Pros and Cons of Norwood

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dominated by the Langley School in athletics most years? what kind of a comment is that and how sad that the poster would consider that a "con". In fact, the statement is not true for all the teams or for all the sports.
Norwood has active sports teams for kids in grades 5-8 and those teams have had their shares of wins and losses against different schools.

Agree, but frankly I don't care about the sports teams since I send my child to school for an education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One thing that I have heard is that if children aren't reading by the end of 1st grade they are counseled out of the school. My DC attends McLean (love it!) and there were a few kids who came in 2nd grade from Norwood. One of these kids' Mom told me that her DC's self-esteem took a huge hit at Norwood because of the reading and the way the school made him feel about it and that McLean not only got the reading down in short order but did wonders for his mental health as well.

This would obviously not be a situation most families would find themselves in but it is something to know.

I must say that I have heard something like this before. We got a kind of warning that nothing is said early on, but they just let you know that things aren't working out.

[Anonymous]

Where do Norwood kids typically go to high school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where do Norwood kids typically go to high school?

Some public. A large chunk to St. Andrews, Holton, Landon, which are closer to their homes. Some to GDS, which seems to be popular, then some go to Sidwell, Maret, and some Catholic High Schools.

[Anonymous]

As a Langley parent I just want to apologize for the previous post. He/she is not the norm and most Langley parents have the utmost respect for Norwood. It is a great school and the kids are very well mannered, respectful and obviously intelligent. We enjoy meeting them at games and think the schools have a healthy rivalry. I am sure the previous poster is the same one who took on St Pat's in a post a month ago on similiar lines and was proven wrong (actually made me question if they really were a Langley parent since they did not really know the league or the school record!). Anyway Norwood and Langley are actually very comprable - just different sides of the river so not quite sure why that poster wants to define everything by something as simple as athletics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where do Norwood kids typically go to high school?

Some public. A large chunk to St. Andrews, Holton, Landon, which are closer to their homes. Some to GDS, which seems to be popular, then some go to Sidwell, Maret, and some Catholic High Schools.

This is incorrect. For the class of 2009, 1 student went to St. Andrews, 1 girl went to Holton and 5 boys to Landon. So hardly a "large chunk." 4 kids went to Sidwell, 3 boys to St. Albans, 5 girls to NCS, 4 kids to GDS, 4 to Maret, 2 to Potomac, 4 boys to Georgetown Prep, 4 boys to Gonzaga, and 1 girl to Visitation.

In light of PP's incorrect information here, I suspect that PP has been providing a lot of incorrect information about Norwood in many recent posts in this thread. So take them with a grain of salt. As to secondary school placement, Norwood provides all this information, in detail, to interested applicant families. The information includes not only matriculation numbers, but also applications/acceptances for each school. The amount of information provided is impressive, and substantively it shows that Norwood kids do extremely well in high school placement.

[Anonymous]

And 2008 is similar to what the PP reports for 2009. I think in 08 Sidwell accepted 10 kids but only one went. The others spread around in fairly equal numbers. I notice that Potomac is the "hot" school for boys - with a number turning down Big 3s to go there. Also, in recent years there is a trend to (a) more of the top students going to public school, sometimes for econ reasons but many for other reasons as well; (b) a few more applications to the magnets (TJ, Blair, IB), and acceptances, though students dont' usually go; (c) lots of boys AND girls going to single sex schools, often w/ religious base (Cathedral schools, Visitation)

So as a parents of a recently graduated child, it was very interesting to see these patterns, especially among some of the top students. From the inside, when I see straight-A Suzie *choose* to go to a catholic or public school, it tells me more than if you are just looking at a placement list.

[Anonymous]

Data on applications and acceptances for the past three years are provided here: http://www.norwoodschool.org/welcome/admission/next_school_placement/index.aspx

[Anonymous]

St. Andrews seems to accept the largest chunk of the Norwood students.

[Anonymous]

Accepts, yes, but if you look further down the page you will see that only 1 student from the class of 2009 chose to attend St Andrews.

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, St. Andrews - a fine school - has become a bit of a safety school for Norwood. But these things are very fluid, and more N-wd students could start going there.

[Anonymous]

Sorry to have spawned a little mini-debate about exmissions. The reason I asked is because from the descriptions in the prior posts I didn't think we would like Norwood families (bitching about chapel, anti-intellectual, etc.) and I wanted to AVOID them if they are concentrated at any particular high schools. Unfortunately it sounds like they are pretty spread out....

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

16:11, if you are making your conclusions about "Norwood families," or the families that comprise the community of any other school, based on posts that you read on DCUM, then you are making a serious mistake.

First, the idea that you can paint with such a broad brush all of the families that attend a school is patently ridiculous. Second, with respect to the "anti-intellectual" comment specifically, I expect that it came from the same misinformed poster who incorrectly suggested that a "large chunk" of the students go on to St. Andrews.

[Anonymous]

16:22, I'd let it go. Someone is working pretty hard to start a fight. Why gratify her (or him)?