John F. Kennedy Middle School BEAT Magnet

With all due respect to G.W. Carver – which everyone knows is an excellent Magnet program – there are great school choices outside of Coral Gables. JFK’s BEAT (Biomedical, Environmental, Agriculture, and Technology) Magnet Program is one of them. JFK BEAT Magnet (grades 6, 7, and 8) sits in the doughnut hole of North Miami Beach. It is a “school-within-a-school”, but it is in a building separate from the main school, and the building is only a few years old.

The academics are advanced and challenging. The curriculum includes courses in Computer Application Technology, Internet Research Technology, Orientation to Environmental Agriculture, Integrated Medical Science I and II, and Biotechnology Directed Research I and II. They offer Advanced and Gifted core classes and they offer three courses for high school graduation credit (Honors Algebra I, Honors Geometry, and Honors Physical Science). Its integrated theme provides the opportunity for children to receive a solid education base in technology and science which supports the STEM School initiative in this country.

Magnet Schools of America (MSA) recognized the BEAT program as the top secondary school in the nation in 2007. It was a Magnet School of Excellence in 2012, 2010, 2009, 2007, and 2006 and a Magnet School of Distinction in 2011 and 2008. Because it is a “school-within-a-school”, I am unable to retrieve the FCAT scores for the magnet program at the school because the Florida Department of Education (FLDOE) website does not breakdown the scores of the magnet programs that are not “schoolwide”. It is unfortunate because magnet programs like G.W. Carver’s have the advantage of having their FCAT scores available on the FLDOE website because they are “schoolwide” programs. The only FCAT score information I could find for the BEAT program was for 2003 -2006 reading scores and is located on the the MSA website:

Percent Meeting State Mastery Level – Reading
Grade Level	District				State				BEAT Magnet
	2003	2004	2005	2006	2003	2004	2005	2006	2003	2004	2005	2006
6	41	40	44	62	53	54	56	64	82	95	94	93
7	40	41	43	53	52	53	53	61	86	83	97	98
8	37	35	34	40	49	45	44	46	95	87	91	91

(retrieved from http://www.magnet.edu/).

These are very impressive numbers! (Go Falcons!) This type of information should be readily accessible to parents who want to make the best school choice for their child.

My child attends JFK BEAT Magnet. We applied to five middle school magnet programs and got accepted to four of them. We did not make the lottery pick at G.W. Carver. JFK was not my first choice – in fact, it was my last. We had to accept the offer for JFK because of transportation difficulties to the other schools. As it turns out, it was an excellent choice. My child has completed 6^th grade and has received an excellent education. I have the utmost respect for the program, the administrators, and the teachers. They run a tight ship and have high expectations for the children. It is a very safe environment and I really like the fact the magnet program is in a building separate from the main school because my child is constantly in an environment of highly motivated children. I believe that John F. Kennedy Middle School BEAT Magnet Program is an excellent choice school.

Making an informed choice: some helpful websites

When I ask around about Magnet School Options, I always hear the same names: George Washington Carver Middle School, MAST, DASH, New World School of the Arts, and Coral Reef Senior High School. My daughter did not make the lottery at George Washington Carver. Some of these high schools will most certainly be on our list of applications for 9th grade, but we are allowed to submit only five applications and we need to make an INFORMED decision before we submit our applications. There are hundreds of Magnet programs in Miami-Dade and the decision making process can be quite overwhelming.

I have found a number of websites that have been helpful in our quest to make the best school choice:

Florida Department of Education (Florida School Rankings)

https://app2.fldoe.org/Ranking/Schools/

Florida Department of Education Bureau of K-12 Assessment (to view FCAT results)

http://fcat.fldoe.org/

U.S. News & World Report

http://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/florida/rankings

The Daily Beast “America’s Best High Schools 2012”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/20/america-s-best-high-schools.html (key “miami” in the search box to show the schools in our area that made the list)

Miami Dade County Public Schools
http://www.dadeschools.net/

Miami Dade County Public Schools – School Choice and Parental Options
http://www.yourchoicemiami.org/

Magnet Schools of America
http://www.magnet.edu/

Last, but not least, you can visit specific school websites. Some provide a lot of information and some need a bit of work.

