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Check your online account. Students are reporting offers are out.
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I see the offer but accepting offer is failing.
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We got an offer at Northside when we went to accept it crashed and the offer page got grayed out and says not available. Dear God, this is insane.
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We saw the same thing. It probably just got posted too early by accident, then they took it down. it’ll be back up after 5.
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@IlliniMom I would just wait to accept. It’s known that the system is wonky right when all the offers are coming out. You have 3 weeks to accept so there’s no rush
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We got in early then it bombed out, but both kids got into Walter Payton so we are relieved.
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Finally I could submit it. Payton 99/99(99,99,99).
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Not sure if this helps but for Payton the twins are in Tier 4 and got 95/99 & 94/99 respectively.
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So you got two kids from tier 4 into Payton with less than 900? That is wonderful. The Payton cut off last year for tier 4 was 900 so that would mean a significant difference in cut scores. Congrats!
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That sounds off for Payton. Last year every single kid in Tier 4 got a 900.
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Maybe IEP? Separate bucket?
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Don’t know what to tell you dad77 but the twins are bouncing off the walls. Heading out for celebratory dinner at Gibson!
And no IEP for either of them Sheesh.
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The cut offs are published now and Tier 4 for Payton is 900 again. (so is Northside) So something is amiss. Maybe you area is actually a different tier.
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Right, that doesn’t make any sense. My kid scored higher and didn’t get into Payton and this dad got two kids in. This seems off. Hopefully they are not in tier 4 and that would explain things.
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sheesh yourself. Either you’re not in tier 4 or you’re incorrect about something. A 900 is 100% required for Tier 4 admittance to Payton, and plenty of 900s get denied if their sub-scores aren’t high enough.
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How is that possible? We’re Tier 4 and my son got 99/99 (99/93/96) and didn’t get into Payton.
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Yeah exactly! My daughter also got 900 but was not offered Payton. She was offered Northside
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Because 100% of tier 4 admissions to Payton have 900 scores and there are more 900 scores than seats.
Therefore it goes to tiebreakers, and by those sub scores that’s why your kid didn’t make it. Sorry Charlie.
Even better, some divorced dad probably set up a little cheap apartment in tier 1 or tier 2, makes 300K a year, and his dumb ass overprivileged kid will get in w/ an 850.
Great system, huh?
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What are the actual, tangible negative impacts of getting into, say, Young instead of Payton? Or Taft/Amundsen/Lincoln Park IB instead of one of the preferred 5 SEHS? Friends are going to be split up among several different schools regardless of whether you specifically got into your first choice program. Is this going to really have a significant effect on college or career outcomes?
Also curious: would you support set-asides for free/reduced lunch students instead of the tier system?
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I 100% support need-based equity. The tier system doesn’t provide that. Its only a lazy box drawn around geographic areas that all contain diverse family incomes/needs. And it sets itself up for fraud. I know several people who live in near-million dollar homes that are somehow in Tier 2. I know a few people w divorced parents, both of substantial income, where one of them rents a place in a tier 1 or tier 2 neighborhood, lies about child living there and take advantage of the system.
In all these cases the “need” based advantage is given to the non-needful. That is wrong, and it needs to be fixed.
Regarding the free/reduced lunch, isn’t that something that is (unnecessarily) offered to everyone in CPS now? Meaning, any kid, regardless of household income, can receive a free lunch on any day? I’m guessing nobody is happier about that than Aramark and Sodexo.
But if what you meant is that there should be at least some proof of need, I 100% agree.
Finally, to your 1st point, I think this information is out there.. Look at graduation rates, average SAT/ACT scores, college admittance and attainment rates and I think you’ll find that the highly sought after SEs top the lists and they correlate w/ the rankings you might find in publications like US News and World Report.
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I think we’re on the same page about the tier system, then. By “free/reduced lunch set-asides,” I mean that there should be set-asides for students who qualify for free-reduced lunch using federal Income Eligibility Guidelines (IEG). Even though CPS provides breakfast and lunch free of charge to all students (which I think is a good thing!), their free/reduced lunch status is still determined each year. Idk how difficult it would be to get free/reduced lunch status for non-CPS students applying to SEHS or magnets, but I think it might be doable. Our private sends home some kind of federal lunch-related form that asks for income info every year. If we did something like this, it would be a lot easier to reserve a certain portion of seats for the same students the tier process is intended to support, but in a much more precise way.
