Landon vs. Georgetown Prep Upper School

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So how are Preppies different from Landonites, except for religion? Is the animosity about sports (lacrosse)? Is it because they compete for the same girls? From an outside viewpoint, it seems that the student bodies are very similar in intelligence and economics and demographics. I'd like to read that article.

Actually two interesting questions. The first is how are the two student bodies different. The second is why all the animosity between two schools that to the outsider seem so similar.

Religion is one big difference. But it goes beyond religion. To get this you have to have an understanding of the history and the various groups that populate the area.
There is, and there has been for a very long time, a large Catholic community in the DC area. This community is largely of Irish extraction. (The students at Gonzaga, Prep's brother Jesuit high school, call themselves "The Eye Street Irish" with good reason.)

This large Catholic community is held together through going to the same churches, the same schools, the same colleges, belonging to the same clubs, intermarriage and a large network of doctors, dentists, building contractors, etc., etc..

Some of these people through the years have been quite successful. And although they live in upscale areas among other groups, they maintain membership in this large Catholic community with their relationships with their neighbors being a kind of secondary one.

As someone said in another thread, they don’t even consider independent private schools for their children.

So it's not just "religion" that binds the group together.

The Landon student population is diverse with even a few Catholics. But these are generally Catholics newer to Washington that aren’t part of the Catholic community.

The “Animosity” between the two schools has its roots in athletic competition. Athletic success is very important on both campuses and among the alumni parents and teachers. By and large these two schools have for a very long time been at the top of the IAC. So to win a championship, one team has to beat the other. They gear their efforts to beating one another in the same way that Army fixates on beating Navy. The coaches --- who at Landon are also teachers –drum this into the heads of these teenagers.

But this “rivalry” through the years has spawned a lot of bad behavior on both sides. So added to the current athletic competition is this long list of past grievances which the coaches, alumni and others carry around like Jacob Marley’s chains.

The students are swept along in this.

The lacrosse rivalry is just another chapter in this. Landon's coach was introduced to lacrosse in college and started the Landon program. For decades they were dominant and the program was a point of considerable pride for the school. It took a long time for Prep to build its program by attracting their better athletes to it. Now there is virtual parity and yet another wonderful opportunity to stoke the fires between the two schools.

Some have said that the two would be better off in different conferences.

Interesting, so where does St John's fit in in the "old money" vs out of town newbie Catholic hierarchy ?

[Anonymous]

"Interesting, so where does St John's fit in in the "old money" vs out of town newbie Catholic hierarchy ? "

That's an interesting question. But this isn't an "old money" vs. "new money" discussion. This is about being a full-fledged member of this community.
This is more about "insiders" versus "outsiders". You'll occassionally read comments on this forum from Catholics who sent their kids to independent schools complaining that they are being treated as less-than authentic Catholics by some in their neighorhoods and parishes.

The large Catholic community has St John's very clearly positioned in their minds. St Johns is a once-great school that now serves a large minority population fleeing the DC public schools and Catholic families, who are connected to the school or for whom Gonzaga is perhaps too academically challenging. When someone announces their son or daughter is going to St John's the assumption is that there is an academic problem of some sort.

This is much different from someone announcing that they are sending their son to Landon, which is generally seen as a thumb in the eye to the concept of Catholic education.

When our sons went to Georgetown Prep, by far the largest group of fathers were St. John's graduates. No school has benefitted as much from the long decline of St John's than has Prep. And these GP fathers maintained a great loyalty to and affection for St John's .... but not so much they were going to send their sons there.

Through the 1970's, St John's was the equivalent of Gonzaga academically and athletically. The school was a favorite of Chevy Chase / Blessed Sacrament families.

But begining in the late 70's and though the 1980's, St John's went into a long decline. In it's current state, in the early 1990's it was barely breating. Since then it has staged a significant comeback. Alumni contributions have greatly improved the facilities. But it has never recovered completely to what it was in the 1960's and 1970's. St John's is now seen as being roughly equivalent to Good Counsel and DeMatha.

It has great faciliities. A great location. A diverse student population. A lot of tradition and a large and powerful alumni group.

