Private schools are indefensible

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is predictively tiresome to see Caitlin "I'm going to write articles trashing WOHMs for employing nannies while I am a full-time SAHM employing a full-time nanny" Flanagan writing breathy, exaggerated articles about how people other than her are hypocrites.

You can shoot the messenger all you want but the message is still true.

No. The message isn't true because the messenger is very problematic. I flat-out don't believe anything she writes. Her deeply problematic history is too long at this point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school parents should feel uncomfortable about the two tiers of education we are supporting. It is intellectually dishonest to act like we are trying to do anything but give our kids a leg up on the backs of others. Some people shrug and say so what - that’s life and I think that is at least reasonably honest. But to act morally superior because you decided to send your kids to GDS over a more conservative private school is reprehensible. Democrats are in many ways no different than Republicans. Everyone on top wants to preserve the status quo and why wouldn’t they. All she is doing is throwing the curtains open and I think these are uncomfortable truths we all need to face.

How is it more honest to move out to a pricey suburb with high-quality schools? Please explain.

Whataboutism at its finest.

DP. It's a valid question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

DP. Here’s some of the research. No show yours proving it “is a lie.”

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/parenting-and-culture/202008/parents-involvement-in-children-s-education

https://www.responsiveclassroom.org/what-research-says-about-parent-involvement/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school parents should feel uncomfortable about the two tiers of education we are supporting. It is intellectually dishonest to act like we are trying to do anything but give our kids a leg up on the backs of others. Some people shrug and say so what - that’s life and I think that is at least reasonably honest. But to act morally superior because you decided to send your kids to GDS over a more conservative private school is reprehensible. Democrats are in many ways no different than Republicans. Everyone on top wants to preserve the status quo and why wouldn’t they. All she is doing is throwing the curtains open and I think these are uncomfortable truths we all need to face.

How is it more honest to move out to a pricey suburb with high-quality schools? Please explain.

Whataboutism at its finest.

DP. It's a valid question.

OMG this is so ridiculous. Where do you think private school parents live, downtown Silver Spring? They live in the fancy neighborhoods, also.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school parents should feel uncomfortable about the two tiers of education we are supporting. It is intellectually dishonest to act like we are trying to do anything but give our kids a leg up on the backs of others. Some people shrug and say so what - that’s life and I think that is at least reasonably honest. But to act morally superior because you decided to send your kids to GDS over a more conservative private school is reprehensible. Democrats are in many ways no different than Republicans. Everyone on top wants to preserve the status quo and why wouldn’t they. All she is doing is throwing the curtains open and I think these are uncomfortable truths we all need to face.

How is it more honest to move out to a pricey suburb with high-quality schools? Please explain.

Whataboutism at its finest.

DP. It's a valid question.

OMG this is so ridiculous. Where do you think private school parents live, downtown Silver Spring? They live in the fancy neighborhoods, also.

And they brag about how much more diverse their private is than their neighborhood. The neighborhood where they *chose* to buy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school parents should feel uncomfortable about the two tiers of education we are supporting. It is intellectually dishonest to act like we are trying to do anything but give our kids a leg up on the backs of others. Some people shrug and say so what - that’s life and I think that is at least reasonably honest. But to act morally superior because you decided to send your kids to GDS over a more conservative private school is reprehensible. Democrats are in many ways no different than Republicans. Everyone on top wants to preserve the status quo and why wouldn’t they. All she is doing is throwing the curtains open and I think these are uncomfortable truths we all need to face.

How is it more honest to move out to a pricey suburb with high-quality schools? Please explain.

Whataboutism at its finest.

DP. It's a valid question.

OMG this is so ridiculous. Where do you think private school parents live, downtown Silver Spring? They live in the fancy neighborhoods, also.