I do wonder if maybe the reason that this tier-as-a-proxy-for-socioeconomic status policy exists (rather than something more straightforward like free/reduced lunch set-asides) is because of elementary selective enrollment and magnet programs? The admissions policy for selective enrollment and magnet programs is the same for high school and elementary school, and since most elementary programs begin in kindergarten, those kids wouldn’t have free/reduced lunch status on file yet…they’re too young. There’s probably a way to solve for that that’s better than the tier system, though.
I’ve seen a regression continuity study of SEHS somewhere that basically showed that for tier 4 kids, there is no difference in academic outcomes for kids who just missed the cutoff for SEHS (and therefore didn’t go to one) and kids who just made the SEHS cutoff and DID go there. In fact, SEHS students in tier 4 who just made the cut were slightly less likely to attend a selective college than those who just missed it, so arguably if you have an 884 and just missed out on getting a Lane (or any SEHS) offer, you’re going to have a very very slight edge on the other 884 kids who beat you in the tiebreaker and do end up going to Lane. The effect is actually bigger for tier 1 kids, but it’s noticeable for tier 4 (at least on the graph about admission to selective colleges…other stuff like ACT score and GPA there isn’t really an effect) too. Wish I could find a link…I’ll add it in if I come across it.
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Where’d you go? We need answers.
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School counselor here…. I have a kid who, FOR ABSOLUTELY NO DISCERNABLE REASON, got into a school outside of the cutoffs/tiers. I would like to know if there are more of these cases. CPS added the appeals process this year — I’m wondering if they know their system has issues.
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1st choice offer Payton , Tier 2, 900
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Is anyone able to see the updated cut-off scores?
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cut scores for 2023-2024:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1enfNw17AWpPrLmHsjJe3Qg6ugtCX-9ka/view
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When I clicked I got the scoring rubric, not cut off scores. Has anyone seen cut scores?
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same here. That link was to the scoring rubric not the cut off scores.
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Cut off scores are posted in gocps.
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Cutoffs are higher than last year and Young flip flopped with Jones.
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Agree — both Northside and Payton have cut off of 900 for rank and Tier 4. Brutal for those Tier 4 kids. But I try to keep in mind that the same number of kids are admitted each year (roughly). You will always have to be in the top whatever % to get into Payton and Northside for Tier 4 regardless of what the cut off score is. The cut off is a function of how many kids take the test, which changed a couple years ago. Hope there are lots of happy kids out there tonight.
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how to apply for jones cte law program for PD? I applied for the Selective Enrollment as well, then I got waitlisted.
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PD is only for SEHS programs. You can’t apply for PD at Jones CTE, only their SE program.
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Does anyone know what does waitlist 16 overlay means? I got waitlisted for Hancock but not sure what the overlay means and if lower number is better? Thank you!
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It means you live within the attendance overlay boundary for Hancocks CTE program. The lower the number, the better. They will move through the overlay waitlist (for Hancock and Jones) before moving through the general waitlist.
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First choice, Lane. T4 w/ 900
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Congrats! 🙂
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First choice Payton. Tier 2, 900 – 99/99 (99/99/96). Not sure if that was enough to get in with rank, but those who got 900s and didn’t get into Payton, could you post the ELA scores?
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My daughter got ELA (97/99/99) but did not make it to Payton. Tier 4. Looks like the cut offs were really high this year
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Were you able to see a waitlist number?
My child was 96/95/99, also Tier-4. She did not get an offer, but like everyone else was waitlisted. Her waitlist was: 11, 8, and 11 at her top three schools; Payton was ranked her 3rd choice.
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No her waitlist column is blank. My daughter got an initial offer from Northside. But Payton was her first choice
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My understanding is that students who get an offer from a SEHS do not get added to any waitlists. The only way you get on a SEHS waitlist is if you do not get any SEHS offers. (This detail seems unfair to me… but I’m pretty sure that’s how the system is set up).
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Oh, okay. She’d have to reject her offer at Northside then to be put on the waitlist for Payton. But it seems that kids who do that will still be sorted by points, if they take that chance. In my opinion, doesn’t seem like it would be worth it to reject Northside for a waitlist number at Payton that might still fluctuate. I bet any kid who gets a spot at Payton will take it, unless they opt out of CPS, and prefer to go to a private school instead.
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889 99math/94 ela, tier 3
Lane Tech (4th choice) offered
Whitney Young (1st choice) not offered
Jones (2nd choice) not offered
Payton (3rd choice) not offered
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Hmm.. something doesn’t seem right. 889 in Tier 3 should be enough for either Jones or WY… seems like you’d have grounds to appeal if all your info is correct (unless: maybe you were updated into Tier 4? Or maybe your child ranked Lane above Jones/WY?)