[Anonymous]

St John's is now seen as being roughly equivalent to Good Counsel and DeMatha.

PP, can you elaborate on what you mean by this statement? Both in terms of academics and athletics.

[Anonymous]

I never knew that St John's was once considered a great school. I know it once had a middle school and served only boys and was a military school. And there upon declined rapidly until it became a HS only and coed.

[Anonymous]

Some of you old men really need to get a hobby. Its high school, get over yourself and the "glory days"

[Anonymous]

Our son got into Prep, Gonzaga and St Johns. I can honestly say they all had compelling reasons to be chosen. We were impressed by all of them and know good kids who go to each.

He went to Gonzaga and it is working out well. But I appreciate that there probably wasn't a bad path from any of these options. We are very lucky in the DC area to have the educational resources we do.

[Anonymous]

I am very familiar with Landon and have an outside picture of Prep. I know if you asked Landon kids, they would say they are very similar to Prep kids except Landon kids go to Landon and Prep kids go to Prep. The amount of Landon-Prep friendship varies from class to class. There are a significant number of Catholic kids at Landon. There are also Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and non-religious kids there. Landon's religion is not Lacrosse, it is the Honor Code. Given the recent publicity, that may sound ironic, but the Honor Code is the foundation of the school and plays the role I suspect Religion does at Prep. I would echo the comments of some of the posters that Prep has recently behaved boorishly at Landon-Prep Games. Generally there are Landon Administrators at Landon Prep games to keep the Landon kids classy. (side note, after Gonzaga's great win over Landon in lacrosse this past spring, the Gonzaga fans yelled "We sodomized you." and "You got sodomized" not exactly behavior you want to hang your hat on)
Landon's academic program is very good. Kids have honors options freshman year in Math, Science, and Foreign Language. As sophomores they have honors options across the board except in English and AP options in U.S. History and Science. Junior year they have the full slate of AP options throughout the curriculum and the same for Senior Year. Junior year is noted for Humanities - a team taught combination of English and History that is basically a Western Civilization course- Great Works of literature in English and Philosophy from the Greeks to the 21st Century. Kids at Landon universally say Humanities was difficult but enlightening and phenomenal preparation for college. Many kids at great universities say they expended more mental energy in Humanities than most of their college courses. Landon's class sizes vary but usually top out at 15 or 16. Some foreign language classes have as few as six or eight students. Freshman English classes have about 12 students per class. The rest of the English Dept has 14-18 students averaging around 15. I cite English because every student has to take English so it will generally be the biggest class and a good indication of class size. Landon reduced the size of freshman English classes to improve writing skills. The Math progression from freshman to senior year is Algebra II, Geometry, Pre-Calculus, and Calculus. Not everyone makes it to Calculus, but everyone has to at least get to through Pre-Calculus.

The vast majority of teacher/coach/mentors in the upper school have a master's degree in their academic subject.

In the past ten years Landon has had three presidential scholars- the best male student from the state of Maryland.

The Music program at Landon is phenomenal. The director is a former road manager for Aretha Franklin. He knows his stuff and almost all of the music instructors are local session musicians. Probably every two years a kid goes to a serious music school to play the violin.

The art department, specifically painting and ceramics are very very good. 10-15% of seniors submit AP art portfolios.

The college list is probably not quite as good as St. Albans but something like ten kids got into Ivy League Schools and half the kids got into colleges whose selectivity is rated the highest - Duke, Kenyon, Davidson, Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, etc.

If you consider the co-ed schools, most of the time their GPA's, SAT's, and College Admissions are brought up by the girls. I suspect Landon's numbers compare favorably to the numbers of boys at any other school in the area except St. Albans and Sidwell.

A boy doesn't have to be a super athlete to fit in at Landon. (the idea Landon and Prep are Athletic factories is absurd- there are very few kids from either school playing college football, basketball, baseball, or track. There are a lot of kids playing college lacrosse from both schools, but lacrosse is a boutique sport). A boy will be respected at Landon if he works hard and has integrity; it is helpful to be good at something- Academics, Athletics, Music or Art but character is most important. Life may be easier for a 9th grade phenom lacrosse player, but everything evens out by junior year and hard work and integrity become most important.

