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Would anybody have recommendations for private middle schools in the Croton-on-Hudson/Yorktown/Cortlandt Manor area and, if so, how do you think they compare to the public schools?
The private middle schools I know anything about are Soundview Prep in Yorktown Heights, Harvey in Katonah, and Rippowam Cisqua in Bedford. Soundview is supposed to be good for kids who need more special attention and who do well in smaller groups. Cisqua and Harvey have a more traditional prep school reputation. My son's gone to the summer camp at Harvey and the campus is great (amazing arts center and an indoor skating ring). All three are about 30K a year.
How do they compare? For one, the independent private middle schools are significantly more expensive than public schools in terms of their tuition. However, you are guaranteed of consistently smaller class sizes in the years to come. Class sizes in the public schools have been creeping upwards in recent years, and some of the suburban districts are looking to raise classes to up to 27 students. Most private schools, in general, make it a practice to challenge each individual child to reach his maximum academic potential, which is why you can find in many cases private school students who can read, write (essays) and do math 2 grades higher than their average public school counterparts. They don't use pull out programs or "differentiated instruction", rather teachers focus on each individual student at all times during and outside of class. Obviously they can do this because of the hefty price tag and because class sizes are small.
As an alternative, you can check out Catholic parochial schools like St. Patrick's in Yorktown. Tuition is a lot cheaper than independent private schools. However, the academic curriculum is geared more towards the average student. Academic standards are suffciently high. Your child will learn what he needs to know in R-W-M-S and will surely not be "left behind" as long as he is responsible with his studies. Also, Catholic school teachers are not burdened by the need to accomodate weaker students at the expense of slowing down the pace of learning. Students who don't put their fair share of work can expect to get "Ds" and "Fs". But it can be a problem if your child is exceptionally bright and is able and wants to be challenged even more. Some (but not all) Catholic schools have honors classes beginning 4th/5th grade. You should check which schools offer honors classes.
Thanks for the responses. My son is very strong in science and reading and we feel that even though the public schools are good, they aren't right for him. He is not challenged in the subjects he excels in because the teachers must follow certain guidelines rather than tailor it to the individual.
Thanks for the responses. My son is very strong in science and reading and we feel that even though the public schools are good, they aren't right for him. He is not challenged in the subjects he excels in because the teachers must follow certain guidelines rather than tailor it to the individual.
It depends on the school and how it is set up. Our local public school (as well as plenty of others) breaks classes into groups based on kids' abilities. Some kids are doing reading, math, and science two grade levels above, while other kids are doing work at grade level and others are doing it below grade level. There's also daily gifted and talented pull-out. If there's one thing I'd say our school has done exceptionally well it is challenge my son in the areas he is strong in and support him in the areas he needs help with. For what its worth, all the private schools I know of function the same way--classes are broken up into level-based groups and given work that meets their abilities.
The big difference with private schools is that they are free to pick topics to study that are of more interest to the kids. For example, while every 4th grader in a NY public school has spent the last few months learning about the pilgrims and colonial times because that's what the 4th grade social studies standards dictate, my niece in a private school has been studying Africa. She's learning the same skills the public school kids are --research and inquiry, using primary sources, critical reading, organizing reports, etc-- but the subject matter is totally different.
If your son is in middle school, maybe you can wait until he's in high school before he's sufficiently challenged. That's when the public schools offer honors and AP classes.
We did tours of and asked families who send kids to various highly-regarded Westchester and Long Island schools, including Byram Hills, Briarcliff, Yorktown, Garden City and Bronxville and found them to be insufficient at the elementary and middle school level. Even the ones who tout to have pull out and gifted programs did not measure up, and all the families we spoke to were not satisfied with the level of academic training their kids were getting when compared with private school students. And I'm not referring to special topics like pilgrims but rather fundamental skills like reading, writing and math. Even the practice of breaking students into groups - we observed that many schools found this to be more and more challenging to implement as class sizes started to creep upwards and teachers were complaining that the weaker students were taking up too much of their time. We toured as many private schools and found that most of them did not break exceptionally strong students into groups, but rather zoomed into these kids individually.
