You really see two extremes here: you’ve got the parents who push the whole "learn Greek, Latin, Mandarin, join robotics club, AND master the violin" lifestyle, and then there are the ones where by fifth grade, the kids are already dropping their second language classes and religious studies—and then by seventh, they're ditching computer science too. It's just a constant cycle of sitting down with the kid for two or three hours every single night to grind through homework, all because the goal is to pump up that GPA just enough to squeeze into that elite prep school Mom and Dad have their hearts set on.
I’m pretty sure Alice and those guys over at ExxonMobil are offering it—not that I should even know that at 3 p.m., honestly, what am I doing with my life?—and then there’s one more... maybe Ernest Hemingway?
Susan James said:The 9th is over in Brooklyn and the 12th is out in Queens.
That classic school everyone seems to be talking about lately also had a cutoff under 74. Both the freshman and junior tracks. Actually, I heard the junior track was accepting students with scores as low as 60, or maybe that’s just a typo in the records? 🤔
I mean, honestly, how many students in all of Chicago actually took Ancient Greek or Latin back in middle school and now have any actual desire to keep up that kind of torture for another four years? And there you go—that’s your explanation for why the enrollment numbers for the advanced tracks are so low. 😉
Larry Walker24 said:Basically, if you've got a 74, you're pretty much screwed and won't get into any decent school.🤦
So, I was digging through some data earlier—just one of those rabbit holes you fall down when you can't sleep—and I stumbled upon this list. It’s basically a breakdown of the top 20 high schools in the entire US based on their students' average test scores. It's pretty wild how much of a gap there is between some of these places and others... anyway, here it is. Honestly, there are over twenty different high schools in a city like Chicago—and you know how competitive things get around here—so I’m pretty sure that kid with the 74 score is going to find a great spot somewhere. There's always a place for them, really.
says the enrolled students averaged around 79.65 points. Which basically means some scored higher and some lower than that—it's not like everyone who missed the mark just got left out in the cold without a chance.
Honestly, if she wants to get into simultaneous interpreting, she’s going to need an incredibly broad knowledge base—it really just depends on whatever topic or field she happens to stumble into—plus this crazy ability to rapidly memorize massive amounts of data and facts (not to mention the vocabulary) when you're trying to prep for those high-pressure gigs. I mean, an interpreter basically has to master the fundamentals of a subject and a mountain of technical jargon in both languages, all within a tiny window of time. In a way, her time in high school was actually great training for the kind of professional skills she'll eventually need for a job like that.
So, they actually have a program for that over at the University of Washington—it's part of their information science studies, specifically within the teaching track.
Look, Rhino, unless you were actually riding the school bus—I mean, leaving the house at 7:00 AM and crawling back home around 2:00 PM just to get four hours of class in—maybe don't lecture us on how the school bus system works. 😢
Honestly, that’s exactly how universities operate. Once it becomes glaringly obvious that nobody from the local area is ever coming back after heading off to study in Washington, D.C., they start scrambling—literally clawing at the ground—to launch those specific programs right here in Indianapolis, Miami, or Seattle. It worked for us in Indianapolis; we got psychology and pedagogy programs started about twenty years ago, and in record time—well, maybe five or six years, once the first few generations finally graduated—we fixed that chronic shortage of qualified staff in our local High Schools. It’s the same story with dentistry in Indianapolis, which launched relatively recently. I really believe dental clinics there will fill up much faster now that students aren't all fleeing to Washington, D.C. The current approach is just completely senseless and totally counterproductive. ☕
You don’t live in a sleepy little town like I do, so you're probably looking at this whole emigration thing through a pretty simplified lens. We aren't just talking about twenty-somethings looking for adventure here. We’re talking about people in their thirties and even forties who end up packing up entire families—both spouses and all the kids—to head overseas. It’s usually an incredibly gut-wrenching decision, too, and most of the time, the hardest part is the kids—having to pull them out of their schools, their classrooms, and away from all their lifelong friends... When that same kid has to spend an hour and a half commuting to school every single day with multiple transfers—whereas somewhere else abroad, everything is just more organized and efficient—the choice becomes a no-brainer. And that leads to a situation where it isn't just one person leaving the US, but four or five at once. Once two or three of those children stop seeing America as home after such a short time, they are essentially lost to us forever.
