Families who can afford private but go public, why?

[Anonymous]

I believe in public education. I want to support the societal mission of public education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
And privates have inflated numbers because they just kick out underachievers. It's not as if they're actually educating kids any better, they're just discarding them or not letting them in. You clearly aren't very bright. Did you go to a private school?

They are actually educating better because they don’t have class disruptions and don’t have to spend time to discipline students.

There are special private schools just for kids with learning disabilities.

If a kid falls behind private school do work individually with students to help them catch up, there are a lot more resources for individual approach. My DC’s French teacher sends me an email that my child is acting very tired in class. In public school I’m not sure they even noticed she was in the class. When DC missed a few days due to sickness the academic advisor at private school together with teachers worked with her to help her catch up on material. I feel they’re vested in her success.

There was nothing like this in public school. The attitude was “you are doing OK? Good.
I don’t have to spend any attention on you.”

THIS x 1000. Our experience exactly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:, but give me a break. Either you're intentionally creating a false dichotomy or you're not very bright.

Public schools, regardless of their neighborhood, are required to educate every student. Some of us - even those who went to fancy privates, like I did - don't want an environment where a bunch of snooty holier-than-thou elitists pick and choose which families may sit at their table. Elitism is ugly.

Well, when a public school actually does what it’s required to do, call me at my elitist bubble. Because they are not doing what their required to do if they have less than 90% kids achieve grade level in reading, math and science. And how many schools do you know that have 90% kids test on grade level?

I can’t blame the schools for this either. Because you can’t fix the culture or family failures.

Average FCPS pass rates across all the schools, across subjects are at around 85% (varies year to year and by subject, so maybe 81-86% is a more accurate representation). So there are quite a few that are at 90+. And given that public schools have to accept everyone that comes their way, and FCPS has a significant population of ELL and FARMS that's more of an achievement than at a private that can more carefully cull who they want to include.

That's a point of pride for fcps but irrelevant to an English speaking family with money to spare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because I went to public school and an ok (not stellar) college and a top 20 (but not top 10) law school and work with and supervise people who went to privates, boarding schools, and Ivy League colleges. I make the same if not more than they do. Why waste my money for similar outcomes. My kids are smarter than I am. They'll be fine.

It’s not always the destination, some parents are able to choose the best possible journey.

[Anonymous]

We could just squeak by into private school (eg, sacrifice to make the $80,000/year on tuition) but I’m not sure I want our kids to be among the least well off. I wonder how that’d work for their social lives if we are not able to do the vacations that we could do with public school. If anyone has insight please share

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because I went to public school and an ok (not stellar) college and a top 20 (but not top 10) law school and work with and supervise people who went to privates, boarding schools, and Ivy League colleges. I make the same if not more than they do. Why waste my money for similar outcomes. My kids are smarter than I am. They'll be fine.

It’s not always the destination, some parents are able to choose the best possible journey.

Oh, please. The journey is what you make it.

[Anonymous]

Both of my kids went to public school. The public’s offer so many more opportunities for personal growth, so many more classes on a much wider variety of subjects, exposure to a wider variety of kids to find your social niche, more ap classes, betterSTEM education, and encourage kids to self advocate. We started both kids at private but switched to public when it became clear that private could not meet the intellectual needs of my DS who is highly gifted in math. He ended up at Blair magnet. I switched my second child to public as well to have one school calendar. Both kids took advantage of what the public schools offer and both landed in top twenty schools. No regrets. If I had left them in private, neither would have reached their potential because the opportunities don’t compare.

[Anonymous]

Had friends who have gone to private and switched back.

This is their opinions of their religious private school, compared to their FCPS home school:

-The private school teaches with the kids facing the white board. There is less innovation-- kids are taught in a really traditional manner and there are expectations of a certain type of behavior.
-It's VERY sheltered. And there were some rather sexist statements made to girls to sort of put them in their place that was alarming.
-ADD kids do not survive in the school that they were at. You either behaved a certain way, or you were punished-- in view of all of your peers. There was shaming done that was a red flag for them.
-Pros: textbooks. Cons: they didn't use them.

I'm sure there are great private schools. But in FCPS: it doesn't seem worth it.

[Anonymous]

I can, without too much pinching, afford to send one child to private school.