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You are correct, we used to be Tier 3 but looks like we were updated to Tier 4.
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900 tier 4 Ela subscores- 99/98/99. Did not get into Payton. Offered second choice Lane.
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Is Northside comparable to Lane? My daughter also did not get into Payton and was offered her 2nd choice- Northside
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I think Northside is a really well-ranked school.
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Many people would say Northside is the better of the two
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But many people would not.
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99/98/99 is corresponding to reading/vocabulary/language art?
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My daughter was offered Lake Zurich HS. 72/81 (62/79/98) tier 4.
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Student with 898,Tier 4, 98 Math/99 ELA (sub scores reading 99, language 99, vocabulary 98), offered at Jones, 3rd choice. This could be me, but something doesn’t add up as I’m reading some Tier 4 kids with 900 were turned away from Payton and Northside. I saw the cutoff scores for this year, but still not clear on how this all works.
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I think you are reading it right! For Tier 4 kids you had to have a 900 to get into Payton or Northside, and even that wasn’t enough for all of them!
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For Tier 4, Payton/Northside cut-off is 900, Jones is 890. So 898 would make it to Jones but not Payton/Northside. It seems working as expected. The real question is whether it’s ELA (99/99/99) for Payton. Some kids who got Northside but not Payton report their ELA something like (99/93/96). Honestly, the test probably should be more difficult to distinguish kids based on math and ELA total score but not splitting the hair.
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So how does a Tier 4 student with lower sub-scores get into Payton or Northside? Btw, my student also had all A’s from 7th.
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Referring to a post earlier in the thread with siblings who had lower sub scores and both got into Payton.
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Yeah… either that person (1) is not actually in Tier 4 — maybe they are in Tier 1? — I sometimes get confused about which way they are ordered, (2) misunderstood the offers screen and did not actually get Payton offers, or (3) is trolling everyone.
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Cutoff scores are published, so no tier 4 students got in at this point with sub 900. It’s also pretty clear no tier 4 got into WPCP with anything less than 99 across the board. At least prior to principal picks.
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Yeah… either that person (1) is not actually in Tier 4 — maybe they are in Tier 1? — I sometimes get confused about which way they are ordered, (2) misunderstood the offers screen and did not actually get Payton offers, or (3) is trolling everyone.
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Both great schools. Northside technically is rated higher and much more competitive to be admitted. It’s among the smallest SEHS options. Lane is much larger and also an excellent school. Its size allows it to offer a really wide variety of programs and activities.
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sorry — meant for this to reply to person asking about Lane and NSCP!
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Thank you!
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Im in tier 4 with 884 points. I got waitlisted 5 for Lane Tech and 9 for Northside. How high is the chance of me getting in?
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I’d imagine your chances are decent for Lane. Northside, probably not. I think the waitlists are updated weekly – keep an eye on how the numbers move. It’s a long time between now and the start of next school year and a lot can happen. Good luck!
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Keep in mind that waitlists don’t actually open until April 24, so schools can’t make any offers off of their waitlist until then. Also keep in mind that it is entirely possible that schools like Payton, Northside, Young, Jones, and Lane may not make any waitlist offers, and if they do, they need to do so in a way that maintains tier/SpEd balance. You’re not the only student with #5 as their waitlist number at Lane; there are 7 others.
Once the waitlist opens and additional students can add themselves to it, according to the waitlist guide on the GoCPS website, they’ll be re-sorted in descending point order nightly.
I think your best option is to apply for PD at the school you ranked #1 and to not put too much hope into getting an offer off the waitlist.
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Tier 4, 889 offered 3rd choice Lane
We’re one point off the cutoff for Jones. If we decline our Lane offer we go right to the top of the waitlist for Jones, correct? I think we might take the risk. There’s a good chance, right? I mean just one person has to decline Jones for us to get in or am I not understanding that.
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Are you on the Jones waitlist? I don’t think declining Lane would move you to the top of Jones. I would ask OAE before declining.
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You are not understanding. High schools make more offers than the number of seats they’re actually trying to fill. If they’re trying to fill 450 seats and usually have 10% of offers declined, they’ll make 500 offers. That means you need more than 50 people to decline before they even think about using their waitlist, and you need to hope that the tier they need to fill seats in is yours. I would accept Lane and apply for PD at Jones.
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Keep trying,
no, I would not assume that you will get a waitlist spot that way. Waitlists were already published. If you were offered a spot at Lane, you will not be put on a wait list if you decline. You will simply miss out. At least this is my understanding. Also, one point does not equal one person.
