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Personally I wouldn't pay for private school while living in a good public school district unless my child were having a lot of trouble in public school and I had reason to believe private would help them succeed. I think all kids would MUCH rather have that money to spend on college and graduate school so that they don't have to take out loans (and college, even public college including all expenses is becoming obscenely expensive), or for you to have that money for retirement so they won't have to support you in your old age. If I was so wealthy that I could afford private school and college/grad school for all my kids + a comfortable retirement without any issues, then maybe both options would be on the table, but I'd still probably lean towards public school.
Thanks. We have similar positives. The private school does offer immersion and a smaller class size as well. I honestly don't know much about the common core, other than the dislike from many internet posters. I don't know enough to like or hate it.
The Common Core is a set of high-quality academic standards in mathematics and English language arts/literacy (ELA). These learning goals outline what a student should know and be able to do at the end of each grade. The standards were created to ensure that all students graduate from high school with the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed in college, career, and life, regardless of where they live. Forty-two states, the District of Columbia, four territories, and the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) have voluntarily adopted and are moving forward with the Common Core.
Thanks. We have similar positives. The private school does offer immersion and a smaller class size as well. I honestly don't know much about the common core, other than the dislike from many internet posters. I don't know enough to like or hate it.
Check to see if your county schools have an immersion program. Also, check to see if they have any magnet schools. You might find what you are looking for within the county. My daughter is in an immersion program (Mandarin and it's new this year but they also have a Spanish one at another ES)and she attends a public school. My daughter has 18 kids in her class (though she started with 24).
I met my best friend of all time in high school. We were both half Asian, math geeks, took piano and dance lessons and went to space camp, had awesome parents, etc. We even had the same birthday. Our IQs were similar and so were our scores on standardized tests, including PSAT, ACT and SAT (I actually beat her by a tiny bit on those). We were both good kids who studied hard.
We went to the same really really good nationally ranked public high school. We took all the same classes. She got a 4.2 GPA in high school, got accepted to all the Ivy Leages, got a BS and MS from MIT, and a PhD from George Mason, and has just this incredible career that's both enjoyable and lucrative. I got a 3.5 GPA in high school, got accepted to state schools, got a BS and MS from the local University, and have a pretty good career, but nothing like what she has.
The only difference between us? She went to private prep school K-8. I went to (highly rated) public K-8. I know first hand that of all the classes we took together, 85% of the material she had seen before in some fashion. For me it was 0%. High school was a review with more depth for her, while high school was really hard brand new stuff for me. I also know first hand that she had incredibly good study skills. She could sit down, knew exactly what to study and how, and got all that stuff up in her brain very quickly in a way she could pull it out. She had been studying for years, because the prep school made her. I had never really studied before in my life before 9th grade, all of my classwork had been test prep, and all of my homework up to that point had been busywork that I could fill out with my eyes closed. While I could grasp all the concepts as fast as my friend, and sometimes faster, I had no idea what to do with it, how to practice it, how to go about making it stick in my head. In fact, I didn't learn how to study properly until my Sophmore year of college, after which point I was able to make straight A's for the rest of my college career. But of course by then it was too late.
I don't blame my parents, they didn't know. They were told the public was as good as private. They even started to doubt themselves when I got to middle school and enrolled me in the private school, but I threw a fit because all my friends were in public (and I didn't know any better), so they relented and let me stay at the public middle school. I didn't learn a thing there, by the way, I'd finish all the work in 30 seconds and go sit in the corner and read a book. My 7th grade math teacher tried to do something, he gave me an 8th grade math book to do on my own, which took me a month. He was my best math teacher by far, lol. Oh, and of course I went to Gifted and Talented classes. We made a giant rainforest out of paper-mache, wrote lots of poetry, and watched a lot of educational videos that were not very educational. It was a joke.
So now, years later, I am sending my kids to that same private prep school. Starting in K. I haven't decided if they will go to high school there, that's not the important part. But they will go there K-8. And they will learn how to study. And they will have the opportunity to follow their dreams, whatever they may be.
That's my opinion, from my personal experience. Your mileage may vary.
Check to see if your county schools have an immersion program. Also, check to see if they have any magnet schools. You might find what you are looking for within the county. My daughter is in an immersion program (Mandarin and it's new this year but they also have a Spanish one at another ES)and she attends a public school. My daughter has 18 kids in her class (though she started with 24).
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll check the one charter school in our area, but I don't think they have immersion.
There is a public school in our area that offers immersion in K, but it's not in our county and I hear they have a crazy long wait list process anyway.
I met my best friend of all time in high school. We were both half Asian, math geeks, took piano and dance lessons and went to space camp, had awesome parents, etc. We even had the same birthday. Our IQs were similar and so were our scores on standardized tests, including PSAT, ACT and SAT (I actually beat her by a tiny bit on those). We were both good kids who studied hard.
We went to the same really really good nationally ranked public high school. We took all the same classes. She got a 4.2 GPA in high school, got accepted to all the Ivy Leages, got a BS and MS from MIT, and a PhD from George Mason, and has just this incredible career that's both enjoyable and lucrative. I got a 3.5 GPA in high school, got accepted to state schools, got a BS and MS from the local University, and have a pretty good career, but nothing like what she has.