Unfortunately, I have rather more than one child. So some of the future tuition gets spent on enrichment and tutoring to make up for FCPS' gaps and the rest is banked for whichever child's needs can no longer be papered over.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Both of my kids went to public school. The public’s offer so many more opportunities for personal growth, so many more classes on a much wider variety of subjects, exposure to a wider variety of kids to find your social niche, more ap classes, betterSTEM education, and encourage kids to self advocate. We started both kids at private but switched to public when it became clear that private could not meet the intellectual needs of my DS who is highly gifted in math. He ended up at Blair magnet. I switched my second child to public as well to have one school calendar. Both kids took advantage of what the public schools offer and both landed in top twenty schools. No regrets. If I had left them in private, neither would have reached their potential because the opportunities don’t compare.

I’d love to know what private you left.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Had friends who have gone to private and switched back.

This is their opinions of their religious private school, compared to their FCPS home school:

-The private school teaches with the kids facing the white board. There is less innovation-- kids are taught in a really traditional manner and there are expectations of a certain type of behavior.
-It's VERY sheltered. And there were some rather sexist statements made to girls to sort of put them in their place that was alarming.
-ADD kids do not survive in the school that they were at. You either behaved a certain way, or you were punished-- in view of all of your peers. There was shaming done that was a red flag for them.
-Pros: textbooks. Cons: they didn't use them.

I'm sure there are great private schools. But in FCPS: it doesn't seem worth it.

I assumed we were discussing elite private schools like Sidwell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Had friends who have gone to private and switched back.

This is their opinions of their religious private school, compared to their FCPS home school:

-The private school teaches with the kids facing the white board. There is less innovation-- kids are taught in a really traditional manner and there are expectations of a certain type of behavior.
-It's VERY sheltered. And there were some rather sexist statements made to girls to sort of put them in their place that was alarming.
-ADD kids do not survive in the school that they were at. You either behaved a certain way, or you were punished-- in view of all of your peers. There was shaming done that was a red flag for them.
-Pros: textbooks. Cons: they didn't use them.

I'm sure there are great private schools. But in FCPS: it doesn't seem worth it.

I assumed we were discussing elite private schools like Sidwell.

Why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep, if you have the money, why send a kid to McLean if you can buy in the Langley district or afford Potomac, Gonzaga, or some other private that doesn’t cram kids into trailers with 30 kids? FCPS only cares about the extremes - TJ or Title 1. No one else matters.

We live in the Mclean HS area and could easily afford private school but have chosen public instead. Why? Because 1) I went to private from K to 12 and I don’t think I was better prepared for college compared to students from public school. 2) I value diversity and don’t like the idea of sending my kids to a school where many kids are entitled and sheltered from reality.

I love irony.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The good news is that your child will likely be okay either way, and you can switch along the way if that changes.

For us but you need to understand it's just one data point: We had the same thought for elementary and public middle, but switched to private for high school in part because of how little our child was learning as far as writing and English. So, we made both choices, I suppose.

One of the things I don't see talked about on DCUM much is the writing component of STEM in private at the HS level. My son did well in math at private but struggled with science at first because of the rigorous writing and analysis component of the lab classes in private. My DH and I, who work in STEM, differentiate between science versus math in our comparison. Another factor to consider for us: the local public high school had a greater variety of STEM classes.

Despite what DCUM says, this all varies by specific schools and specific child. I would beware of anyone who says across the board that one is better than the other for your own child. There are plenty of bright STEM kids doing very well in private and plenty of good writers in public. For my kid, the huge class sizes for writing and lack of teacher interaction wasn't working for him for analysis and writing. He was floating along, doing "fine," but not what I would call "fine." But there are plenty of kids who are genuinely "fine" with public writing classes.

The other thing to consider is that admissions at private HS from public can be very difficult, again depending on the child. There were several bright, terrific kids in DS's public 8th grade that didn't get into any private schools. DS was lucky (and there is an element of luck in admissions).

Socially the kids were great at both schools. It was great to have neighborhood friends in public, and it was great to befriend kids from all over in private. I don't buy all these wildly dramatic posters who castigate private or public kids as a group, depending on their bias. That's just a bunch of hyperbolic nonsense.

Good luck. Don't question yourself so much. It will be okay. If your child is thriving, I would stay the course. Just make sure to trust your gut if the school tells you he or she is "fine" but you don't think so.

This, 100%!

I'm the 15:14 poster, but I also agree with this. By middle school, we were hearing a lot of, "They're FINE!" but we saw lots of signs that they were not. And writing instruction was non-existent in public.

+100
My kids are straight A MS students in HS credit courses and I’ve never seen them study. They do very little writing and don’t get me started on the iPads the schools put in their hands beginning in 2nd grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I believe in public education. I want to support the societal mission of public education.

Michael Moore said on the topic of why his kids go to private school: “I won’t allow my kids be a social experiment.”