In laws offered to pay for private. Crazy to turn them down?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My in-laws are willing (and easily able) to pay for private for our kids. They made the same offer to all school-aged grandchildren and our SIL/BIL took them up on it. But I think we want to turn them down. Our first is in 3rd grade in a Whitman cluster elementary and our second is still in preschool. We like our current school, our future schools, and DCs little group of friends. Both DH and I went to public high schools. Kids don't seem to have any special learning or social needs that would make private an obvious advantage. I know privates are "better", but we are happy where we are. Thanks in part to both sets of grandparents and our personal contributions, 529s have enough money in them to cover four year private college plus grad school so we don't need to direct the offer to other types of educational assistance. Is it short sighted to say thanks but no thanks to the private school offer?

Don’t ever go to an open house for a private school. You can unsee it. IYKYK.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Offer is likely still there if we change our mind later, barring of course something horrible like them passing away. They want to decrease their taxable estate so would be happy if we took them up on this at any point, I am guessing. I can ask about camp, good idea!

Can also encourage them to add to the college fund, but they have already done that and not sure we need anymore. 9 year old already has over 300k in the account and with interest and the annual contributions DH and I put in, I am guessing we won't need anymore.

OP if you think there’s a chance the offer wouldn’t be on the table in the future (due to death, as you say, or maybe if one of your in-laws passes away and the other remarries), you might want to consider whether you would be able to continue paying for private school if their contribution were no longer available.

[Anonymous]

elementary school is great to stay public but many kids do start going to different schools in 5th/6th/ 7th grade. You've basically missed the application window for next year at this point so maybe just tell them thank you and we will reassess in the fall, at least for the older one?

[Anonymous]

or maybe another approach is that you do some tours and identify your top 1-3 dream schools. have your child apply there and if they don't get in then just stay public.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:elementary school is great to stay public but many kids do start going to different schools in 5th/6th/ 7th grade. You've basically missed the application window for next year at this point so maybe just tell them thank you and we will reassess in the fall, at least for the older one?

We have had a mostly good elementary school experience in a less “desirable” cluster than you and I would do it again. Local friends who can walk to your house are gold and my kids are doing very well academically. But I’m on this forum because I am a lot less excited about our public middle school. At this point if someone offered to pay for private middle school I would probably really look into it. I would have a frank talk about could you reassess at MS or something to keep the options open.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My in-laws are willing (and easily able) to pay for private for our kids. They made the same offer to all school-aged grandchildren and our SIL/BIL took them up on it. But I think we want to turn them down. Our first is in 3rd grade in a Whitman cluster elementary and our second is still in preschool. We like our current school, our future schools, and DCs little group of friends. Both DH and I went to public high schools. Kids don't seem to have any special learning or social needs that would make private an obvious advantage. I know privates are "better", but we are happy where we are. Thanks in part to both sets of grandparents and our personal contributions, 529s have enough money in them to cover four year private college plus grad school so we don't need to direct the offer to other types of educational assistance. Is it short sighted to say thanks but no thanks to the private school offer?

Don’t ever go to an open house for a private school. You can unsee it. IYKYK.

I'm not sure what you mean but we thought our public school was good until we went to a few selective private school open houses and now we are spending almost 6 figures per year for our 2 kids in middle school. The differences are stark and hard to un see.

[Anonymous]

You spend a lot of money to live in an affluent school district, right? So that problem has been solved and you don’t need private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You spend a lot of money to live in an affluent school district, right? So that problem has been solved and you don’t need private school.

That's just not at all true. Walk through Whitman high school for a while and then walk through a top private school, not the same thing.

[Anonymous]

OP, I did a mix of public and private as a kid and my kids went to MCPS all the way through.

I really wish we'd had the money to do private for HS. I hated watching my kids go through MCPS high school. My private was SO much better.

Tell them for now you are happy in your local elementary, but you may re-assess and go private in a couple years. Ask if it would work for them to pay for enrichment like a good summer camp, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:elementary school is great to stay public but many kids do start going to different schools in 5th/6th/ 7th grade. You've basically missed the application window for next year at this point so maybe just tell them thank you and we will reassess in the fall, at least for the older one?

Not true. Even top schools open up late applications but you need to be full pay, which OP would be

[Anonymous]

I would take this time to start learning about all of the schools that might interest you, go to some open houses in the spring and try to talk to actual current parents rather than anonymous message boards. If you find something that is a good fit for your family go for it, if not you're fine where you are.

I am perfectly fine driving my old Ford but if someone offered to buy me any car out there I would go for some test drives.

[Anonymous]

We have done both public and private- I will say private can give your kids experiences and activities that most publics cannot. This is a fact in our situation. Also, you can be and are encouraged to be involved in your child’s education and when they reach high school, the school works hard to develop that executive functioning and develop kids to be able to accomplish things outside of parent’s assistance. It is not totally full of rich, snobby kids talking about their money- there is a level of that - but we had that in our affluent public school too. I feel there was a higher level of dedicated attention given to my child in private school that could not be achieved in our public school system. We are middle class and receive aid and have sacrificed for our child to attend private school (college is funded) and I still feel it was the right choice. Especially during COVID when they remained in person after the mandatory shut down. If grandparents had paid, it would have made that much more of a difference.

[Anonymous]

OP, just because you and DH say no doesn't mean, perhaps, DH could ask them to revisit their offer in some future year.

[Anonymous]

I went to Whitman feeders and then private in the 80’s and 90’s. Back then, the difference was clear and it is even more so now. We started our oldest in public (planned to move to private later) and switched after a year. Then we were in person during covid when everyone else was online. The class size alone makes the difference for me. When I was in MS, I don’t think any teachers really knew who I was. Every teacher who has my kids knows them and many teachers know them even if they don’t teach them. It creates a great sense of community as well as accountability.

Just visit schools and see!

[Anonymous]

If you and DH both went to public, and you have no private school experience, you don't necessary know what you are missing. Do you volunteer at the public school and keep abreast of curriculum updates and classroom happenings? I didn't switch to private until I became really involved in our "excellent public" and saw how the sausage is made.

That said, I've also toured some private schools that were no better than the publics. Private doesn't always mean better. But you should try to make an informed choice.