Last year's student body president was an African American boy who was a role player on the basketball team, but he was an actor in the play and a phenomenal singer who won a singing contest in New York. There are a fair number of Landon kids who get Financial Aid. You could probably find the number on the website.

To the prior poster who conflated the school's founding in 1929 to rising Naziism in Germany, Landon has had a minority Division Head for at least the last thirteen years and I think the first minority student was admitted in the sixties.

From my perspective, the biggest difference between Landon and Prep is the size of the schools. Landon has 340 students in the upper school. It is small enough for every student to be known by any teacher who takes an interest. I think Prep has 440 students and might be going for 500. At Prep's size, some kids can be more anonymous which I think leaves more room for kids to wander off the righteous path. Kids emboldened by their anonymity might explain some of the boorish behavior at athletic contests. I think Landon's academic program is better than Preps but only slightly so, but Prep has so much money, I suspect they can change that if they want. (if you put the top kids from either school they will be very similar- I think Prep's bottom kids would also be very similar to Landon's, but just a few more as a result of the size of the school.

[Anonymous]

Looked up the college list online for 2012 and it really is pretty good -- counted 9 at Ivy/MIT/Stanford and a lot of other very selective schools such as Duke, Davidson, NYU, UVA, etc.

I've also heard excellent things about the humanities program and the music program at Landon. I do still think that lacrosse has an outsized role at Landon -- think football at Penn State -- which can be a corrupting influence regardless of the good intentions of those involved.

But other than the "Landon is classy, Prep is boorish" at lacrosse games in the above thread (and I'm not a Prep person, I'm just dubious in general about this statement), there's a fair amount of good info there.

[Anonymous]

Wow 2:04...
Can't sleep at 2 in the morning because you are worried about Landon?
Landon administrator?
Landon trustee?
Parent who was helped with a response by a PR firm?
No other school on this forum generates longer, more self-serving replies that make you look desperate for approval.

[Anonymous]

try some insomnia. I said "classy" tongue in cheek al la Anchorman. over and out.

[Anonymous]

omg. why does it seem like the same 3 posters with the same tired rhetoric are the only ones posting here (trying to make each post just dfiferent enough so that one would assume multiple unique posters/comments?) if the original poster is legit, just visit the schools and talk to
CURRENT kids and families....both are great schools.

[Anonymous]

Is it true that GP holds kids back a year to give their seniors and juniors a significant playing advantage over other teams?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is it true that GP holds kids back a year to give their seniors and juniors a significant playing advantage over other teams?

Nice try.

Prep doesn't hold anyone back for athletic purposes. It would make no sense to do so.

The IAC Conference has a single rule on eligibility to play. No one can play any sport more than four years at the high school level.

What happens to students before Prep is out of Prep's control.

The practice of red-shirting in elementary schools is rampant in Washington. Landon pioneered the practice in the 1980's. By the 1990's it began to spread.

Nowadays its pretty common.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Landon's religion is not Lacrosse, it is the Honor Code.

LOL. Except for that SAT cheating thing.

[Anonymous]

There's a lot of good stuff in 02:04's post a few up the page.

BUT:

An Honor Code is anywhere near the same thing being a Catholic in America. Being a Catholic goes beyond attending Mass or practicing the Faith more broadly. It has any number of cultural aspects.

With 60 boys in a class, how many Catholics can there be and still have room for the Mormons, Jews, Buddhists, and other Protestants? There are a few Catholics at Landon and their families are generally new to DC and not part of the larger Catholic community.

If you take most of the African Americans out of the mix at Prep, the student body is overwhelmingly Catholic, primarily from families that have been in DC for several generations. Prep is run by a Catholic religious order. Its staff and alumni are also overwhelmingly Catholics.

The schools are similar when viewed from the outside. But their primary difference is who attends each and not size of the student body.

For some reason, the Landon people choose to argue with this relatively obvious difference. I guess they are interested in seeing more Caholics enrolled or they don't want the school labeled as being dominated by other groups. It's curious to me. Prep has 450+ Catholic boys. Landon has a handful of them.