A kid who isn’t in high school yet shouldn’t be targeting any colleges yet, let alone elites. This focus on admissions will distort the entire high school experience.
We’ve said that to OP numerous times. If OP now thinks a broader set of schools beyond HYPS are worthwhile, she might want to say so.
@compmom wrote
Here’s where that thinking comes from-in elementary school my kids were tested for the gifted program, plus all those other tests they do like ITBS, etc. They didn’t ask me, they just do it. The numbers come back and they’re super high and all of a sudden it’s the schools putting them in the gifted program, saying stuff like “these numbers are so high” your kid can go to any college they want (in elementary school!!!), yadda yadda yadda.
I wish I’d never known how “smart” my kids were when they were young because I feel like it put all this pressure on them to be super good at everything (and I feel like I put pressure on them). Like, oh, they’re smart, they should go to the smart school. Eh, I don’t know sometimes now.
The awareness of that they scored these numbers when they were little and those numbers are dictating what they should do in high school or what their track should be made for some very upset kids at times-like they felt like either they weren’t living up to their “potential” or that choosing a career like pastry chef wasn’t something that “smart” kid did. If they didn’t have that label, at least exploring the idea of being a pastry chef would have felt like an option.
One thing I would like to add- I think it is very important that the child really wants to attend the magnet school. In our case, S did. If he hadn’t wanted to go, we would have sent him to the local public. There are some kids who really don’t want to attend the magnet schools but are there because of parent pressure- not good.
I don’t even know how you make a distinction between A+ and A- schools. Who is doing the grading? Do you agree with their criteria? Every year one of our local magazines publishes a ranking of all the local schools. One year we were highlighted as great. All the other years we are in the bottom third. When Newsweek first started ranking high schools it was in the top 2% of the country. Then every other high school started playing the AP game and it fell off the list. Nothing changed at the high school. (Well actually lots of good things happened, but none of it reflected in the Newsweek criteria.)
It was a great school for my kids. It has a fabulous art program. It had a diverse population where kids actually have diverse friendship groups. And that was all important in my book.
I can only compare our local public ( D attended) with the magnet S attended. While the local school was very good and D had great teachers and was well prepared for college, the magnet was more challanging. Comparing classes that were " the same" ( I.e regular Physics, APUSH, Language arts, AB Calc, etc.) that my kids took at their respective schools, I was actually surprised at how much more was expected at the magnet school. There really was a difference.
@FallGirl But did the different schools make a difference in the outcome of your kids’ college acceptances…or even their application lists? It sounds like your son had different interests than your daughter anyway.
@thumper1 It might not have made a difference for @FallGirl 's kids college acceptances but it sounds like it made a difference in their education.
Hard to say. D knew where she wanted to attend and although her HS was not encouraging of her , she applied and got in anyway. S had a longer list and it was very different.
It is somewhat complicated to say whether it is a disadvantage in admissions to attend the more competitive school because on one hand it is harder to stand out but OTOH, I have no way of knowing how S ( or anyone else) would have fared at the other school. Perhaps he upped his game because of the people he was with. Perhaps he would have taken different classes/ been involved in different EC’s at the other school.
One difference for my kids is that the IB magnet school they attend has worse sports teams than the high school we are districted for. This may not be good for really good athletes that need a great team to showcase their talents, but for kids just hoping not to be cut, it can be a benefit.
We had a similar issue. My son was told to apply to our arts magnet school. It had fine arts programs, but the rest was meh. He elected to stay where he was (which had an outstanding public school music program) and supplemented with youth orchestra at a conservatory, private lessons, brass chamber music group, etc.
Some of this also comes from some schools, teachers, and prevailing community with the mentality that it’s never too early to think about/preparing for colleges. And it’s not limited to immigrant communities contrary to many stereotypes which manifest even here on CC.
For instance, there are quite a few multi-generationed Americans from upper class homes who have been obsessed about preparing their child from practically birth to “continue the family tradition” of attending the same Ivy/elite private college their families attended for generations or the obsessed families from several upper/upper-middle class suburban neighborhoods across the country ranging from the NE to West Coast and especially Hawaii* who feel waiting until one’s a junior in HS is way too late.
- Part of that is historical as the local elite and upper-middle class traditionally sent their kids to private high schools in order to prepare them to attend elite colleges on the US Mainland so the local public school system ended up being effectively neglected by the state government as the vast majority who attended were lower SES Native Hawaiians or children of mostly Asian immigrant agrarian laborers. This factor is one reason why Hawaii has one of the highest rates by stage of families sending kids to private HSs at ~20% of the HS age population.
