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It's two kids, so it's at least $40,000 a year. I think you get a price break for multiple kids.
The mom was worried about her kids being around "poor kids" in the public school. I think they just wanted a more sheltered experience for their kids, and the mom grew up in a country where everyone goes to private school. Her kids do love going to the private school.
I think lots of people are scared of public schools.
To the person who repped me and left me a note saying that's cheap...kudos to you for having an extra $20,000+ per kid lying around. :-)
As far as your issue with giving your child money later on, if you can afford to pay tuition monthly, you could save it instead. A 529 plan works for much of it, as does a trust. I believe the 529 has a $200,000 cap.
We put away the equivalent of a cheaper private school in a 529 for college and other investments. That way our child can pick the right university.
I do think private schools are a necessity for people in failing or dangerous schools, and for those kids who have issues. for others it's a choice that they are free to make. I have no issue with the educational choices other people make. We may end up choosing a private school for middle school or high school. We will try the public school first and then switch if necessary. We've also toyed with home schooling to have more flexibility in traveling.
Did they say why? I know for some it's family tradition or they just don't know what to do with their money...wouldn't that be nice!
I pay almost that much (tuition ranges from 15K to 19K plus fees depending on grade). For me, I'm paying for an easier path towards desired opportunities. At our public school, it's a small handful that gets into a prestigious college, and only a very few of those actually go for something lucrative, like med school or engineering. At the private school, 100% go to college. About half of them are prestigious. And the majority of them are for something lucrative. They go on to do crazy awesome things. A huge percentage of them go one to become doctors, lawyers, geneticists, etc. One of them co-founded Wikipedia.
It's like playing the lotto. Sure I could win the lotto with one $1 ticket. But if the jackpot's up to a kajillion, and you have $20... well, you know. You're gonna get 20 tickets.
Yes I realize I could save all this money to pay for Harvard or whatever. But my concern is that they are much much less likely to get into Harvard from our public schools. Even more, they are much much less likely to WANT to get into Harvard. (Just using Harvard as an example, there are many other great schools).
My first grader, she goes to school, and all the kids talk about what their parents do. Doctors, lawyers, engineers, scientists. 3/4 of the class as PhD/MD/JD parents. On career day, these are the careers that she sees, that she is exposed to. She comes home, and she tells me she wants to be a baby doctor. I tell her if that's what she wants, I will help her get there. She asks me, what does it take to become a baby doctor? And I tell her it takes a whole lot of hard work, work work work, starting yesterday, to do that. Is that what you want? Yes she says. And every day after school she spends 15 minutes doing her actual homework, then the next hour and a half doing advanced math, vocabulary, logic problems, piano practice, watching science videos and doing magic school bus experiments, whatever can help get her there.
I can rattle off 3 of her kids in her grade whose parents are baby doctors (we have a neonatologist and two pediatricians). There's also a neurosurgeon, a neurologist, a cardiologist, and an ER doc. (There's more MDs, but I don't know what specialty they are, these are just the ones that I know them and their kids). And right now she goes over to their house to play, but 10 years from now, she will go over to their house to study. And 15 years from now, when she's trying to get a residency or whatever, one of those baby doctors is going to tell all of the other residency doctor picking people, hey, get this girl, she studied at my house with my kid when she was a kid and she's smart and I know her.
That. That's what I'm paying for. Not the teaching, I can do that myself, just as well if not better. I'm paying for culture. To give my kid their culture.
I pay almost that much (tuition ranges from 15K to 19K plus fees depending on grade). For me, I'm paying for an easier path towards desired opportunities. At our public school, it's a small handful that gets into a prestigious college, and only a very few of those actually go for something lucrative, like med school or engineering. At the private school, 100% go to college. About half of them are prestigious. And the majority of them are for something lucrative. They go on to do crazy awesome things. A huge percentage of them go one to become doctors, lawyers, geneticists, etc. One of them co-founded Wikipedia.
It's like playing the lotto. Sure I could win the lotto with one $1 ticket. But if the jackpot's up to a kajillion, and you have $20... well, you know. You're gonna get 20 tickets.
Yes I realize I could save all this money to pay for Harvard or whatever. But my concern is that they are much much less likely to get into Harvard from our public schools. Even more, they are much much less likely to WANT to get into Harvard. (Just using Harvard as an example, there are many other great schools).