Some do, some don’t. We can’t afford both the fancy zip code and the expensive school, so we live someplace cheaper, because the school is more important to us. Does that blow your mind?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school parents should feel uncomfortable about the two tiers of education we are supporting. It is intellectually dishonest to act like we are trying to do anything but give our kids a leg up on the backs of others. Some people shrug and say so what - that’s life and I think that is at least reasonably honest. But to act morally superior because you decided to send your kids to GDS over a more conservative private school is reprehensible. Democrats are in many ways no different than Republicans. Everyone on top wants to preserve the status quo and why wouldn’t they. All she is doing is throwing the curtains open and I think these are uncomfortable truths we all need to face.

Speaking as one of the many parents whose kids have benefitted from financial aid at private schools, I’ll say this: we need to focus on improving public schools. Our local DMV public disappointed me on so many levels. No discipline for misbehaving kids, and no desire to improve upon incorrect or outdated teaching materials. School leadership has passionately embraced all of the broader community service missions attached to the school, but has not embraced intellectualism or the pursuit of excellence with the same fervor.

This brings up a good question, is there no discipline or does the discipline not address the root cause of the problem? Thought of a different way, when kids misbehave in private they can be expelled because public school is the backup. What happens to students who misbehave in public? What is the backup?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

Most of the money goes to administrator fees not to students. The lie I'm referring to is that public schools and private schools have equal resources. GTFO with that lie.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

Most of the money goes to administrator fees not to students. The lie I'm referring to is that public schools and private schools have equal resources. GTFO with that lie.

Part of how deeply stupid this conversation is is that “private schools” are not monolithic and most don’t look like Sidwell or Dalton. There are many smaller schools, parochial and independent, where per pupil funding looks a lot more like public schools. DC spends just shy of $22k per pupil. Lots of Catholic schools cost half that, and have better educational outcomes. Does that make you real mad, too? Or is it just the few Sidwells and Daltons that get ya steamed?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

Most of the money goes to administrator fees not to students. The lie I'm referring to is that public schools and private schools have equal resources. GTFO with that lie.

Part of how deeply stupid this conversation is is that “private schools” are not monolithic and most don’t look like Sidwell or Dalton. There are many smaller schools, parochial and independent, where per pupil funding looks a lot more like public schools. DC spends just shy of $22k per pupil. Lots of Catholic schools cost half that, and have better educational outcomes. Does that make you real mad, too? Or is it just the few Sidwells and Daltons that get ya steamed?

Right. The vast majority of kids attending non-public schools attend Catholic parochial schools.

Only something like 2% of US students attend secular, independent schools and even then, most of them don’t attend schools like Sidwell, Dalton, Brearley, Harvard-Westlake, Andover, Exeter, etc.

MCPS spends roughly $16K per pupil. Seneca Academy—a school lots of people on this board say is crappy, but is actually a really welcoming, down to earth school with an IB curriculum—charges $19,500/year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

The problem is personal responsibility. The problem is the cycle of poverty and the lack of commitment to education. As has been reflected with Covid, children are a low priority in society. They don’t march in the streets or vote.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What’s crazy is how much money per pupil school districts spend. I’ve taught in public schools and private schools. Resources aren’t what separate private from public. I had more resources in the public (esp. Title 1) schools in which I taught. There are two main differences: teachers‘ unions and parental involvement. If you can fire a bad teacher and hire whomever you want, it’s better for the school. If parents are involved, students do better. Private schools have the freedom to create their own curricula and fire bad teachers.

This is a lie that is repeated way too many times.

And do Americans realize that they're the only group that spout that "Parental involvement is the most important thing"

How come I don't see other nations mentioning this?

Baltimore city is in the top five nationally for a per pupil spending. I don’t know what the answer is, but money doesn’t seem to be it.

Most of the money goes to administrator fees not to students. The lie I'm referring to is that public schools and private schools have equal resources. GTFO with that lie.

Actually most of the public school funds go towards supporting special education. Most private schools don’t have those expenses because they don’t admit kids with high levels of special needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do people really care about what the truly elite do and have? My life is happy, fulfilling, and meaningful. I’m not struggling and have everything I could want. I could care less that families at these schools have more than I do. It just doesn’t impact me or my kids. Let them live their life. You live your life.

You should care about it because these are the folks who in many ways end up running the country on so many levels and make decisions that will directly affect you and your family