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According to their guide, you are only on a waitlist now if you received no offers. We’re not on the waitlist because we have an offer. But we can decline that offer then she goes into the waitlist queue and with tiers out of the way they just pick by points so for Jones they will go right to all the 889’s on the waitlist. It’s a risk but she really has no interest in Lane (great school, just not for her) so if it doesn’t happen she’s ok going to her choice school. But I guess I’m wondering just what her chances are. Surely ‘some’ kids are in the same boat and declining Jones, right?
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I made a previous post where I cautioned against declining Lane to go on the waitlist at Jones, but if your daughter truly prefers her Choice offer to Lane, I actually would advise accepting the Choice program and trying the Jones waitlist when it opens in that case.
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Yes, if you decline your offer, you can be added to the waitlist and will be placed according to your score. Those already on waitlist because they received no offers will likely be bumped down as kids with offers decline and are moved to the waitlist.
The SEHS schools factor in that a certain number of kids won’t accept in extending offers. Accordingly, one person declining doesn’t open a spot. Rather, only if more people decline than expected will a spot open for a kid in the waitlist.
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Just a little quibble with the “you decline your offer, you can be added to the waitlist” language: getting onto the waitlist after declining a SEHS offer is not a passive process. You need to manually add yourself to your waitlist(s) of choice.
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one other thing is that kids often accept both their cps offers and a private and wait until the very last second to decide. In the past, the school could give those spots away to anyone outside of the PD process. I’m assuming now they will be filled from the waitlist .
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i’m planning to apply for Jones PD. Does anyone have any info on what kind of students the principal prefers? Like how WY prefers athletes and stuff like that.
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On a related note, for Payton, what does the PD process emphasize on? Is it worth trying through that route? My daughter has a 900 score with 99/99 (97,99,99).
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I know an older friend of mine who got into Payton by PD. She went to like Junior National History Fair, Junior National Science Fair, Fluent in Arabic, French, Mandarin. U.S Figure Skating Championships, and other impressive competition wins. So yeah high level stuff.
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Thank you! Looks like the standards are pretty impossible to meet then. Appreciate the insights
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Jones wants siblings who were close to the cut off scores and prefers siblings whose parents contribute in some tangible way to the school. Next, they want African American or Hispanic kids.
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So if I’m an Asian female, and my score was around 20 points below the cutoff score, does this mean I have no chance? I think i have a pretty strong application
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That’s pretty far below the cut off. Jones also has an over representation of Asian kids.
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I know my demographic info and HSAT proves a disadvantage in the process. But, I think I have a resume that allows me to stand out from other applicants. Is there still no chance? I’m pretty desperate for a spot.
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If you don’t try, you don’t know what might have been. So just try! Especially if you think your application stands out.
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Offered Whitney Young Tier3/900-1st choice
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Hi everyone,
Please pardon my ignorance. We moved to Park Ridge a couple of years ago from Texas, so didn’t follow CPS that well. We have a decently bright child on our hand. So we applied everywhere, including Private – Latin, LFA etc including CPS.
Yesterday we received an email that he got accepted at Northside which seemed to be big deal? A few questions please:
1) Is it really a big deal? Would you move to city from Park Ridge for this school? I know there is subjectivity here but academics matter to us and our son
2) I see that some of you are reporting scores. All I see is “900” under Total points.. Did he score perfect? Where do I see the breakdown?Thanks in advance!
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Congrats on the Northside offer! Northside is consistently ranked as one of the top high schools in IL and amongst the best in the country so certainly not a bad school to be able to consider. It is filled with academically focused, smart, driven kids but it doesn’t have a competitive feel to it. All the classes are Honors or AP level. It has a bunch of clubs and pretty much all HS sports except tackle football, but I wouldn’t say it is a sports driven culture, if that is important. The school is about 1000 kids or so total, so not a huge high school but big enough to not feel too small. My kid is a Freshman there and it has been a great fit.
Only you and your family can really decide if moving to take the offer makes sense, and you don’t mention if he has been accepted at any of the other schools you mention so not sure what your are deciding between. I would encourage you to attend whatever the accepted student event is to get a little more feel for the school. You should get an email from NCP about it, if you haven’t already and it should be scheduled to happen prior to when you need to make a decision.
900 means all A’s plus 99/99 on the test. The breakdowns for the three ELA scores should be in your CPS portal (assuming you have that set up?) but since he got an offer, it doesn’t really matter. They are only really important for tiebreakers and clearly if he was in that situation, his scores got him the offer.
