TJ ADMISSIONS UPDATES

February 28th, 2022

Last week, a federal court ruled against the recently updated TJ admissions process, arguing that it’s discriminatory.

The FCPS school board has not yet released any information about a potential new process, and one FCPS attorney was quoted saying that they'd consider an appeal.

While there is a lot of speculation about what the admissions process could look like in future years, nothing has been determined yet.

As more information is released and as the school board reconsiders the process, we'll continue to update this page.

Read more about the ruling in the Washington Post here.

June 24th, 2021

Fairfax County Public Schools released some data regarding this year’s acceptances in their press release on notification day. In total, they received 3,034 applications and offered 550 spots, which comes to an 18.13% chance of admission overall. The average GPA of students who were extended an offer was 3.95, which continues to show that a high GPA is a requirement for admission. There were also significant changes in the data as well. Of students offered acceptance, almost a third of them were from previously underrepresented schools. In fact, the new Experience Factors (underrepresented school, economically disadvantaged, special education, and English language learner) seemed to play a large role in admission — considering that some students could have multiple Experience Factors, somewhere between 169 and 359 students, or 31 and 65 percent, of the total 550 accepted had at least one. Another noteworthy change was the decrease of private school students accepted. Here’s a table that shows a breakdown. We reached out hoping to receive more information regarding acceptances by middle school and by math class and will continue to keep you updated here.

June 22nd, 2021

According to their website, TJ will be releasing their admissions decisions Wednesday, June 23rd after 6 pm. Once students log into the portal, they’ll see their result. Best of luck to everyone in this strange year!

June 11th, 2021

A quick update here for future prospective parents: TJ’s last email communication said this year’s admissions results will come out mid-to-late June, so we’re holding tight here for a few more weeks.

They also haven’t announced a timeline for next year’s applicants, and it’s unclear when they will, but we’ll keep you updated here as soon as they do. Regardless, we’ll be scheduling fall classes for 7th and 8th graders soon.

March 5th, 2021

TJ emailed all applicants with additional information regarding the writing administration on Monday, March 15th:

• Student Portrait Sheet (SPS): Test Session 9:00-10:00am - (4 Questions)

• Problem Solving Essay (PSE): Test Session 10:30-11:00am - (1 Question)

Given the reduced time limit this year, we’ll be focusing on revised time management techniques over the next week with our students.

As TJ's email encourages, we highly recommend students who are available to participate in the sample test session this coming Monday, March 8th to introduce students to the mechanics of the virtual administration so they know what to expect come test day on the 15th.

Note that they have yet to confirm both GPA eligibility and accommodations, and more details from TJ should follow next week.

January 23rd, 2021

TJ announced that they will hold a virtual timed administration of the Student Portrait Sheet and Problem-Solving Essay on Monday, March 15th in the morning at a time to be determined.

The accommodations and make-up day will be Monday, April 12th.

For students who have not begun a group class, we still have one spot left in the 5-week course that began this morning, and we are planning to offer two more 5-week classes leading up to the writing date. More details on our website here.

They have not yet released details of how the writing will be virtually administered, so we'll keep you posted as we learn more.

January 7th, 2021

TJ updated the calendar on their website here announcing that applications will open on February 1st and close on February 26th. It’s currently unclear whether this application will include the writing components or if those will occur at a later date.

January 3rd, 2021

We’re opening new 6-week intensive courses geared toward the Student Portrait Sheet and the Problem-Solving Essay for current 8th-grade students. More details available here.

December 17th, 2020

The FCPS school board voted to proceed with an amended Holistic Review Process effective for this year's applicants to TJ.

As previously proposed, the holistic review will be based on the following factors:

• 3.5 GPA in core academic classes

• Enrolled in both math and science honors courses

• Enrolled in one additional honors course or identified as a Young Scholar

• Student Portrait Sheet (SPS), formerly the Student Information Sheet

• Problem-Solving Essay (PSE)

• Experience Factors

Instead of the previously proposed geographical pathways, students will be chosen first, considering the above, to fill a minimum number of spots equivalent to the top 1.5% of the 8th-grade class at each Fairfax County middle school. Once those minimums are met, the holistic review will continue county-wide, accepting the highest-evaluated students regardless of middle school.

