Kailua High School (Honolulu, Kalaheo, Waimanalo: 2010, how much, buy)

[bahiaboyz]

Do any of you guys have kids attending Kailua High School. Can anyone give me an honest assessment on the school.

Thanks

[bahiaboyz]

Not one recommendation - i can't believe its that's bad.....

[Bandalero]

Originally Posted by bahiaboyz

Not one recommendation - i can't believe its that's bad.....

Trust me, its THAT bad! Several of my kids went through KHS back in the late 80s/early 90s, and it was "bad" way back then, both academically and racially, so I can't imagine it over there today. It cannot be good.

Like it or not, facts are facts. The state's students have consistently scored 48th or 49th in the nation on SAT scores . . . ninety percent of the state's teachers fail to meet Federal standards for teachers . . . the teachers here have all refused to submit to drug testing per their existing contract with the state, etc., etc. Its a flippin' joke!

How much more does a discerning parent really need to hear? If my kids had not received an above average education for YEARS before coming to Hawaii, they would have been 'dummied-down' to the point of being unemployable by the schools here, period!

The only other alternative is private schools (at $30-50K/year) where they'll get an education about equal to the public schools on the Mainland. Just pick your poison.

Good Luck!

[HankDfrmSD]

Originally Posted by bahiaboyz

Not one recommendation - i can't believe its that's bad.....

There are two high schools in Kailua - Kailua High and Kalaheo High.

Kailua High gets most of the kids from Waimanalo.

[kaimuki]

Originally Posted by Bandalero

Trust me, its THAT bad! Several of my kids went through KHS back in the late 80s/early 90s, and it was "bad" way back then, both academically and racially, so I can't imagine it over there today. It cannot be good.

Like it or not, facts are facts. The state's students have consistently scored 48th or 49th in the nation on SAT scores . . . ninety percent of the state's teachers fail to meet Federal standards for teachers . . . the teachers here have all refused to submit to drug testing per their existing contract with the state, etc., etc. Its a flippin' joke!

How much more does a discerning parent really need to hear? If my kids had not received an above average education for YEARS before coming to Hawaii, they would have been 'dummied-down' to the point of being unemployable by the schools here, period!

The only other alternative is private schools (at $30-50K/year) where they'll get an education about equal to the public schools on the Mainland. Just pick your poison.

Good Luck!

I graduated from public schools in Hawaii. While I agree with you that public schools are bad in Hawaii, private schools in Hawaii do not cost 30-50K a year. Unless your children attend HPA (Hawaii Preparatory Academy) on the Big Island, the tuition is FAR less than 30-50K a year. Also, stating that the quality of education in Hawaii's private schools is only on par with Mainland public schools is ridiculous. Do you know where some of the kids that graduate from Hawaii private schools go to college? Try the Ivy league schools, Stanford, Cal-Berkley, Duke, Virginia, UCLA, USC, Washington, MIT, BYU, Michigan, Notre Dame, Amherst, Georgetown, Boston U and the list goes on and on. Here are some of the better known private school's (mostly on Oahu) tuition rates.

HPA (Big Island)
Tuition for the 2009-2010 Academic Year | Hawaii Preparatory Academy

Punahou
Punahou: Tuition and Payment

Iolani
Iolani School - Tuition and Financial Aid

Honolulu Waldorf School
Honolulu Waldorf School:Tuition

Lutheran HS of Hawaii
http://lhshawaii.org/files/Charges%2...20Students.pdf

Hawaii Baptist Academy
Hawaii Baptist Academy: Tuition

Le Jardin Academy (located in Kailua)
Tuition at Le Jardin Academy

To the OP, if you're unable to enroll your children in a private school, Kalaheo H.S. would most likely be a better fit for your children than Kailua H.S.