Just heard a parent say his son in the 4th grade has friends in school and all they talk about is getting into college. Wonder where they get that from? Probably at home listening to their parents. (planning out how to get into the magnet program) In my head I thought I so glad I am past that stage. Easier said than done but sometimes you really have to tune out that stuff.
My kid attended an IB Diploma program. Some mentioned that the sports teams were not so good at the IB school. In our school, IB Diploma candidates had to take an 8th period class after school known as Theory of Knowledge. That made it hard for those who wanted to participate in sports teams because of conflict of schedule.
Kids in A- and B+ schools get into college. If they are truly that brilliant and unique then they will get into top notch schools. It really is a matter of personal opinion and choice. For me if a school was rated A- I would be ok with that.
RE: #75. But PG this parents IS focused on those schools. While of course HYPS are tough from any where, there are some HSs where more than one or two kids get in every year and others where one kid may get in every few years. If the difference is 4 vs 3, then that is meaningless. But if she is comparing a well known prep school with a well connected college counselor to the local public, there may actually be a difference in admisisons.
Not sure you can tell the OP what she ought to be thinking (even though I agree that the hyper-focus is not necessary and not the best criteria for picking a high school).
In some of the lower performing schools around here there is a lot of talk about college at school early on. They want kids to know that even if their parents didn’t attend college they can. I know with our oldest we used to joke even when he was young that he’d probably rather go to the tech school down the river from our alma mater. I’m sure parents can pressure their kids without meaning to - though honestly this was a kid who was always pulling us to allow him to accelerate or have more opportunities to learn new things.
I should clarify. Golf and tennis are very good at the IB school. Not so good at other sports.
TOK is offered during the regular school day here. No problem playing a sport and doing TOK. Jr year most kids take 2 SL’s, TOK and 3 HL’s for a total of 6 classes.
@VickiSoCal If it weren’t for your name, I’d really begin to wonder if you weren’t describing the exact same high school my son attends.
I suspect that IB schools being good at golf and tennis and not so great at football may not be all that unique 
From FallGirl: “We heard plenty of “all nighter” and up until 4AM doing homework stories, but it never happened in my house. Maybe some kids do, neither of mine did.”
Our kids attended our county’s selective admit (15% of applicants) STEM program and IB program. We heard those stories, too. They were true for some kids. My kids knew some who coped by cheating, and some who developed eating/cutting issues.
S1 never stayed up til the wee hours for homework. He was vocal about not getting into that rat race, though his courseload was extremely challenging (but for him, it was fun, so it never felt like work). He has told me many times that his HS saved his life.
S2 did well at balancing his life in the IB (girlfriend, debate, sports, to be before 11 pm) til senior year. This program was IB on steroids and when you added college apps to the mix, he started getting migraines. The burnout lasted through college. He is still struggling (and yes, he is getting help with that). In retrospect, he says he’d still do the program, but as a parent, the stress level of that program gives me pause even to this day. There were less stressful alternatives, but we had no reason to question his ability and motivation until it all fell apart. I wish we had insisted on a gap year.
DH went to Bronx Science. It gave him the escape route from a horrendous family life and gave him the family he never had at home. (He admit he was a total slacker til grad school and coasted on his brains, but what he got from BxSci made his later success possible.) We are still close friends with many of his former classmates, most of whom didn’t love the place, but who treasured the people.
All that said, your kid is more than academics. If the A- school gives him/her the chance to pursue other passions (or discover new ones), in the long run, it makes for a healthier mind and soul. Doing all kinds of academic contortions for schools that accept 5% of applicants is an exercise in futility. Learn how to work hard and learn how to play hard. The rest will take care of itself.
Honestly, they don’t even have to be unique and brilliant. Over the past two-to-three years, “Average Excellent” students in my daughter’s B+ public high school ended up at places like MIT (2), NU (6+), Penn, Notre Dame, WUSL, UChicago, ND (3+), UCB, UCLA, etc. And that’s not counting kids who chose schools like Alabama or Pitt because of their excellent merit awards or those who chose the “quirky” vs. the prestige choice (like the kid who’s going to St. Olaf rather than the various Ivies she could have gone to or even D who only applied to her first choice, which happened to be a “match” rather than a “reach” in terms of selectivity). These are students who have worked hard, earned good grades, gotten good test scores, and been active and involved in their ECs. From what I’ve seen, it’s the kid, not the school, that matters.