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I am in the same boat and your response was extremely helpful. We currently reside in Naperville ( renting). Our first choice was Payton but my daughter has an offer from Northside (2nd choice). I was wondering if Naperville 202, 204 schools ( Metea, Neuqua) are comparable to Northside and does it make sense to relocate to Chicago for Northside. Any insight on this would be much appreciated.
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I don’t know much about those Naperville schools. With a quick search, they are in the top 25 or so in the state, so I’m sure they have a lot to offer as well. Naperville and Chicago have a very different feel when it comes to day-to-day life though, so I would consider what your family would prefer for the next four years in addition to the school choice.
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Thank you, appreciate your inputs
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It is a big deal if you already live in Chicago. If you have to move and you own a house, it might not be such a big deal to you. Your kid can go to any college by studying in a number of suburban schools. Northside doesn’t guarantee a good university. If you rent, then it is much easier to move and I would say it is a good idea to go to Northside.
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fair point. We own the house but it’s not a huge deal. We will figure out if that means he can increase his odds at better education.
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Excited to get our first choice of Lane! Tier 4, 900.
Im not understanding the obsession with Payton. Everyone’s entitled to their preference, of course, but what a great opportunity we’ve just had to teach our children to be self aware and think independently about their future. Highly ranked schools are great, and we’re accepting an offer at one, but I don’t think US News & World Report’s specific ranking criteria are going to have a profound effect on my child’s individual high school experience. To have ranked Payton first would have been a decision of vanity for us and nothing else. If your kiddo is let down after yesterday, I feel for you. I hope your family can get excited about what’s next anyway. If you’re stuck slumming it at LT with us, we don’t care that you didn’t get a 99/99/99/99/99/99/99/99/99/99, our kids can be friends anyway.
The kids will be alright!
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Great post, Mary…and, it’s true that the kids will be alright. When we start to fixate on one school, one career, one whatever, we create misery and disappointment.
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Well said!
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Well said! Our kid is going to Payton, which was his choice after we went to their open house and he decided it was the school for him. Although they are very different school with different vibes, Lane Tech was his second choice, which he (and we) would have not been disappointed with at all!
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NCPParent – many thanks! He is indeed 99/99.. really surprised to be honest. He is bright kid but I didn’t think he would do well without any prep.. With that, I am now even more inclined to offer him an environment with like minded kids. He is not into the sports so that’s actually a big Plus.
He did get accepted at Latin and LFA. Latin – he wasn’t keen given the racism history, LFA – we really liked at all but academics are lacking.
Also – completely non-CPS related.. Where does one move in Chicago? I am assuming that given long hours, after school activities, you would need to be nearby? Appreciate any pointers.
Happy to speak over the phone or beer.. truly appreciate it
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NCP kids come from all over the city, but there isn’t a perfect public transportation option to the school. You can use the Kimball bus (4 blocks away) or the Foster bus (5 blocks away) and many kids do. There is also a parking lot that students can get space in once they are able to drive themselves to school, but a lot of kids are driven or car pool. We happen to be in walking distance so I can’t speak to the commute much more than that. If you were to move, I would look at homes in Hollywood Park, Sauganash, Lincoln Square, North Center, North Park, Logan Square, West Ridge, Albany Park, Andersonville, Edgewater, etc. as some of the closest areas. Basically try to stay a max 20-30 minutes away so four years of commuting to school isn’t painful.
Most after school clubs or practices are done by 5 or 5:30 in most cases, unless it is an event like a game, concert, show, etc. School opens by 7:30am but starts at 8. Done a little after 3.
Once nice thing about the school is the block schedule. Many classes are only 2x a week and every Wednesday is mostly flex periods and that is when the kids get a lot of homework done. My kid has so far had very little after school homework to do which has been good on nights when they have been at school later for activities, though I’m sure that will pick up in later years with more AP coursework.
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NCPParent – thx! are you happy with the school thus far? If you had an opportunity to afford a private school, would you have considered it instead and would you have moved to city as well?
I see good high rises on 4100 marine drive, that shows about 19 mins of drive. I am not sure what snow and other factors would be.. Is it possible to live on Marine drive and make this school work?
I know that I am asking you tons of questions and I want to thank you for your time and kindness. It’s helping me a lot.