My first grader, she goes to school, and all the kids talk about what their parents do. Doctors, lawyers, engineers, scientists. 3/4 of the class as PhD/MD/JD parents. On career day, these are the careers that she sees, that she is exposed to. She comes home, and she tells me she wants to be a baby doctor. I tell her if that's what she wants, I will help her get there. She asks me, what does it take to become a baby doctor? And I tell her it takes a whole lot of hard work, work work work, starting yesterday, to do that. Is that what you want? Yes she says. And every day after school she spends 15 minutes doing her actual homework, then the next hour and a half doing advanced math, vocabulary, logic problems, piano practice, watching science videos and doing magic school bus experiments, whatever can help get her there.
I can rattle off 3 of her kids in her grade whose parents are baby doctors (we have a neonatologist and two pediatricians). There's also a neurosurgeon, a neurologist, a cardiologist, and an ER doc. (There's more MDs, but I don't know what specialty they are, these are just the ones that I know them and their kids). And right now she goes over to their house to play, but 10 years from now, she will go over to their house to study. And 15 years from now, when she's trying to get a residency or whatever, one of those baby doctors is going to tell all of the other residency doctor picking people, hey, get this girl, she studied at my house with my kid when she was a kid and she's smart and I know her.
That. That's what I'm paying for. Not the teaching, I can do that myself, just as well if not better. I'm paying for culture. To give my kid their culture.
True, some private schools do have a large majority of kids who will go on to have successful professional lives. Lots of public schools offer that too. It's all relative to the individual school you place them. My child goes to school with kids whose parents work at NASA, lots of executives in oil and gas, top medical doctors in Houston, CEO's children, etc...
I'm sure your kids are doing great. It's just not a choice I would make, unless the public school became a place that wasn't meeting my child's needs. If you are comfortable with your choice, great. I am comfortable with my choice.
True, some private schools do have a large majority of kids who will go on to have successful professional lives. Lots of public schools offer that too. It's all relative to the individual school you place them. My child goes to school with kids whose parents work at NASA, lots of executives in oil and gas, top medical doctors in Houston, CEO's children, etc...
I'm sure your kids are doing great. It's just not a choice I would make, unless the public school became a place that wasn't meeting my child's needs. If you are comfortable with your choice, great. I am comfortable with my choice.
Yes, I agree. It's about the particular school, and the particular people who make up that school, not whether it is public or private. If I had a public school like that available to me I would take it. But they just don't have those in this neck of the woods. Around here, if you want that type of quality, private is your only option.
To the person who repped me and left me a note saying that's cheap...kudos to you for having an extra $20,000+ per kid lying around. :-)
I hate the comments via reps.
But I do have to agree with this one. That's cheap...for MY area. Parochial HS is upwards of 15K per year. Independent privates are over $30K per year and staring at 5th grade (middle school).
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As far as your issue with giving your child money later on, if you can afford to pay tuition monthly, you could save it instead. A 529 plan works for much of it, as does a trust. I believe the 529 has a $200,000 cap.
Our financial advisor swore by 529s. We are LLs and RE investors but trusted these 529s he convinced us to sink our money in to as opposed to buying more rental properties. After investing in and watching the 529s do nothing for a decade + we pulled the funds out and invested in RE income producing properties with those "college funds". We made more in the first year through rental income than we did after 10+ years of 529s.
Quote:
I do think private schools are a necessity for people in failing or dangerous schools, and for those kids who have issues. for others it's a choice that they are free to make. I have no issue with the educational choices other people make. We may end up choosing a private school for middle school or high school. We will try the public school first and then switch if necessary. We've also toyed with home schooling to have more flexibility in traveling.
Most private schools don't take kids with issues and most folks don't purposely move to towns with failing or dangerous schools if they can afford private. My town is an example. The public schools are terrible, due to one small segment of the town that tends to produce the majority of the kids who attend the public school system. Hasn't changed for decades. Newbies to the town, who might live in any one of many million+ dollar per house developments.... they don't believe those who know better. Not until their kids are school-aged and get a taste of the gen pop. Then they either pack up and move out of town or put their kids in parochial/independent private.
But I do have to agree with this one. That's cheap...for MY area. Parochial HS is upwards of 15K per year. Independent privates are over $30K per year and staring at 5th grade (middle school).
Our financial advisor swore by 529s. We are LLs and RE investors but trusted these 529s he convinced us to sink our money in to as opposed to buying more rental properties. After investing in and watching the 529s do nothing for a decade + we pulled the funds out and invested in RE income producing properties with those "college funds". We made more in the first year through rental income than we did after 10+ years of 529s.
