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I'm tired of hearing people saying that they "sacrifice" to send their kids to private school.
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Anonymous
Love your post!
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Anonymous
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The privilege on this thread is nauseating. OP is nauseating. No, of course it's not a "sacrifice" to give up our annual European vacation for our family of 5, but it hurts!! I let go my cleaning service, we drive old cars, but our kids go to great schools.
It's not a sacrifice. It is a choice about how to spend our money. We'd LOVE to send our kids to public, but our very well regarded schools do not work for our kids. They do far, far better since we moved them to private. We feel a little resentful that we're so raggedy-looking and live in a dump compared with other private school families, but these are choices we've made, not sacrifices. |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
Sacrifice is working two jobs to put food on the table. (Believe me when I say I've seen my fair share of this first hand.) So no one on this thread is truly "sacrificing." I also don't understand how public schools "don't work" for your kids. Enlighten me, as I am truly curious. |
Anonymous
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"I also don't understand how public schools "don't work" for your kids. Enlighten me, as I am truly curious."
I am genuinely amazed if you are really being honest (as opposed to disingenously just pretending to be honest). Are you actually, seriously, with a straight face, saying you are incapable of understanding how public schools might not work for some kids? Huh. Well, I'll bite, even though I don't actually think you are as obtuse as your question would suggest. I can think of dozens of reasons why public might not work for some people, but I'll limit myself to the situations of real, actual people that I know. Maybe: --The child is very shy and does not do well in a large class. --The child is off-the-charts intelligent and isn't being properly educated in public. (As an aside, amazing how everyone agrees on the moral imperative to give an appropriate education to those below the curve, but many people still seem to think highly intelligent children somehow don't deserve an appropriate education.) --The child is being bullied and the public school won't put an end to it. --The child needs (truly needs, not just wants) a lot of physical activity and the public school has one twenty-minute recess period a day, which is frequently taken away if even one child in the class misbehaves. The above is a tiny, off-the-top-of-my-head sampling. Do you get it now? |
Anonymous
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My kids go to public school because I believe in this country and refuse to see the public school system as simply dumping grounds for the disenfranchised.
By the way, my kids do just fine. |
Anonymous
| Sacrifice means doing without. It's relative. I am sacrificing. I don't have to explain to anyone how. But I'm definitely doing without so my child can attend private school. |
Anonymous
Careful, one of the entitled parents here will tell you that you shouldn't be in the private school forum. |
Anonymous
No, it's not. If it means giving up a vacation versus taking on another job to buy clothes for your children, your idea of "sacrifice" is laughable. Do tell, PP - What EXACTLY are you sacrificing? |
Anonymous
I'm noy the PP you are addressing, but I must say that I do not care whether you laugh at my use of the word "sacrifice" as applied to giving up material goods to save for private school. No one needs to tell you "EXACTLY" what she is sacrificing in order to be qualified to call what she is forgoing a sacrifice. It is a subjective term. What's sacrifice for one is not sacrifice for another. |
Anonymous
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7:32 I am the PP. I am not going to tell you what I am sacrificing. What I am going to tell you is to consult a dictionary and get off your high horse. And guess what: I don't discuss this with anyone except myself. I've cut back seriously so my child can attend private school without FA (for which we are eligible).
Please look at the second definition. That's how I'm using the word. I'm a professional editor and writer. If I were editing you, I'd say, sorry, this usage is acceptable, you've got some crazily distorted notion of this word. sac·ri·fice (skr-fs) n. 1. a. The act of offering something to a deity in propitiation or homage, especially the ritual slaughter of an animal or a person. b. A victim offered in this way. 2. a. Forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of one considered to have a greater value or claim. b. Something so forfeited. 3. a. Relinquishment of something at less than its presumed value. b. Something so relinquished. |
Anonymous
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I dunno, the second definition seems fairly relativistic to me.
I'm a professional social scientist and I'd say that the word is being used not incorrectly, but in a way that suggests its users comes from a position of relative privilege in this society. If I were an economist, I'd think we're all just talking about preference curves. Sacrifice, as defined in entry #2 is a rational form of optimization, especially in the absence of distributional issues (e.g. if the same economic unit suffers both the loss and the gain). |
Anonymous
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I'm sacrificing having a fourth child because we are tapped out at sending three to private and I think it would be weird to just send one to public given the current make-up of the family.
This is one of the more judemental threads i've read in a while on DCUM and just really makes me shrug. It reminds me of my mother who was great for us growing up. She always said that you should never judge the way that other people live because you can never tell how much money they have. Some people chose to spend it all and have no savings and all you see is the stuff and some people chose to live more modestly but have more money. (She also taught me that there's always someone with more, so not to spend time comparing, but that might be for a different thread.) It always helped me not compete with other people around me whether friends as a child or peers now and it enabled me to feel confident with my own decisions and have friends from a very wide range of economic backgrounds without judging any of it or giving me feelings of insecurity or superiority. Every financial decision that you make can be considered a sacrifice from chosing to budget in a $5 coffee instead of making it at home to a $32K/year private. Can we be a little less judgemental of it all? |
Anonymous
For having the means to send your child to private school, you're definitely snippy, aren't you? Do I get it now? I've always "gotten it." So you've offered 4 reasons why public schools fail kids. - being shy and therefore not being able to function in a large class: Most ps teachers implement strategies that encourage the shy students to speak up (participate). There are talking sticks, for example, and red/yellow/green cards to indicate level of understanding. Teachers use consensograms to pre-assess. Differentiated instruction seamlessly incorporates group work where each student is assigned a role to encourage active participation and to emphasize the importance of individual effort. Furthermore, "crowds" are a part of life. To shelter your child from the masses is to do your child a disservice. - "Off-the-Charts" Intelligent: I do love this line, as it highlights your elitist attitude nicely: "As an aside, amazing how everyone agrees on the moral imperative to give an appropriate education to those below the curve, but many people still seem to think highly intelligent children somehow don't deserve an appropriate education." Alas! The Intelligentsia are ignored, eh? I've already discussed some of the basics of differentiation. There are programs - once considered only for the "elite" (a term with which you are familiar) - that ALL students can participate in. Do your research, PP. Look up PYP and MYP (elementary and middle) and IB and AP (high). Furthermore, the emphasis across the board is on critical thinking, which starts in K and continues through grade 12. Students can master critical thinking skills in ALL classes, regardless of level. - bullying: Bullies are bullied by their parents, who were also bullied by their own parents. So it's an endless cycle. And it's everywhere - across all socioeconomic and ethnic lines. Are you telling me that some of those entitled students enrolled in private schools don't bully through intimidation? They don't "bully" through exclusion? And from whom do they learn THAT behavior? parents . . . PS schools DO handle bullying through programs, such as peer mediation, and administrative efforts that involve parents. But the MOST effective measure comes from the parent. Build self-esteem in your child. I teach my children to stand up for anyone who's being picked on and to fight for what they believe is right. So parents who ignore insecurity in their children enable that behavior b/c they don't offer their children the means to move forward. - physical activity: This one makes me laugh. When your child returns home, what does s/he do? sit on the couch playing with electronic games? I suppose you're relying on the school to meet all of his/her physical needs, too? YOU'RE the role model. Invest in a treadmill and some free weights. Take a walk on those warm spring days after school. If you talk the talk, walk the walk (literally WALK the walk). And do your homework b/c your "tiny, off-the-top-of-my-head sampling" lacks evidence to support your claims. |
Anonymous
| I'm guessing 9:05 was bullied by her parents... |