Here's what you can do. Make visits and talk to families, administrators and teachers of both public and private schools and see which really can maximize your child's academic abilities. Investigate Hackley, Rippowam and Masters as you would Chappaqua, Briarcliff or Yorktown. Ask them what specifically they do for kids who are exceptionally bright, and not what they do for average students.
We're in Yorktown and the above is definitely not my experience. The schools are set up for differentiated instruction, with set periods in which kids from different classes are pulled out into level based groups (so one teacher is teaching a group of on-level kids while another is teaching beyond-level kids, etc., so no one teacher has to juggle multiple groups). This is done for math and reading and to a lesser extent for science. There is also daily G&T pull-out. I talk to loads of parents and the only complaint I've ever heard about a child not getting the attention they needed was from the parent of a child with aspergers. And I've never heard any complaints about the level of academics. As I said above, the school has done a great job of challenging my son in his strong areas and giving him extra support in his weak areas.
I had a fascinating talk with parents of kids in a number of local schools at a party in December and one of the topics was getting above-level work for kids who were ready for it. Some of the parents were satisfied, and some said that there was no differentiation or advanced pull-out in their schools at all. So you definitely need to check to see which schools offer it.
And, by all means, look at private schools too. Personally, I wouldn't want to send my kid to such a socio-economically homogeneous school experience, but there are some private schools that have good financial aid programs and a more diverse student body.
We initially took an interest on Yorktown because of the affordable, spacious homes and the good reputation of the district. To its credit, we found that academic standards were no better or worse than more expensive neighborhoods like Bronxville or Cold Spring Harbor.
That said, it did not come across as a place where academically gifted students can be challenged to the best of their abilities versus good private schools - at least not until high school where you get the benefit of the AP and honors classes. The practice of grouping kids worked as long as class sizes were sufficiently small, because even in groups, you could still zero-in on the abilities of an individual student. But families we talked to complained that this has been a challenge as class sizes especially in middle school have slowly gone up from 20 to 25, and would likely go up to 27 in the future as budgetary pressures increase, and this will make it more difficult to individualize. As a homebuyer, you would definitely have to account for the future because you will be investing for the long term.
As an exercise, do a tour of Yorktown or some other district, then do a tour of Hackley, whether or not you can or want to send your child to Hackley, just so you can know. Disregard special courses like subjects about pilrims or Roman history and just focus on core subjects - reading, writing, math and science and see which school imparts these subjects at a higher level.
As for being homogeneous, this is hardly relevant when it comes to schooling. It's quality of instruction and the level of challenge that really matters. Even then, many NYC-area private schools are sufficiently diverse because of professional up and coming minority families choosing to send their kids to private school and scholarships offered to needy but bright minority students.
Last edited by Forest_Hills_Daddy; 05-14-2011 at 01:19 PM..
Again, that hasn't been my experience at all. I've found the primary, elementary, and middle schools to offer a great deal of challenge to students ready for it, as well as plenty of support for those in need of it. In addition to the differentiated groups and pull-out, the teachers regularly tweak the assignments for individual kids to best meet their ability (so, for example, when all the kids have to do a research report, the guidelines for the final outcome vary depending on the kid; or when kids read independently and then write a response, both the books they can choose from and the expectations for the response vary depending on level).
The potential for increased class size is a real concern. As of the last meeting, a few weeks ago, the largest class size will be held at 25 next year, with most at 19-22. But that could change in the future. As I described above, the way Yorktown schools organize differentiated groups makes it much easier for teachers to manage even with bigger classes, since half the kids are going to the specials while the other half are broken up into leveled groups for small group instruction and each teacher works with one leveled group at a time. (For schools that take the more common approach of dividing kids into groups in the same room, the model for differentiated instruction is 5 groups of 4-6 kids. I've seen this done in schools around the country and it works very well--how well depending on the teacher, of course).
By the way, pilgrims is not a "special course"--it is a required component of the NY state 4th grade social studies standards and is tested in the state test. Sadly, Roman history is not part of the state standards (my son would love that!!). Personally, the primary attraction of private schools is that they can teach rich subjects like Roman history or ancient Egypt or modern Africa, etc. It is subjects like that that get kids enthralled and motivated to learn--which is the ultimate goal of any education.
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