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That is a hypothetical that I can’t fully answer 🙂 We were considering moving out of the city before my kid got into a selective enrollment elementary school, and stayed when they did. We also wouldn’t mind getting a new house for a number of reasons, but will not now until my kid graduates. I also know people who got into good private schools last year and turned them down to take the NCP offer and felt it was the best choice then and still. CPS as a public school system absolutely has it’s downsides, but our experience with the selective enrollment schools has been worth navigating through that.
I asked my kid whether it would be worth moving to come to NCP, and the first response was about the students. That being in a school of smart, driven “perfectionist” type kids (as it was described to me) works well. They don’t compete with each other, but they understand, support and commiserate with their own efforts to be top students; if your kid is the same they would likely thrive at NCP. Obviously there can be exceptions to that, but it is one of the benefits of the SEE/SEHS process that I think a private school doesn’t necessarily have. Kids can possibly get into private schools without being “that” type of student, but it is harder for them to get through the SEHS process if they aren’t.
I also asked what they would change, and there was nothing big. A few teachers are maybe not favorites (but I think that can be the case at every school), a little more emphasis on the arts (though what there is is quite good) and because it is a smaller school, club participation can be spotty. But I saw a comment elsewhere about NCP maybe not having a lot of school spirit, and my kid would disagree with that. A lot of kids stick around or show up at after school events to support each other. They just had their big international dance event (I-Night) and the students were all in supporting their classmates; it sold out both performances and was the “toughest ticket in town” to get, partly because so many students came to the public performances even though they had seen all the groups do their dances in school at assemblies that week.
4100 Marine Drive is near Wrigley Field and the lake and would be a great location to live. Not a terrible commute to NCP (or downtown) by car but it would be 2 bus routes by public transport. It really depends what your ability is to drive and pick up or your kid’s comfort with taking CTA transit. There may be other kids in that area for car pools also.
Overall we are very happy with the experience our kid is having. Again, I definitely suggest you and your kid plan to be at the accepted student event as you will probably get a lot of questions answered there. If you have other questions for me, don’t hesitate to ask. Good luck with your decision!
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Thank you NCPParent and TomJerry(for asking). I had almost the exact same set of questions and I really appreciate you taking out the time to provide so much inputs. It for sure helps the decision process. We plan to be there for the freshman night on Tuesday and hope to get more information. But having inputs from the parent of a current student is invaluable. So thanks a ton for your kindness.
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Indeed thank you!. We have been in full blown process to find a home.. It’s going to be difficult to sell and buy.. but we are committing the process. Just turned down the LFA. so it’s going to be Northside.. Hope they will be flexible with the timeline on residency!
That said, we will be visiting admitted day on Tuesday before fully committing to it.
AJ – I wish there way a way for parents to connect and compare notes live.. I am happy to figure out a method if there is interest.
NCPParent – I have a few more questions for you. I know that if we were to send our kid to local public school, we would have to hire AP tutors and likely college counseling. I am assuming that quality of teachers is darn good that you would haven’t to hire tutors? How about SAT/ACT prep? Private classes required? I am assuming that you have to have college councilor externally?
lastly, I can’t find matriculation report for last two years. Despite it’s standards, I find that most students just end up at local public universities vs Ivys.. For a STEM oriented kid, who is dreaming of Stanford or MIT – do you find this school a good fit?
Thx again!
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I think your questions are a bit above my pay grade now :). All students are assigned a counselor when they are freshman, but we haven’t had a ton of interaction around college with ours yet (more by choice than anything against the counselor). Being just a frosh parent, I really don’t have a clear line into test or AP exam prep at this point, but based on some info I’ve seen shared it does seem the school does offer something and many kids do prep outside of the school also. Perhaps NerdMom would have more insight into all of that having an NCP senior.
As another parent said earlier, I’m not sure any particular HS guarantees acceptance anywhere and where kids go is also as tied to finances and geography as school. Just because they might be able to get into Harvard, might not mean they even will apply if it isn’t financially or logistically a good choice, so the data will always be skewed a bit. From what I have seen, NCP kids get into “top” colleges, and whether that is more or less than other “good” HS’s in the area, I can’t really say.
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NCPParent – Thank you..Whatver the paygrade is, you deserve the more!
We are committed to selling our house and moving! So be prepared, unless something is odd on Tuesday night.
Our selling points:
1) Parents / kids happiness ( I interviewed over 10 parents and kids – this is general sentiments)
2) Collaborative nature (true for parents and kids)
3) Socioeconomic balance – this is important to us as we are coming from private wealthy small school
4) Exposure to real world problems (take CTA etc.)
5) You are a mean of 3 friends.. Keep a company of bright friends – not true for private.