The only difference between us? She went to private prep school K-8. I went to (highly rated) public K-8. I know first hand that of all the classes we took together, 85% of the material she had seen before in some fashion. For me it was 0%. High school was a review with more depth for her, while high school was really hard brand new stuff for me. I also know first hand that she had incredibly good study skills. She could sit down, knew exactly what to study and how, and got all that stuff up in her brain very quickly in a way she could pull it out. She had been studying for years, because the prep school made her. I had never really studied before in my life before 9th grade, all of my classwork had been test prep, and all of my homework up to that point had been busywork that I could fill out with my eyes closed. While I could grasp all the concepts as fast as my friend, and sometimes faster, I had no idea what to do with it, how to practice it, how to go about making it stick in my head. In fact, I didn't learn how to study properly until my Sophmore year of college, after which point I was able to make straight A's for the rest of my college career. But of course by then it was too late.
I don't blame my parents, they didn't know. They were told the public was as good as private. They even started to doubt themselves when I got to middle school and enrolled me in the private school, but I threw a fit because all my friends were in public (and I didn't know any better), so they relented and let me stay at the public middle school. I didn't learn a thing there, by the way, I'd finish all the work in 30 seconds and go sit in the corner and read a book. My 7th grade math teacher tried to do something, he gave me an 8th grade math book to do on my own, which took me a month. He was my best math teacher by far, lol. Oh, and of course I went to Gifted and Talented classes. We made a giant rainforest out of paper-mache, wrote lots of poetry, and watched a lot of educational videos that were not very educational. It was a joke.
So now, years later, I am sending my kids to that same private prep school. Starting in K. I haven't decided if they will go to high school there, that's not the important part. But they will go there K-8. And they will learn how to study. And they will have the opportunity to follow their dreams, whatever they may be.
That's my opinion, from my personal experience. Your mileage may vary.
Wow. Thanks for your opinion. It's very helpful. My wife has a similar experience as yours, although it was in college, not high school. She was surprised by the amount of work kids did in college and was overwhelmed initially, while private school grads seemed to think the new workload was easy and actually less than in HS.
The only advantage private has over public is there is no red tape you have to go through to get rid of problem children.
Don't underestimate the importance of this. Your child might be in the same classroom in elementary school as these problem children. I once subbed a third grade class with several students who should've been in a self-contained life skills classroom with several aides. At the secondary level, this will likely affect your child if they are average or below. Classes will be constantly disrupted by students who are constantly talking in class and not paying attention. When the teacher gives an assignment, they yell out, "I don't understand what we're supposed to do."
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkbab5
I met my best friend of all time in high school. We were both half Asian, math geeks, took piano and dance lessons and went to space camp, had awesome parents, etc. We even had the same birthday. Our IQs were similar and so were our scores on standardized tests, including PSAT, ACT and SAT (I actually beat her by a tiny bit on those). We were both good kids who studied hard.
We went to the same really really good nationally ranked public high school. We took all the same classes. She got a 4.2 GPA in high school, got accepted to all the Ivy Leages, got a BS and MS from MIT, and a PhD from George Mason, and has just this incredible career that's both enjoyable and lucrative. I got a 3.5 GPA in high school, got accepted to state schools, got a BS and MS from the local University, and have a pretty good career, but nothing like what she has.
The only difference between us? She went to private prep school K-8. I went to (highly rated) public K-8. I know first hand that of all the classes we took together, 85% of the material she had seen before in some fashion. For me it was 0%. High school was a review with more depth for her, while high school was really hard brand new stuff for me. I also know first hand that she had incredibly good study skills. She could sit down, knew exactly what to study and how, and got all that stuff up in her brain very quickly in a way she could pull it out. She had been studying for years, because the prep school made her. I had never really studied before in my life before 9th grade, all of my classwork had been test prep, and all of my homework up to that point had been busywork that I could fill out with my eyes closed. While I could grasp all the concepts as fast as my friend, and sometimes faster, I had no idea what to do with it, how to practice it, how to go about making it stick in my head. In fact, I didn't learn how to study properly until my Sophmore year of college, after which point I was able to make straight A's for the rest of my college career. But of course by then it was too late.
I don't blame my parents, they didn't know. They were told the public was as good as private. They even started to doubt themselves when I got to middle school and enrolled me in the private school, but I threw a fit because all my friends were in public (and I didn't know any better), so they relented and let me stay at the public middle school. I didn't learn a thing there, by the way, I'd finish all the work in 30 seconds and go sit in the corner and read a book. My 7th grade math teacher tried to do something, he gave me an 8th grade math book to do on my own, which took me a month. He was my best math teacher by far, lol. Oh, and of course I went to Gifted and Talented classes. We made a giant rainforest out of paper-mache, wrote lots of poetry, and watched a lot of educational videos that were not very educational. It was a joke.
So now, years later, I am sending my kids to that same private prep school. Starting in K. I haven't decided if they will go to high school there, that's not the important part. But they will go there K-8. And they will learn how to study. And they will have the opportunity to follow their dreams, whatever they may be.
That's my opinion, from my personal experience. Your mileage may vary.
Interesting perspective that points to the importance of your peers in the quality of your education. Most teachers will teach to the level of their students. This is usually an advantage of larger high schools over small schools. The large schools can group students into honors and AP courses. While average test scores may be low in the large public school, there may be a core segment of outstanding students taking AP courses. I'm aware of a public school in Western PA that has a bad reputation and low average test scores, but graduates some outstanding students who take advanced courses.
The only advantage private has over public is there is no red tape you have to go through to get rid of problem children.
No, but they are sometimes kept on b/c the parents are big donors, or they need the tuition money.
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