SAES vs. Field for my ADHD Kid

[Anonymous]

Hi all- we visited St. Andrews and Field for my rising 9th grader and were impressed with both. DD is sweet, social, but probably a little immature and has very real executive functioning challenges. No learning differences, but when you forget to submit things, forget to study, and have horrible organization skills it's really tough to succeed. She doesn't want an alternative vibe, so just trying to figure out which of the two can support her needs and ensure that she also thrives socially if we are fortunate to have a choice between them.

Thanks for any advice!

[Anonymous]

I'm more familiar with Field than St. Andrews, but I don't think either school will offer enough support to someone who routinely forgets to do work or study. You will likely need to hire outside support.

They have very different feels -- your daughter should do a shadow day at both.

[Anonymous]

Field likes to have it both ways : loads of kids with exec functioning issues and nothing particularly innovative or helpful on that front with exception of lax policies for allowing kids to submit work multiple times. And very alternative vibe. Which you say you aren’t so interested in. Recommend St John’s. Special program for kids that need support and more sophisticated in its approach with a traditional atmosphere.

[Anonymous]

My ADHD kid graduated from SAES, and I confirm, you won’t get individualized help with executive functioning. Very happy with the education my kid got, but I don’t want you to be misled.

[Anonymous]

OMG, go to McLean. Did wonders for our ADHD kid, and there’s no alternative vibe, whatever that means. Plenty of opportunities in sports, music, and theater.

[Anonymous]

Once again: SAES is not a good fit for kids with ADHD or any kind of learning differences. People need to stop thinking this is true. SAES is a good school but it isn’t one that will work for kids with learning differences. They stopped doing that half a decade ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Once again: SAES is not a good fit for kids with ADHD or any kind of learning differences. People need to stop thinking this is true. SAES is a good school but it isn’t one that will work for kids with learning differences. They stopped doing that half a decade ago.

You can just say 5 years. It’s faster.

[Anonymous]

Agree - don’t go to SAES if your child needs those types of accommodations. We’ve had three kids in the upper school and one with accommodations. They are not equipped to handle learning differences.

[Anonymous]

Bullis is the place that has more options for support.

[Anonymous]

SAES also isn’t a kind environment. Our very kind ADHD DD struggles there socially because the kids aren’t nice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SAES also isn’t a kind environment. Our very kind ADHD DD struggles there socially because the kids aren’t nice.

Which grade?

[Anonymous]

I have a child at Field with mild ADHD and a child NOT at Field with more severe ADHD (they are thriving in public). IMO, You can't expect a school to solve this issue for you. If your kid is on meds, has an executive functioning coach who they have learned "tools" from, they should be fine in most environments. For my student at Field, when assignments are missing, the teacher emails the student, advisor and parent in many cases. Its not like public school where they can fall through the cracks. That being said, after that one email, its up to the student to follow through.

[Anonymous]

See

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SAES also isn’t a kind environment. Our very kind ADHD DD struggles there socially because the kids aren’t nice.

Which grade?

High school. I don't want to be more specific because the grades are relatively small.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SAES also isn’t a kind environment. Our very kind ADHD DD struggles there socially because the kids aren’t nice.

The current senior class especially has some unpleasant students.