Any Parents Privately Disappointed with College Placement?

[Anonymous]

I was talking to a parent this morning regarding the choice between sending their kid to Fairfax County Public School in McLean for elementary or applying to a private school in Northern Virginia and/or DC. Their DD attended Country Day until Kindergarten and the parent stated that they opted for FCPS elementary since there is no difference in college placement if their child attended Langley High school versus attending Potomac or other private schools and that they know parents who sent their kids to private schools and were disappointed with the college placement. Do you find this to be true? Would you be disappointed if your child did not go to a Top 25 liberal arts college or university after spending $$$$$$ on private school education?

[Anonymous]

My kid wouldn't make it into a top school regardless of whether she was in private or public. She's a great kid but she's only a fair-to-middling student. She shifted from public to private because the private school is what she needed at that point in time. She is a better, more committed student because there is an incentive to do well at her private school. That's why we're spending the money on private school, not college placement.

I'm not worried about the fact that she won't go to a top 25 university. I've known lots of successful people who did not go to top schools. I'm more concerned she attend a school that fits her.

Best to think about what suits your kid at that particular time and not worry about college. People with toddlers will be surprised at how their best laid plans have a way of going haywire when it comes to what children end up doing/being as they grow older.

[Anonymous]

13:37 is right (about everything -- well, in that post, at least!)

[Anonymous]

I couldn't agree with 13:37 more. My goal for my kids was to send them to a school where they would learn how to *learn,* to learn how to study; to think critically and to be exposed to great teaching in a stimulating environment. From the list of college acceptances at our school, I assume my kids will do just fine. I think there's a better shot of getting into a very good school from private when you're not necessarily at the top of your class then if you're in the middle at a big public. I could care less about the Ivy League - there are so many first-rate colleges and universities in this country and great grad schools also. In addition, I assume that my kids will be very well prepared for college as a result of their education in high school, unlike their dear old mom.

[Anonymous]

OP -- there is a college forum for your angst...go there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I couldn't agree with 13:37 more. My goal for my kids was to send them to a school where they would learn how to *learn,* to learn how to study; to think critically and to be exposed to great teaching in a stimulating environment. From the list of college acceptances at our school, I assume my kids will do just fine. I think there's a better shot of getting into a very good school from private when you're not necessarily at the top of your class then if you're in the middle at a big public. I could care less about the Ivy League - there are so many first-rate colleges and universities in this country and great grad schools also. In addition, I assume that my kids will be very well prepared for college as a result of their education in high school, unlike their dear old mom.

But a kid who is in the middle of his class at an academically competitive private perhaps would have been at the top of the class at a public.

[Anonymous]

OP you bring up a valid point though you'd be hard pressed to find people to open up and admit it.

Private schools, especially those like Flint Hill that seem to accommodate children with minor learning issues, are not merely for those who scored in the top 5% of testing. Privates are often times used by those parents who believe they will provide extra attention, extra nurturing, or extra sensitivity to their child's needs. For example I know of a parent who put her child at a private simply to accommodate his extreme sensitivity to loud noises. Public schools would never have done that. I know of many parents who brought their children to privates because their children had dyslexia or add or some kind of LD.

Potomac isn't generally known to accommodate children with these or any kind of learning issues, however. But I was told by one Ivy league graduate who went to Potomac that one third of her grad class went to Univ of Va. Univ of Va is a good school but not in the league of Duke, Yale, Georgetown, etc.. and it's reasonable to expect the kids from Potomac would have fared better.

I spoke to a few parents at another private, however, who said they'd be thrilled if their child went to Univ of Va though. So it all depends on the private.

[Anonymous]

I don't see how anyone could reasonably conclude from what OP's acquaintance said that "there is no differerence in college placement" between a child's having attended a public school and the same child's having attended a private school. It simply is not possible to be certain about a counterfactual like that. If only a parent could know that!

[Anonymous]

In the last US News rankings, Georgetown ranked #23 and UVa ranked #24.

[Anonymous]

Regarding the US News rankings: "A New York Times article reported that, given the U.S. News weighting methodology, "it's easy to guess who's going to end up on top: Harvard, Yale and Princeton round out the first three essentially every year. In fact, when asked how he knew his system was sound, Mel Elfin, the rankings' founder, often answered that he knew it because those three schools always landed on top. "

I know US News rankings is popular, but do you know how they come to their conclusions?

[Anonymous]

I was at the top of my high school class, in a good high school. I was woefully underprepared for the academic and intellectual rigors of top-5 college, and it was only through some combo of luck and willpower that I didn't fail out my first year. By my junior year in college, once I figured out how to be a student -- self-teaching the study habits I never had to learn in high school -- I was getting straight As. Getting into a good college is only half, or maybe less than half, of the battle.

[Anonymous]

13:37, you are way too sane to be a DCUM. If I didn't agree with you totally, I'd ask Jeff to banish you.

To the PP who posits that a student ranked in the middle of his class at a private school might have ranked higher at a public -- maybe, but that doesn't mean he would have been a stronger student. While this might affect college admissions, if you're more concerned with how your child does in college than where he goes to college, you might prefer the latter outcome. Our children's school doesn't rank students, but I'd guess that my kids would have higher grades at our local public. That's fine with us -- they've learned to think, to write and to question respectfully. And, BTW, our oldest, who just graduated is going to an Ivy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But a kid who is in the middle of his class at an academically competitive private perhaps would have been at the top of the class at a public.

Not at McLean. Basically, that's only true at a public high school that is problematic for one reason or another (and/or if you have a really broad definition of top -- e.g. top 1/3). It's highly unlikely to be true of high-performing suburban high schools serving the same demographics as privates.

So the question become whether a kid who's literally in the middle of his/her private school class would do better in college admissions than if s/he'd been in the top third of his/her public school class? If the private has a good reputation (among college admissions officers -- not your neighbors), then the answer is probably no. Basically, better college counseling and better preparation (which inspires more confidence in admissions officers and which increase the odds your kid will do reasonably well once admitted) give the edge to a good private in this scenario.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't see how anyone could reasonably conclude from what OP's acquaintance said that "there is no differerence in college placement" between a child's having attended a public school and the same child's having attended a private school. It simply is not possible to be certain about a counterfactual like that. If only a parent could know that!

It's counterfactual for the parent too -- unless there's a time machine involved. The kid either went to public or to private or to some combination of both and in any of those scenario's the parent is guessing what would have happened in some alternative scenario.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I couldn't agree with 13:37 more. My goal for my kids was to send them to a school where they would learn how to *learn,* to learn how to study; to think critically and to be exposed to great teaching in a stimulating environment. From the list of college acceptances at our school, I assume my kids will do just fine. I think there's a better shot of getting into a very good school from private when you're not necessarily at the top of your class then if you're in the middle at a big public. I could care less about the Ivy League - there are so many first-rate colleges and universities in this country and great grad schools also. In addition, I assume that my kids will be very well prepared for college as a result of their education in high school, unlike their dear old mom.

But a kid who is in the middle of his class at an academically competitive private perhaps would have been at the top of the class at a public.

That's an ignorant statement.