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Another very happy Northside family here. My son is currently a senior, and my 8th grader was just accepted. We live about a mile from the school, which is wonderful and a big reason why we picked it, of course. I would suggest trying to live relatively close. There are communities with nice and somewhat affordable single family homes nearby in North Park and especially Albany Park. If you want a more suburban feel, you can go a bit more west to Jefferson Park.
My son has thrived there. It is very different from Payton — much more nurturing environment, less of the competitiveness, much more diverse. Most teachers are great. Tons of activities, best arts programs around (both performing arts and fine arts), wide participation in sports, though they tend not to be all that competitive. Even though one of the main reasons we chose it (for both kids) was location, we liked the feel of it much more than some of the other selective enrollment schools. From a college perspective, it is ranked high enough that any difference between it and Payton is truly negligible.
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I can help but ask, how do you know how’s Payton?
My child is in Payton and we can’t be happier.
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Does anyone know anything about Westinghouse High School and Lincoln Park’s IB program? Can’t decide which would be better…
We welcome your feedback.,.
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Westinghouse is a very good school and offers a lot in the healthcare relationship with Northwestern Hospital. The facilities are new and the students are involved its a good choice especially if you live close.
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Good morning,
I’m happy for everyone and the best luck. I’m still waiting on my son’s results. I don’t think this is normal. I’m confused. Nothing has been posted for him😰. Any advice please.
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Where are you going to look for results? What do you see there when you check for results? Are you sure that you’re logging into the correct account?
You should be logging in here: https://cps.schoolmint.com/login. Once you get to the main dashboard, you should click on the “View Results & Options” button. If that’s what you’re doing, what is happening when you do that? What do you see?
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Thank you for your help. I have tried everything. The dashboard is blank. It just has my sons general information. This is very frustrating. I really do hope I get in contact with someone tomorrow.
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General information like what? His name? Anything else? If so, what?
Are there buttons you can click? One that says “Student Details” or one that says “Review Submitted Applications”? If so, what happens when you click on them? If not, what specific text or information do you see anywhere on the page?
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Thanks for the great conversations here!
Wondering if there are kids commuting to Northside Prep from the magnificent mile area and what the options are? With the peak traffic, the drive must be long. Any other options? -
You “Student Details” it only gives me the grades from the school, but not the test results. He doesn’t allow me to click on anything else.
Selective Enrollment Elementary School ExamsClassical Reading Percentile:Classical Math Percentile:Regional Gifted Center Score:Academic Center Point Total:EL Regional Gifted Score:GPA:4.0GradesReading:AMath:AScience:ASocial Science:A
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Academic Center results aren’t released until April 21.
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Thank you so much. To be honest I was so confuse. I do appreciate your time and help.
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To Space37. This happened to some last year and CPS figured it out in a couple days. Fingers crossed they will figure it out for you (and likely others that this happened to, as well).
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The info they copy/pasted from their Student Details tab suggests that they applied to an Academic Center, not a 9th grade SEHS program. Their results won’t be released until April 21.
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I’ve seen some conflicting information and I’m overall a little confused about the process, but a couple questions:
My daughter was waitlisted at five different selective enrollment schools. She is #57 Tier 3 at Hancock which was her top choice. Is that 57 representative of anything? Does it mean she’s 57th in line? I’m unsure because elsewhere on the GO CPS website they say they will not publish waitlist numbers for SEHS, but they are plainly listed there.
I know nobody can answer definitely, but is 57 a high enough waitlist number to be a pipe dream or is it possible we’ll get a call? We do plan on applying for Principal’s Discretion as well.
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#57 means there is 56 kids in line ahead of her on the waitlist.
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School counselor here. We are discovering a lot of irregularities with IEP kids (frankly, the whole process this year) and are amassing a spreadsheet to discern if there are any patterns to the offers. We also are perplexed how they are reaching the 14% special education student threshold at schools like Payton and Lane where they are turning away students with 898’s and 899’s that have IEPs.
We are looking for the following information: tier; score ?/900; rankings; and whether the child received an offer or no offer. We don’t want names or middle schools or any identifying information. So, please encourage parents to share their data with us here or on the IEP comment thread.
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I am sorry, but you don’t sound like a school counselor to me. I am pretty sure you could get all the relevant data from CPS through the official canals instead of crowd sourcing here.
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Also, it’s not possible to receive an 899. It goes from 900 to 898.
If you are indeed a school counselor, you would likely know this. -
Also, also, also, this:
“Lane where they are turning away students with 898’s and 899”
is completely false. Everyone with an 898 got into Lane.