But hey, if a country views education as nothing more than a drain on the budget, then maybe it doesn't even deserve them.
It’s not just kids from that specific town enrolling in that school—students from all the neighboring areas sign up too. And honestly, you just can't compare the public transit situation in Washington, D.C. to what it's like out in the middle of nowhere near Memphis. Seriously, I mean it—sometimes you literally only have three buses showing up all day, like one at 7, one at 2, and one at 8... so good luck trying to get anywhere.
Just wanted to jump in here with a quick correction because some of this info is a bit off—unqualified substitutes actually get hired within five months, and then we see the exact same job openings popping up every single five-month cycle. The absolute longest anyone should be stuck waiting for an emergency substitute position before a formal job posting goes live is two months, or about 60 days... though honestly, that "emergency" loophole is being abused way too often in a lot of school districts lately.
And seriously, if we just keep shutting down schools and vocational programs in smaller towns, we can't act surprised when everyone moves away. We need to build things in places where fifteen-year-olds don't have to spend three or four hours every single day just commuting on public transit and waiting around just to get their high school diploma.
mellowskipper said:So, I found a lighter in my daughter's things yesterday—it just sort of spilled out when I was looking through her stuff. It didn't even smell like cigarettes, which is a relief, I suppose. She just looked at me like I was being dramatic and said that everyone has lighters and it’s totally normal. I mean, seriously? Why on earth would a seven-year-old be carrying around a lighter? That whole phase where kids are obsessed with playing with matches or fire seems to have passed for her long ago, so I'm honestly just stumped...
I don't know... back when I was that age, we were basically obsessed with singeing the edges of our notebooks just to make our emo poetry look more "authentic." Plus, let's be real—if you're writing a love letter to the absolute love of your life, you're kind of a loser if you aren't using glitter pens and burnt paper edges.
Now, though, I have no idea how much that carries over to the digital generation—honestly, I’d expect them to just use some vintage burnt-edge filter on their phone instead. 😂
To be honest, I don't even have any firsthand experience with stuff like that—though I do know someone who teaches a bilingual curriculum. But then again, he actually spent some time teaching in the USA, so his grasp of both the language and the subject matter is pretty much flawless. I’ve always been a huge fan of the CLIL method, personally; if you execute it right, it makes learning a language feel so much more purposeful. As for English professors, we had this guest lecturer at our university one year who was an absolute powerhouse when it came to her specific niche of literature—but man, oh man... her English. We were fourth-year students by then, so anyone who was going to struggle with the language had already washed out ages ago. You basically had to bite your tongue just to keep from laughing at the blunders she’d make. And it wasn't even about the accent (which was honestly passable enough), it was the grammar and the vocabulary... just a total mess! Luckily, we didn't pick up any bad habits because, being seniors, our language skills were already pretty much set in stone, but I really think a teacher like that could do some serious damage to students at a lower level.
I honestly feel like all they need to do is weed out the kids who walk in boasting about an A in math but then freeze up when faced with even the most basic problems. If they can just filter those types out, they’re already halfway to being superstars 🤣
mellowskipper said:Of course they should have the freedom to choose what they want—that’s a given. But I have my doubts—perhaps just a hunch—that kids who aren't already crushing it in STEM are actually going to gravitate toward PMO or specialized science academies. It seems more likely that someone coming out of a place like Mio would lean toward STEM or Treasury studies rather than, say, sociology or something equally niche. And as for putting computer science on the entrance exams? I highly doubt that will happen, especially since it's only an elective in 7th and 8th grade. Still, I suppose the idea itself isn't entirely bad. When I mentioned competitive tasks, I was thinking of something a bit more complex—you know, a higher level than just the usual average stuff. More like actual brain teasers.
God forbid that actually happens. I was just wondering—if she doesn't get into that school in Washington, D.C., but maybe makes it into the one in Annapolis instead—would a transfer even be possible? And honestly... what kind of halfway decent argument could anyone even use to convince them to approve it?
Honestly, I think you’d be pretty surprised. I have this whole group of girlfriends who were total linguistics nerds in high school and then somehow ended up pivoting straight into STEM fields. And then there's the flip side—I know plenty of math whizzes who spent their teen years obsessing over literature and languages. It’s strange, really... it's like at some point, something just clicks in your brain and you head off in a completely different direction.
