Downcounty Consortium

The Downcounty Consortium (DCC) is a group of five high schools that rising middle-schoolers in a select part of Montgomery County, Maryland choose from to attend for high school education. These high schools are Albert Einstein High School, John F. Kennedy High School, Montgomery Blair High School, Wheaton High School, and Northwood High School.

Introduced in 2004, each Downcounty Consortium high school offers different academy programs catered to the interests of a student. These academies are open to all students in the Downcounty Consortium area. After a student chooses one academy and takes four of that particular academy's classes, the student is eligible for a special certificate. Students also participate in internships as they are referred through the program.

The schools that feed into the Downcounty Consortium are Argyle Middle School, Eastern Middle School, Col. E. Brooke Lee Middle School, A. Mario Loiederman Middle School, Newport Mill Middle School, Parkland Middle School, Sligo Middle School, Silver Spring International Middle School, and Takoma Park Middle School.

The Downcounty Consortium choice process allows students to request certain high schools to attend. The students rank high schools by preference, which is often related to the school's academies. An academy is a set of classes that focus on a specific subject, such as theater, photography, or law. Unlike in a magnet where students must pass a test to be accepted, students get into academies by requesting them at the end of ninth grade, and begin them in tenth grade.

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