So, what’s your actual agenda here?
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Hello! So I’m not the brightest (I got a 99 for ELA and 79 for Math. Which is an 855 total) I got into Taft IB and am on the waitlist for Northside ( my no.1) and Lane. My Northside waitlist number is 240. And for Lane it’s 367. What are my chances for Northside? None? Or a maybe, just maybe…?
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You are very smart – getting a 99 on the ELA part is a great accomplishment! Your score on this one test does not define who you are. But in all honesty it will be hard to get off of those waitlists where you’re at, so realistically it might be a good idea to accept the Taft IB offer.
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Thank You so much! I really appreciate this comment, and I did accept the IB offer 🙂 thank you again for your kind words.
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Taft is a very good school and their IB program is fantastic it requires a lot of discipline. IB is very rigorous and it will stretch you to think beyond regular or honors classes. Your writing skills and time management skills will be razor sharp. I like IB over AP for an overall education to me the IB education is much more comphresive than AP. Although AP capstone is modeled after IB.
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Thank you so much! I accepted the IB offer. It seems like a challenge but I’m willing to accept it. My sister went to Taft IB and ended up getting a full tuition scholarship to the University Of Michigan so I hope I can be successful like her. Thank you again!
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Is it true that even 99/99 with 99/99/99 in tier 4 didn’t get accepted by Payton, their first choice?
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This sounds unlikely. My Daughter had 900 (all 99s and As), and listed Payton as her first choice and was offered.
p.s. You didn’t mention grades, but I assume it’s straight As.
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It happened last year, anecdotally. That’s why cps uses tie breakers.
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Tier 4. Kid got a 865 total, could have done better but the math portion tripped her up a bit. Still a good score, and I’m proud. The test is no way a measure of intelligence.
Enrolled in the prep courses, but the only class we could do involved taking her out of class 20 minutes early. It was a music class, so I thought GREAT! Unfortunately, our principal wouldn’t allow it, and she missed a lot of the math prep portion, which probably affected the score and therefore her chances. Elementary school is great, but not very rigorous. She excelled easily and they have no honors or advanced work whatsoever.
I guess now I’m just ranting. We are waitlisted 300’s for Lane as first choice, (that will never happen) and we just accepted Taft IB program, which I hear is a rigorous program.
I grew up in a bad area and worked my ass off to be able to attend college and live in the neighborhood I’m in now. I just feel like we got penalized for our hard work. We are not rich. It’s a real slap in the face, especially since my job REQUIRES me to live in Chicago.
Ultimately, I have a very pragmatic view of education. My kid will do fine because we emphasize hard work and accountability no matter what high school they go to. Just needed to rant about this terrible system, inadequate public resources and institutions that create this system in the first place.
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I grew up in a bad area and worked my ass off to be able to attend college and live in the neighborhood I’m in now. I just feel like we got penalized for our hard work. We are not rich. It’s a real slap in the face, especially since my job REQUIRES me to live in Chicago
Sometimes you have to be very rich to afford to be poor.
The children just have to cope with it. The good thing is that college is a great equalizer in that hardworking students will always persevere in life regardless of the colleges they join.
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Not sure why any principal would not allow a kid to miss a few music classes to be ready for High School – maybe you should have said they were doctor’s appointments. It does seem that Tier 4 kids overwhelmed with their scores, knocking a lot of kids out of their chances. We got into Lane, 1st choice, Tier 3 with an 875. Happy with that, but finding too many kids locked out of SEHS with higher scores than that who are in T4. Don’t understand that coming off Covid – how did the scores jump so much?
Would love to hear any insight on that……..
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Does anyone know if CPS elementary students has choosing the valedictorian during 8th grade graduation ceremony? One of my friends’ child in a New York school has this, and she says almost all elementary schools in New York has this, so wondering if CPS too has this. Thank you
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Valedictorian in elementary school? What grades would it include? Maybe just middle school? I’ve not heard of that at my school or in CPS.
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My son graduated 8th grade last year and there was a pre-determined valedictorian who gave a speech during the graduation.
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Thank you for the clarification. Was it a selective enrollment elementary school? Thank you.
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It was not. Just a neighborhood school.
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then theres me in tier 1 and got into payton lol
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is it possible to check child number on waitlist in selective enrollment?
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Is anybody here waiting on Principal Discretion results?
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you should have result today.
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Hi, Does any one know what’s mean on Rolling Waitlist, 2 Tier 4 and
4 Tier4？
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