God forbid that actually happens. I was just thinking—if she doesn't get into that school in Washington, D.C., maybe there’s a chance with the one in Annapolis? Is a transfer even a possibility there? And honestly... what kind of half-baked argument could we possibly use to convince them to actually listen?
Man, the commute around here is just such a nightmare lately—seriously, the connectivity is absolute garbage. It feels like the public transit lines were designed by someone who’s never actually tried to get anywhere in real life. You pick a route, thinking it’ll get you from point A to point B, and then—bam—you're stuck waiting on a bus that's already twenty minutes late, or you realize the transfer takes forever because the schedules don't even remotely line up. It’s honestly exhausting. Just one constant struggle to move from one place to another without losing your mind.
It’s honestly just a way to bail out the kids who are about to fail—you know, those ones where they get transferred to some other school, preferably a private academy, during this last month of the term, and suddenly all their failing grades just... vanish. Then, once they hit the next grade level, they try to slide right back into their old public school like nothing ever happened.
Elizabeth Morales49 said:Just let him go. My wife and I used to party and hang out with our own crews all the time when we were younger—we weren't exactly inseparable back then anyway.😁
He’s already in high school. Six years of middle school followed by five years of high school, kind of like that structured system they have over in the UK...😉
But if I'm being fair, COVID really messed things up. They kept everyone stuck in those ridiculous little bubbles at school, so you couldn't even socialize with kids from other classes, just your own group. Of course, once school lets out and everyone piles onto the same buses to head home, there aren't any problems socializing then...
School, homework, whatever else life throws at you... it's all part of the deal, I guess. Just the way it goes.🤣
Look, maybe try letting your kid just be his own person. Just because you had a blast doing things that way doesn't mean he’ll feel the same—it’s really not a given. He isn't some mini version of you, and you can't expect him to just replay your teenage years—or rather, let you live them through him.
It would’ve been perfect for us, honestly—but my parents would absolutely lose their minds, and then you’d have all those child advocacy groups breathing down our necks. Apparently, high-stakes testing is just too much stress for kids these days... cry me a river, I guess.
Jacob Sullivan91 said:And then, if you're unlucky enough to be part of a hiring committee at work, you get a front-row seat to these absolute gems who show up to job interviews with their mom or dad in tow. Or worse, the mom calls the office to grill us about the job details 😲
I'm probably the oldest person talking about this, but honestly, back in the day, you could only really apply to one high school. So if you don't make the cut, you're forced into a second round where you have to pick from the schools nobody actually wanted to go to in the first place.
Even for college, all those technical universities held their entrance exams at the exact same time... you could only pick one.
Jacob Sullivan91 said:They had a 100% overlap because my cousin and I took them at the same time... we even realized the exams were identical, which felt totally insane at the time. That was the first year of the new credit system. And the year before that, I'm pretty sure it was the same. Beyond that? No clue...
Wait, hold on—you actually started college during those first years of the credit system... and you're seriously claiming to be the most experienced one here on this topic? 🤣
I mean, you might eventually get there—but only if you're looking at like a ten-year gap between finishing high school and actually starting college. It’s a long stretch, honestly. 🤣
rowdypanther12 said:I’m already starting to feel a little slow sometimes, especially when my daughter shows me something she’s programmed or gets all excited about how her math teacher explained a concept in such a simple, clear way. 😂 Honestly, I can't make heads or tails of it either. It might as well be written in code. 😵 Not again—she’s just totally off base. Looking back at everything she’s said about where she wants to start her career, it's never been anything like a solid foundation in science or even a basic starting point. Sure, maybe it'll round up to an 8, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen just yet.
Is the math program different? Does hitting an A on the SAT require extra effort, or will I need to make up for it later once I'm actually in college?
It's like you're describing me perfectly. Math and chemistry were always just... intuitive? Like, they just clicked. (Physics, on the other hand, was a total disaster for me—but then again, that might have been because of how they taught it.) I could breeze through those classes with one hand tied behind my back, and I genuinely couldn't wrap my head around how anyone found them difficult. But my heart was always in languages and literature. That’s why I chose my high school path, and that’s why I picked my major in college too—I would've rather bled out than enroll in a math program or something similar that I only ever passed with zero effort.