Yesterday when I was at our community pool, I met a gal who has had two children attend the science and math magnet in our district. I asked her if it was difficult for them to get in. (Her other child attends another high school magnet in the county). She said that it is a challenge and said jokingly that they hang on and hope their child won't burn out by the end of their senior year. She said it simply to acknowledge that the math and science magnet is a challenging program. All of her children have loved their high school programs. I then asked what her children did to prepare for application to the program. She didn't tell me much aside from their middle school math schedule of courses. When I was in middle school over twenty years ago, I took 6th grade math, Pre-Algebra in 7th, and Algebra in 8th (which was a joke of a class). I went on to start Algebra I freshman year, then geometry in 10th grade, Algebra II/Trigonometry i...