[Bandalero]

Originally Posted by kaimuki

I graduated from public schools in Hawaii. While I agree with you that public schools are bad in Hawaii, private schools in Hawaii do not cost 30-50K a year. Unless your children attend HPA (Hawaii Preparatory Academy) on the Big Island, the tuition is FAR less than 30-50K a year. Also, stating that the quality of education in Hawaii's private schools is only on par with Mainland public schools is ridiculous. Do you know where some of the kids that graduate from Hawaii private schools go to college? Try the Ivy league schools, Stanford, Cal-Berkley, Duke, Virginia, UCLA, USC, Washington, MIT, BYU, Michigan, Notre Dame, Amherst, Georgetown, Boston U and the list goes on and on. Here are some of the better known private school's (mostly on Oahu) tuition rates.

HPA (Big Island)
Tuition for the 2009-2010 Academic Year | Hawaii Preparatory Academy

Punahou
Punahou: Tuition and Payment

Iolani
Iolani School - Tuition and Financial Aid

Honolulu Waldorf School
Honolulu Waldorf School:Tuition

Lutheran HS of Hawaii
http://lhshawaii.org/files/Charges%2...20Students.pdf

Hawaii Baptist Academy
Hawaii Baptist Academy: Tuition

Le Jardin Academy (located in Kailua)
Tuition at Le Jardin Academy

To the OP, if you're unable to enroll your children in a private school, Kalaheo H.S. would most likely be a better fit for your children than Kailua H.S.

Nope! So sorry Kaimuki, but your argument doesn't hold water and I stand by my earlier assertions.

To hear you tell it, "Hawaii's best" (i.e., the kids who were fortunate enough to have attended Hawaii's esteemed private schools exclusively their ENTIRE academic life or K-12), went on to high-dollar educational institutions (like Michelle Wie), solely because they had somehow achieved greatness here, when the reality is, 90% of the faculty that they were subjected to at those esteemed local private schools, were graduates of Hawaii's public school system themselves. That's "fact"! So, unless that entire stream of faculty members was immediately replaced with MIT grads, your equation doesn't sell.

Secondly, many of the schools you've cited here have less-than-stellar academic reps themselves. In fact, I wouldn't give you a dime for an education at any one of the schools you've mentioned, save MIT, Berkeley, UW and Michigan). And as I've said elsewhere, most of them are VERY high-dollar schools that have histories of accepting just about anyone with sufficient funds to pay their exorbitant fees. Perhaps more importantly, most of them are bound by quotas, ethnic and geographic, under penalty of law.

So no, I'm afraid I don't buy your contention that graduates of Hawaii's esteemed "private" schools (like Michelle Wie) are somehow intellectual giants relative to their U.S. Mainland public school counterparts. If that were so, all of the Mainland kids accepted to these various institutions would be from Mainland-based private schools, and that's clearly not the case.

[kaimuki]

I do not know if "90%" of all the teachers in Hawaii's private schools graduated from public schools. However, if we assume this is true, then you will conclude that 90% of the population in Hawaii is uneducated, or just plain dumb.

Clearly, we do not agree here, so I'm willing to agree to disagree. LOL!

[mdand3boys]

Don't forget about the charter schools, many of them are gaining excellent reputations and are free.

[wb3690]

we are in kailua and most of our friend's kids either go to kalaheo or the parents send them to private.

it's sad when you talk to the teachers at public schools who basically tell you to send them to private schools because of the lack of funding at public schools. I know my son who was in intermediate school in kailua had a teacher who said she'd never send her kid to a public school here and she taught at them. sad.......her son ended up going to Iolani.

[Bandalero]

Originally Posted by wb3690

we are in kailua and most of our friend's kids either go to kalaheo or the parents send them to private.

it's sad when you talk to the teachers at public schools who basically tell you to send them to private schools because of the lack of funding at public schools. I know my son who was in intermediate school in kailua had a teacher who said she'd never send her kid to a public school here and she taught at them. sad.......her son ended up going to Iolani.

Yup, perfectly typical. A legacy in the making.