Public vs. Private Schools for people living in Montgomery County

[Anonymous]

say you live in Montgomery County, which has an excellent public school system

Montgomery County does not have an excellent school system. Its mediocre at best but getting worse each year. In the past few years it has gone down hill fast. Class sizes exploded a few years ago and 2.0 is the biggest disaster. The new Algebra 2.0 was such a disaster that MCPS inflated all test scores to bring everyone up to last year's failure rate. 32% of middle school kids and 82% of high school kids failed before the grade inflation. Several ES schools in Churchill and Wootton are seeing enrollment declines for the first time in years. It isn't because houses are not being sold to people with kids.

Montgomery County is becoming what NW DC used to be..a residential community with good houses but if you can afford it, you do private.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
i thought the buzz word was diversity

All schools follow the same curriculum. 2nd grade math is 2nd grade math no matter what school you attend in the county. Biology is biology no matter what school. Where things start to change is the demographics....

If the population has a majority of students that need remedial assistance to get them up to par for say 2nd grade math then the teacher will focus their attention and energy to the level. If you child does not need the remedial assistance they will need to sit in class and wait for the rest of the class to learn the material. If you get a great teacher, hopefully, there will be some differentiation. But under 2.0, differentiation is not strongly encouraged anymore and truthfully it makes more work for the teachers. If your child is one of a few that is ahead of the class, they don't have a peer group to encourage higher performance. They might not like to be singled out as the "smart" kid and it might backfire. School demographics also impact the PTA which in turn impacts the extra circular activities that are offered at the school. There is no point in offering latin, yoga, or art history if the majority of the parents in the school district cannot afford the class. If the parents cannot afford the class, the chances that the PTA being able to fund the class from their funds is also slim. In addition, if the school demographics require a stronger focus on basic needs (food, clothing) teachers need to address this issue before they can teach educational material.

But from an educational curriculum standpoint, all the schools are the same.



This is incorrect.

[Anonymous]

Sorry but differentiation is non-existent in 2.0. The math "enrichment" is a joke. Reading is the ONLY area where kids are allowed to work in abilities but high readers end up solely on their own with very little, if any teacher involvement.

MCPS is all about baseline now. K-3 is basically a waiting room for many kids while the rest of the county catches up. Its terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Montgomery County does not have an excellent school system. Its mediocre at best but getting worse each year. In the past few years it has gone down hill fast. Class sizes exploded a few years ago and 2.0 is the biggest disaster. The new Algebra 2.0 was such a disaster that MCPS inflated all test scores to bring everyone up to last year's failure rate. 32% of middle school kids and 82% of high school kids failed before the grade inflation. Several ES schools in Churchill and Wootton are seeing enrollment declines for the first time in years. It isn't because houses are not being sold to people with kids.

Montgomery County is becoming what NW DC used to be..a residential community with good houses but if you can afford it, you do private.

There are valid complaints about MCPS. But these are not the valid complaints. Class sizes have not "exploded". There are people who hate 2.0 (especially on DCUM!), there are people who don't hate 2.0, and there are people who like 2.0. And MCPS is certainly not seeing a decline in enrollment -- maybe in the Churchill cluster (Potomac, more or less), but schools in almost all of the other clusters are at or over capacity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry but differentiation is non-existent in 2.0. The math "enrichment" is a joke. Reading is the ONLY area where kids are allowed to work in abilities but high readers end up solely on their own with very little, if any teacher involvement.

MCPS is all about baseline now. K-3 is basically a waiting room for many kids while the rest of the county catches up. Its terrible.

I'm sorry that things are like that are your child's MCPS school. They are not like that at my child's MCPS school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi everyone,

Please help me understand (since I did not grow up in this country); say you live in Montgomery County, which has an excellent public school system: what would be the advantage of sending your kids to pricey private schools, like e.g. Sidwell Friends.
I am not being cynical, I am trying to think forward; our twins are only 2 years old and we live in NW DC. I grew up in a country with free education, so I am just trying to consider what would be best, including maybe moving to Montgomery County which I know has an excellent (best in the country?) public school system. One of my friends live in Montgomery County, but they send all of their kids to private schools. Is there an advantage for later on when they enter higher education? Thanks!

I live in upper NWDC and my husband and I considered moving to Montgomery County and sending our twins (now 12 year old) to MCPS when they were 8 years old. I remember having a conversation with a friend who told me something I will never forget. She said "I don't know why you are thinking about moving to Montgomery County. You will end up sending your kids to private school anyway." And, we are so glad we did not do it because most of the friends we know who live in Montgomery County send their kids to private school in middle and high school. We love our house in a sought after neighborhood DC and would have regretted the decision to sell and move to the suburbs and still be paying private school tuition. And, the kicker would be that we would not have been able to afford to move back in our DC neighborhood because we bought before the market went crazy and got a good deal. Just food for thought...

[Anonymous]

Some of the hater posts seem to be written by thesame person...but here is my take:

You don't see that many private schools in MoCo for the simple reason that the public system is indeed, on a high level, excellent. If there was a need for privates or charters you would see it look more like DC, where well over 50% of families choose against public. In MoCo something like 90% are public (I think it is on MCPS website but someone else can use google here.)

For some families, obviously the religious aspects is important. For others, in HS, sports are a consideration. And smaller class sizes are important of course also.

FWIW, if you look at Fairfax also (similarly quality school system, and similar size) there also are not a lot of independant schools. And it's because of a lack of demand, not a lack of income among residents.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thanks everyone..hmm, well we have some time to figure this out anyway....our in-boundary school is Stoddert, but Horace Mann is the actual closest one to us, and Janney, Hearst and Eaton are also very close.

[Anonymous]

Horace Mann is the actual closest one to us, and Janney, Hearst and Eaton are also very close.

How is this relevant?

[Anonymous]

OP here, its relevant since at age four, they can start Pre-K and it's by lottery, so they could be admitted to any of these schools.

[Anonymous]

We moved to Montgomery County for the schools and deeply regret it. We are now paying for private and have a longer commute. I never thought we would pay for private but MCPS is not a good school system. Other than the realtors, we haven't met anyone around here who does think its an excellent school system. Parents with younger and older kids say it used to be much different. Who knows, maybe it used to be better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, its relevant since at age four, they can start Pre-K and it's by lottery, so they could be admitted to any of these schools.

In theory, yes, but most of those schools don't even have room for all the PK4 students who live within their own boundaries, so considering them as possibilities OOB is not really realistic.

[Anonymous]

You don't see that many private schools in MoCo for the simple reason that the public system is indeed, on a high level, excellent.

You must be getting Montgomery County confused with Virginia. There are far more privates in Montgomery County than VA and possibly DC. Holton, Bullis, Norwood, Georgetown Prep, Landon and zillion other good but lessor known schools and parochial schools. There may be more in Montgomery County than DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You don't see that many private schools in MoCo for the simple reason that the public system is indeed, on a high level, excellent.

You must be getting Montgomery County confused with Virginia. There are far more privates in Montgomery County than VA and possibly DC. Holton, Bullis, Norwood, Georgetown Prep, Landon and zillion other good but lessor known schools and parochial schools. There may be more in Montgomery County than DC.

And you see lots and lots of people from NW drive to these...they're not going to cross a bridge, drive to Fairfax, and then drive back into the city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, its relevant since at age four, they can start Pre-K and it's by lottery, so they could be admitted to any of these schools.

No, you will never get an out-of-boundary PK spot at any of these other schools. No-one does.
You may not get a PK spot at your own school (Stoddert). I know last year not all the kids did. I'm not sure about the PK class starting this fall.