS. Great kids, great curriculum. However, her GPA will ultimately suffer. Her college prospects will suffer as well. Good education, great friends. .... bad for college admission.</p></li>
<li><p>Minority school. Possibility to become valedictorian. Easy classes, great GPA. Flexibility. Time for online education. Time for EC. Gang-infected classes, all inner-city problems, diversity experience. Great for resume. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>What advice would you give? Relocation is not an issue. She aims for Ivy or Stanford-Berkeley.</p>
<p>I would say the magnet school is the best option. Your daughter is going to be spending 4 years at this school, you want her to be challenged in the courses she takes so that she will actually learn something. Colleges will look at her in the context of the school so if she goes to the magnet school where the average GPA is a 3.4 and she has a 3.6 and is in the top 10% in her class, than she is doing pretty well. </p>
<p>Sending her to the “minority school” just because she has the chance of becoming valedictorian won’t do her much good if the classes are extremely easy because she won’t learn and therefore won’t be prepared for college. Do you even know if this school has AP classes? Also, if you think that sending her to a disadvantaged school so she can graduate at the top of her class is going to help her get into top colleges, then you are wrong. And if she is not disadvantaged the way her classmates are, then colleges may take that into consideration.</p>
<p>All in all, send her to the school that will offer the most rigorous classes and the most enjoyable atmosphere. High school is not all about becoming valedictorian, its about learning.</p>
<p>YEs, I do think that “disadvantaged school … top of her class is going to help her get into top colleges”</p>
<p>Am I wrong?</p>
<p>I look at the list of kids accepted to Ivyes. Even the best, magnet schools have a max of 1-5 kids accepted to the top schools. All admission officers empathize that kid must be the best in his class. Even if the school doesn’t offer AP classes, she can take them online. I am the foreigner, I don’t know the American system well, so I am a bit confused.</p>
<p>Why do you think that magnet school is better? All admission officers tell otherwise. They say that the kid should “take maximum advantage of the classes available to him”. Obviously, it is impossible in a magnet school, too many AP classes.</p>
<p>Does anyone has the data that proves that magnet schools improve kids abilities for admission? I think otherwise. I am a foreigner, not very familiar with the US education system, I may be wrong. </p>
<p>All college websites say that they are interested in kids that graduated from impoverished schools with little resources. Isn’t it obvious that such schools are beneficial (and easy to get in) for admission?</p>
<p>I went to a small (~30 students) Magnet program (at a minority high school). Why will it be bad for college admission? Her GPA may not suffer - I had a 3.6 when I graduated, which isn’t the highest of the highs (and I wasn’t valedictorian) but was still enough to get me accepted to some great schools and a full merit scholarship. I also made some lifelong friends.</p>
<p>Sometimes, even when the curriculum is rigorous you rise to the challenge. And when you’re in an environment that you feel comfortable it’s easier to excel. I chose to take a 2-hour bus ride to attend this HS over a 10-minute one to my local one because of the academics and the social environment. I still had time for ECs.</p>
<p>Why would you want to send your daughter to a school that has gang-infected classes just because she can be valedictorian? Preparation is much more important than being at the top of the class. The inner-city school probably doesn’t have the same offerings and rigor as the other two schools. And if she’s afraid for her safety, she won’t be able to do well!</p>
<p>Colleges are interested in kids that graduated from impoverished schools because they had no other choice. And even though they say that, if you look at the makeup of the student bodies of top Ivies MOST students don’t go to these kinds of schools. Only a small fraction do. The majority of students at top schools went to expensive privates or good public schools. I go to Columbia and there are tons of Choate, Groton, Exeter, Horace Mann and Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, Boston Latin type students here. There aren’t as many Compton High students.</p>
<p>I think the Magnet HS sounds like the best choice for her.</p>
<p>When AOs say “max advantage of classes available,” they obviously don’t mean taking all of the AP classes in the school. They mean putting together a rigorous courseload that makes sense for the student in question.</p>
<p>MOST students at Ivies weren’t the valedictorian of their class. There are stories on here all the time of the #5 or #17 in their class getting in somewhere over the #1. Magnet schools don’t have a max of 1-5 students accepted to top schools. If you look at the top private and public high schools in the nation, they have very high percentages of their senior classes headed off to the top 30-50 colleges in the nation.</p>
<p>OP makes it sound like the goal is gaining admission to a highly selective college. IMHO, the goal should be to gain the best education possible (in high school and college). These goals differ greatly in numerous aspects.</p>
<p>Adcoms for highly selective universities are familiar with high schools in their region. They expect students to take advantage of all opportunities available to them. There is a good chance that they will recognize that the magnet school was available and wonder why it was not selected.</p>
<p>One final thought: why does OP have so little confidence in her daughter - that she won’t be at the top of the magnet school?</p>
<p>Yea, she might have a higher class rank at an easier school but the lack of rigor will negatively affect her college performance (and possibly her ACT/SAT scores).</p>
<p>My reasoning is as I stated. better preparation means better outcome.