This ensures that students from every Fairfax County middle school will be offered admission to TJ.

While the board did not specifically vote on how to administer the SPS/PSE writing, they alluded to continuing with their previous process for this year's applicants, where students write their responses in a proctored environment at a particular assigned location. Beginning with next year’s application cycle (Class of 2026), they will require FCPS to offer the SPS/PSE to all eligible 8th graders by proctoring locally at every middle school and also offer them an opt-out clause if they wish not to participate. This will not impact this year's applicants for the Class of 2025.

Regarding this year's timeline, the board, unfortunately, again did not discuss it. There is currently no information on when the application will be released or when the SPS/PSE will be administered.

We’ll post another update as soon as more information is released.

November 17th, 2020

The FCPS school board used today's work session to address their COVID return-to-school plans and metrics instead of the TJ admissions process.

Their final proposal, however, was released and can be found here. In short, they will vote in December on whether to choose a 1) Hybrid Merit Lottery, where 100 seats will be awarded to the highest-evaluated students and the remaining seats selected by a lottery within pathways or 2) Holistic Review, where all seats are awarded to the highest-evaluated students in each pathway.

Both processes include:

• 3.5 GPA in core academic classes

• Enrolled in both math and science honors sources

• Enrolled in one additional honors course or identified as a Young Scholar

• Student Portrait Sheet (formerly the Student Information Sheet)

• Problem-Solving Essay

• Experience Factors

Unfortunately, no further details were released on the application timeline for this year's 8th-grade applicants.

Given that both processes include the Student Portrait Sheet and Problem-Solving Essay and given FCPS's consistent delay in making a decision, we've decided to move forward with our 8-week group classes beginning in December and ending in February. More details are available on our website here.

If you would like to register for a class, please let us know or fill out the form online as soon as possible as spots are limited. If the new application deadline announced by FCPS ends up being before the end of our scheduled class, we will, of course, refund the prorated amount accordingly.

As always, we'll keep you in the loop as soon as further updates are released and decisions are made.

October 8th, 2020

FCPS officially announced the elimination of the TJ admissions test, effective for this year's applicants. Their brief explanation is on the TJ Admissions website here. More details were also released for tonight's school board meeting in regard to a plan moving forward here.

In short, no decision has been made on the exact process that will be used for this year's application — merit lottery versus holistic review — and therefore, an application window has not yet been determined. We understand the frustration for students and parents alike, particularly with timing and now with the uncertainty, and we share your concerns.

The next work session on TJ admissions will be held on November 17th, and we hope to have more concrete details on the timeline and process then.

We’re planning to reevaluate our former 2nd round writing classes to accommodate the new application and timeline when the news is revealed, which will be detailed on our website here.

September 16th, 2020

Yesterday, FCPS held a school board meeting, in which they proposed a new merit-based lottery system instead of the current Thomas Jefferson High School of Science and Technology (TJHSST) admissions process, effective potentially as soon as this fall. For more information on how the merit lottery would work and the proposal, here's a link where you can watch the meeting and a link to the proposal itself.

Registration for this year's exam, which was supposed to open this past Monday, has been put on hold. In the meantime, there will be meetings and town halls to discuss the proposal throughout the area, and a final proposal will be brought to the school board on October 8th. 

We understand that this is a frustrating, last-minute development, and we're as surprised as you are about FCPS's timing for this admissions cycle. Since this is not officially finalized yet, we recommend students continue to attend our classes if currently registered. Regardless of the October decision, we will continue to hold classes as scheduled up until the previously planned November 7th test date. As per our policies, we do not offer refunds on our group classes, but we're confident the concepts, test-taking strategies, and critical thinking and problem-solving skills learned in the class will continue to benefit students in high school and beyond.

If you would like to participate in the virtual town hall next Wednesday, September 23rd at 7 pm, community members can watch online, submit comments or questions to tjcomments@fcps.edu, or call into the town hall live at 1-800-231-6359.

We'll continue to monitor the situation and post additional updates here.