Handling school resistance to applying out
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Anonymous
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My DD is at school at the school I graduated from and that my family has always been prominent donors at (sorry to say it that way, but it’s contextual, I promise).
She decided with full support from me and my DH to apply out this year. It’s been obvious for a few years that she could get more out of a different kind of school but it’s taken all of us some guts to admit it. Anyway, we were transparent with school about both the fact that we were applying out and the fact that we haven’t made any final choices because we don’t have choices yet. We haven’t said a peep to anyone else save for the teachers who wrote her recs and have no desire to poison the well or spread discontent or anything. Nevertheless, I am getting a constant stream of guilt-tripping and commentary from administrators who shouldn’t even know about the applications. One of them even said “do you realize how bad this looks for our school?”. Another person from development checked in to make sure that the remainder of our pledge for the year was going to process. A 3rd person who I work with as a volunteer has been guilt tripping me and saying that if my DD switches schools and I am not volunteering anymore, x y and z bad things will happen. They’re making me feel like it will be my family’s fault if totally unrelated initiatives don’t come to fruition in the future. I’m trying really hard to be gracious but they are not making it easy. Has anyone experienced this? If we were even vaguely in the fence, this would have definitely pushed us to leave no matter what. Which is what our plan is now anyway. |
Anonymous
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Note the calls from "development." They think of you ss a giant ATM and they are entitled to be sole withdrawer.
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Anonymous
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17:34 continued
Nowhere near so wealthy, but lately I have been getting letters from development VPs at places I have supported wanting to talk about me leaving them a chunk of bucks when I die. Makes me want to find new routes for philanthropy. |
Anonymous
The largest transfer of wealth is history is coming as Boomers begin to die, and Development departments are desperately trying to position themselves to get a piece of it. Every conference has multiple sessions on planned giving, AFP chapters are running more legacy giving workshops and lunch seminars than ever before, etc. it is THE topic right now. Any donor 50+ with the slightest suggestion of philanthropic capacity is a target. Nonprofits want those dollars and right now the job market is paying development professionals with planned giving experience a lot of money as a result. Expect to see larger national and international organizations aggressively push things like charitable gift annuities that lock in money for them. A will can be changed, beneficiaries of retirement accounts can be changed. A CGA or other similar vehicles assure them of future income. |
Anonymous
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I think the school is handling this very poorly.
A discussion about what they could do better both if you stay or for others if you don’t would be warranted. Guilt tripping you isn’t. Second, unless you told development, they shouldn’t know or at least act on the information. I understand that schools tend to be small communities, but they should not say a word unless the pledge when it was promised to come through doesn’t. Third, unless your family has told someone not within the school that got back to the volunteer, the volunteer should not know. The point of all of this is: yes it happened to my family many years ago. I was in the position of your daughter. It was jarring, because I got pulled out of math class and sent to the principal’s office and given the 6th grade equivalent of a KGB interrogation. It took me 15 minutes to realize I didn’t do anything wrong. Maybe they’re treating your daughter the same way? After that, my mother basically said to the administration in succession when they brought it up: “this is our choice.” “I do not feel like discussing this with you.” “If you would like to continue this line of conversation, I’m afraid we’ll have to reconvene at a later date.” If they continue to guilt trip you, then thank them for their time and leave/hang up. To development, I would keep it brief, informative, and friendly, “has the check not come on time?” Or “Did the check clear?” They should say “no” and when they do, tell them “let me know when it doesn’t” and hang up. If they bring up next year, then say “All options are open to me. I will let you know when I have made our financial decisions around charitable giving. I would appreciate my privacy until then.” To the volunteer, just smile and say nothing. If the volunteer insists on a response, “the school was here before me and it’ll be here after me.” |
Anonymous
| Wow, the school showed its true colors. This would make me feel very confident about the decision to transfer out. |
Anonymous
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Do you know the content of the teacher letters that were sent to other privates? Have the schools to which your DD is applying received the most recent transcript yet?
Tred lightly until at least the transcript is received and your daughter has received a formal acceptance. Also get a copy of her transcript yourself right away. Do not take no for an answer. That way, they can’t trap you. They will try any way they can. |
Anonymous
| We’re kind of in the same situation. Our current school has been non-responsive in getting our son’s transcripts. |
Anonymous
| Play nice until you’ve made a deposit at the next school. Don’t burn bridges. |
Anonymous
This. Even though the school is behaving poorly, better to get a definite plan together before letting them know their behavior is inappropriate. I'd stay cheery and heavy on the 'have to do what's best for DD' until you are sure where you are going and deposit has been made. Then on your way out a quick 'FYI, this was discouraging and disappointing to feel so unsupported by the administration and the school when we feel that we have been strong members of the community for so long.' Then ghost them for $. |
Anonymous
| We dealt with this when we applied out of public, the principal was vocally against it and refused to mark any school visits, interviews, etc as excused absences. The school was just short of sabotage and I had finally put my politeness away when they started missing deadlines and hound the admin and faculty to submit recommendation letters and transcripts. Thankfully the schools we were applying to were understanding and helped as well. |
Anonymous
[twitter]
OP and they have not sent the transcript to one school! How did you know? They claimed that they usually do it electronically via Ravenna and aren’t used to the [perfectly standard form that’s an exact copy of what’s in the electronic submission via Ravenna] method used by one particular school. I chased down various other administrators who all keep referring me back to the woman who claims there’s no way to do this. Fortunately the teachers who write the recs are excellent people and sent them early in the fall and gave me copies of what they sent. One of them offered to meet with us and then without prompting privately shared her thoughts about good target schools (which overlapped with our choices). |
Anonymous
How did the schools you were applying to help out? |
Anonymous
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18:18, thank you for sharing your experience. That was quite the read and there’s a lot of overlap with our experience. DD has not yet been pulled aside for a meeting, thank goodness. That’s messed up and I cannot imagine the adult who thought that was appropriate.
Thank you to everyone else for your solid advice and commiseration. It’s obvious there is zero confidentiality at school so we need to avoid them and lie low lest a random comment get twisted and passed along. We are keeping our mouths shut until decision time, trying to avoid interactions beyond what’s necessary to get a child through the school week, and hoping that some great (any?) will be available for DD. What petty, insular, self-involved places private schools can be! I have many regrets. |
Anonymous
As a private school teacher this whole scenario sounds completely bonkers to me. |