Most private schools don't take kids with issues and most folks don't purposely move to towns with failing or dangerous schools if they can afford private. My town is an example. The public schools are terrible, due to one small segment of the town that tends to produce the majority of the kids who attend the public school system. Hasn't changed for decades. Newbies to the town, who might live in any one of many million+ dollar per house developments.... they don't believe those who know better. Not until their kids are school-aged and get a taste of the gen pop. Then they either pack up and move out of town or put their kids in parochial/independent private.
The issues I was referring to are the mild variety. Some kids need more attention, are shy, are followers, middle of the road average kids, and random other issues.
It does sound like your school district is less than desirable. Many public schools are good though. It all depends on the area.
We like having a 529, but that's in addition to all our other investments. It's just one way to do it.
So I wanted to provide a quick update/ my thoughts on Public vs. Private schools since my son has almost finished his 1st year of school at the local private school. These are the advantages that I have seen over my public school (I can't really compare to the local public school, because my kids don't go there and I only hear secondhand stories from neighbors).
1. Field trips: They go on 2-3 field trips a month (ranges from local farms or state park to the high school). I think they do a really good job tying them into the curriculum and the kids are always excited about them.
2. Parental involvement: The private school almost "forces" the parents to get involved, whether it's music lessons (that the parents must attend) or a "game night" or some party of even the weekly show-and-tell.
3. Interaction with older kids: My son knows a bunch of kids in the older grades, some of which are his mentors. This is awesome for him and will be even better when he has the opportunity to mentor younger kids.
4. Sense of community: Every student, parent, teacher that I have met is super nice and involved in the kids educations. It's really stunning and makes for a great sense of community.
5. They have an innovative curriculum: The private school doesn't really seem to care about standardized testing, especially the state's so they rely on their own curriculum, which from what I understand is different than the Public School's (e.g. no common core, more language, music, art at the younger ages) and they use computers/ tech like Osmo...
Let me know what you all think, but after almost a full school year, these are my thoughts. Whether they are worth paying for is another question (I'd say yes).
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
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Good Education is worth paying for if you can afford it. and worth breaking your back to afford it.
Some public schools are excellent, some private schools are terrible.
Expose to various adventures and interests and nurture your kids as broadly as possible (I worked nights so I could school / be with my kids during the days). We traveled 50% of the time (as possible).
We traveled / lived internationally, so ended up homeschooling till grade 9, then using FREE FT College instead of High School (available in WA State since 1990). 10 yrs PAST College and our kids are doing well! Very engaged in community service / volunteering / international travel and volunteer AID projects. We volunteered with seniors and with public schools, so 'socialization' is a great strength for our kids. (each were tutors for non-English speaking adults / disadvantaged youth while attending college during their HS yrs)
better deal... our friends that moved to Singapore during k-8 and used public schools.
Their kids are multilingual, very talented musically (required) & got full ride scholarships to USA and Euro Ivy leagues (cuz they aced the entrance requirements and tests). 10 yrs beyond college and they all have great international jobs. Cost of their EDU... ZERO dollars, but lots of time studying.
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.
You might check to see if there is a public International Baccalaureate Elementary school in your district, they all give language instruction from Kindergarten on. There are two in our area, one teaches Spanish, the other Russian but my son decided not to send his son to either because in one that teaches Spanish the test scores have been dropping steadily for the 3 years since they started their IB program. (I don't think test scores mean everything, but when they drop for three or four years I think it's indicative of a problem) and in the Russian IB school (a charter) it looked like they have no money to run the school, there's no library the multipurpose room serves as a gym, lunch room, and assembly room, and the school and grounds just looked shabby and run down.
There are also two Montessori charters here and they claim to teach Spanish but all they do is provide the kids access to Rosetta Stone online and the kids are expected to work independently on the program.
The school district in our neighborhood is just awful and my son didn't have much luck with the open enrollment lottery so we offered to pay for parochial school for our grandson and were prepared to do that but about 3 weeks ago when we found out that a fundamental elementary school (highest rated in the district) had added another kindergarten class and had openings so my son went there immediately and enrolled his boy, we're thrilled because that is the school we were hoping he could go to. We all wanted him to go to a fundamental school and this particular one has a great reputation.
It didn't used to be this hard, when I was a kid everyone went to Catholic school or the public school in the neighborhood there weren't charters, open enrollment, lotteries or specialized schools and no one seemed any worse for it.
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