Academies of Loudoun Admissions by the Numbers

AOS and AET Applicants and Offers: 2016 to 2019

A May 2019 LCPS School Board presentation includes a four-year admissions comparison for rising ninth graders. LCPS labels the outcome in this table offered admission. The shares below are our calculations from those published counts.

These are historical offers, not enrolled students and not current admission odds. The source does not state how waitlist movement or declined offers were treated.

Assessment averages reported for 2018

A separate May 2019 LCPS summary reports the following averages for students offered admission in 2018. The same summary labels 150 AET and 120 AOS students as admitted. These are group averages from an older process, not cutoffs, minimums, or targets for today’s applicants.

“Not listed” means the LCPS summary did not report that metric for the program. The assessment names and figures are reproduced as printed.

AOS and AET: Fall 2020

These are the latest official AOS and AET applicant and admission counts we located. They come from a presentation to the School Board on August 11, 2020, and describe the students admitted for fall 2020, the last class chosen before the 2020 changes to the process.

Applied and admitted are the totals of the two groups LCPS reported by economic status, below. Share admitted is admitted divided by applied.

By economic status

Three students from economically disadvantaged families were admitted to each academy that year. That gap is one of the reasons LCPS gave for changing the process in 2020.

By Middle School, Fall 2020

LCPS compared the number of students each middle school sent to AOS and AET with the number it would expect from that school’s share of 8th grade enrollment. The last column marks the schools where enrollment was under 75% of that expected number, as LCPS flagged them.

Enrollment is as of May 2020. Mercer Middle School is not included because it had no 8th grade class that year. The AET tables have no rows for Belmont Ridge or J. Michael Lunsford, so the AET column adds up to less than the 145 admitted. LCPS reported 8 middle schools under 75% for AOS, with 9 students between them, and 5 for AET, with 22.

What the 2020 Score-Quartile Tables Show

LCPS also modeled how two narrowly selected groups of high-scoring students who were not admitted compared with the STEM-test score quartiles of students who accepted offers. These tables contain relative quartile positions, not raw scores.

Economically disadvantaged students

Students from underrepresented middle schools

LCPS selected only the highest-scoring non-admitted students needed for hypothetical representation levels. The totals here are therefore not all rejected applicants. The tables do not establish a cutoff, and they describe the former admissions process.

Post-Policy Enrollment Context

Annual LCPS school profiles provide a consistent view of actual Academies of Loudoun enrollment after the policy change. They do not report how many students applied, received offers, or accepted offers.

Grade 9 is an enrollment headcount across the Academies, not an AOS or AET admissions count. The economically disadvantaged percentage is schoolwide across all grades and programs. Neither measure can be used to calculate a post-2020 acceptance rate.

MATA: 2019 to 2024

LCPS reported MATA applications, offers, and acceptances for six years in its 2024-25 MATA report to the School Board. Applications nearly doubled over that time while offers grew much less, so the share of applicants offered a seat fell.

Years are as LCPS labels them. Share offered is offered divided by applied. MATA students choose up to three pathways, and LCPS does not break these totals down by pathway.

How AOS and AET Selection Worked Under the 2020 Policy

In August 2020, LCPS staff told the School Board how AOS and AET students would be chosen starting that fall. In plain terms:

1. Eligibility. 8th graders in or past Algebra I, with a C average or better in grades 6 and 7. Today’s requirement is narrower: a C or higher in specific math and science courses.
2. Two assessments on one day. Every eligible applicant takes a STEM Thinking Skills Assessment and a Writing Assessment.
3. A profile for each applicant. The Research Office builds a profile from the two scores.
4. A panel review, school by school. A panel of educators gets the profiles ranked by STEM test score within each middle school, and separately for students from economically disadvantaged families, with the writing score alongside.
5. A floor, not a quota. The panel’s list must include at least 75% of each middle school’s expected share, and of the expected share of economically disadvantaged students. LCPS’s example: a school expected to send 8 students gets at least 6 recommended, with a wait list behind them.

LCPS has not said publicly whether this process still applies. Its admissions page today says only that applicants are evaluated on all of the published criteria, with no benchmarks or minimum scores.

Is It a Lottery?

Not for AOS or AET. Families sometimes hear that AOS and AET admission is a random lottery. Nothing LCPS has published says so. Applicants take the Writing Assessment and the admission test, and LCPS says they are evaluated on all of the published criteria.

MATA is different. LCPS checks each applicant’s requirements, then holds a lottery only when more qualified students apply than there are seats.

What LCPS Has Not Published

AOS and AET counts after 2020

We found no later applicant, offer, or admission counts for AOS or AET in the public LCPS pages and School Board documents reviewed.

Current admission test statistics

LCPS published historical 2018 averages and 2020 quartile comparisons, but we found no current score scale, averages, distribution, or cutoff. LCPS says there is no minimum score.

Advanced AET

We found no official applicant or admission counts in the records reviewed.

Any AOS or AET acceptance rate you see for a recent year is an estimate, not an LCPS figure.