to break it down slowly- a higher bar of achievement means a greater likelihood the student will be able to benefit from the offerings of a rigorous college.
Attend a high school that doesn’t prepare you and you may indeed be first in your class, but with a much lower bar, is that really something to get excited about?
My kids both always attended the most rigorous schools possible.
They each were accepted into all their college choices.</p>
<p>"What is your nationality? " from lastminutemom196</p>
<p>I am technically Latino … but I am blond. My daughter is platinum blond. She can’t really claim URM because people think that she fakes it. She is tired of trying to explain her origin, so she gave up and accepted “white”. Talk about the color of your skin. :)</p>
<p>OK, let me see if I understand. You WANT to send your D to a “minority school” which likely will not help her. But then you DO NOT WANT to declare Latino which will definitely help her.</p>
<p>OP, I think when emeraldkity said that the magnet would produce the best outcomes, she meant that your daughter would learn the most at the magnet and therefore be most successful in college. Her “outcome” wasn’t regarding admissions; she was talking about an educational outcome.</p>
<h1>1 looks like a lot of worthless busywork.</h1>
<h1>2 looks like the best preparation to do well in college, whether one of the schools listed or a slightly less selective school (like some other UC if you are a California resident).</h1>
<h1>3 looks like a place for distractions and insufficient preparation to do well college.</h1>
<p>I don’t think that’s exactly true. Kids need to take maximum advantage of the opportunities they have. Colleges are interested in impoverished minorities who rise above their circumstances. Less interested in middle class kids with lots of advantages who (surprise, surprise) get great grades at a bad school.</p>
<p>One of the biggest reasons is social. If she is surrounded by students who all aspire to the top schools, she will probably do the same. Now imagine how her aspirations may change surrounded by students at a gang-infested, inner-city problem high school. Chances are your daughter’s academic performance will be fine at the magnet school and she will be well-prepared for college. If she goes to a low-performing high school, she may NOT be prepared for Berkeley/Stanford, even if she graduates top of the class.</p>
<p>BTW, you want your daughter to have access to those AP classes. It’s okay if she doesn’t take ALL the classes. </p>
<p>As for students at high schools with high poverty rates and other problems, those are students who don’t have a choice. They’ve overcome barriers to get to their level. I bet, if they had the choice, they would have jumped at the chance for the magnet high school. I highly doubt AO would look kindly on students who chose this high school so they can be valedictorian.</p>
<p>"OK, let me see if I understand. You WANT to send your D to a “minority school” which likely will not help her. But then you DO NOT WANT to declare Latino which will definitely help her. " </p>
<p>My D doesn’t want to put “Latino” on her application (she has all legal rights), because she is tired of dirty looks that she gets. She is very blond, almost snow white. People think that she is an imposter. It is really hard to be under a constant pressure to prove that you are not a liar. I know that it sounds ridiculous; it is hard to explain.</p>