I recently read the list of “destination schools” in Miami-Dade (http://www.yourchoicemiami.org) and Greynold’s Park Elementary School (GPES) was listed as having a STEM school strand (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) coming in the 2012-2013 school year. The STEM theme makes perfect sense because the magnet middle school in the NMB feeder pattern is John F. Kennedy BEAT Magnet (Bio-Medical/Environmental/Agricultural/Technology). I have not quite figured out the difference between a “destination school” and a “magnet school” so I visited GPES’s website (http://greynolds.dadeschools.net/) to learn more but, unfortunately, the website provides the 2009 school supply list and lists the name of the former principal. GPES needs to update the website. JFK BEAT Magnet also has a website (http://jfk.dadeschools.net/B.E.A.T.%20Magnet.html) but it is also lacking up-to-date information, although, I understand that they are working on upgrading and enhancing the site. Both schools have given my daughter an exemplary education, but their websites need to be updated so everyone can see what these NMB schools have to offer. Parents cannot visit every magnet program to whittle down their application choices to FIVE schools. Individual school websites can help parents to make a more informed school choice – and make the process a little less overwhelming.

Annual South Florida Education Expo at Aventura Mall

Annual South Florida Education Expo at Aventura Mall

July 14, 2012 12:00 noon to 7:00 p.m. at Aventura Mall

Miami Dade Public Schools will have a booth with information about the Magnet School Programs. (http://www.yourchoicemiami.org/index.php?/index/department/11)

I found this event on http://www.yourchoicemiami.org. This is a great opportunity to start to gather your information about the magnet programs for the 2013-2014 school year because the application period is just around the corner (begins in October).

ATTENTION NORTH MIAMI BEACH RESIDENTS: TRY TO ATTEND – THEY ARE BRINGING THIS INFORMATION TO OUR AREA. DON’T MISS THIS OPPORTUNITY!

Hello Miami!

I have a child in the Miami-Dade School System. She attended the neighborhood elementary school and participated in the gifted program. I was not very informed about “Choice Schools” at the time and was very happy with the gifted education that the school provided. However, for the 2011-2012 school year, when we were making the transition from elementary school to middle school, it was not my choice to put her in the middle school in our neighborhood, and hence, my journey began to make a choice – the best choice.  I am more interested in the academic success of a school than I am in the Magnet theme of the school. What I found when I was looking for a middle school magnet program was that information on the internet was limited. The Miami-Dade County Public Schools website provides information about the Choice School programs, but the information provided did not really give me the information I was seeking about the academic success of the different Choice Schools. So, I googled. I asked around. I visited some schools. I still felt that I lacked sufficient information to make the best choice for my child. I ended up choosing the magnet school in our neighborhood because of transportation issues, but it turned out I made an excellent choice – that will be a topic for another day.

I have absolutely no affiliation with the Miami-Dade School System.  This blog is simply a venue for me to express my thoughts and opinions, and hopefully, to provide a place where parents can go to share their thoughts about the Magnet Schools in Miami-Dade. I am a proponent of the Miami-Dade  Magnet schools and I would not choose a Charter school but that is not the topic of my blog. In my quest to find the best Magnet Middle School, I discovered that:

• There are a lot of choices!

• I could not find any cohort of Magnet parents(other than those affiliated with a specific school).

• I could not find any cohort of parents of gifted children in Miami-Dade.

• Transportation can be a prohibitive factor in making a choice.

• There was more information available on the internet about the academic success of the Magnet  high schools than there was about the Magnet middle schools.

I am not an educator, but I firmly believe that preparation for my child for college is a priority in middle school – I do not believe we should wait until high school.

I am not a writer, but, hopefully, I will get better as I go along.

According to the Miami Herald, there were about 50,000 applications for choice schools in Miami Dade in 2011 (http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/26/2610014/more-magnets-to-open-in-miami.html). That is some stiff competition. Lottery aside, I want to know how I can best assist my child to be  a competitive applicant for the best magnet schools. My journey continues here.