Best K-8 Schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think kids who get into top-tier schools or Hunter necessarily choose to go to Speyer. If a child is truly gifted, shouldn’t they at least pass the first round of the Hunter exam?

I actually know quite a few kids who attend Speyer. Among students who later get into top-tier high schools, many transferred from public schools in grades 4–6—and they were already academically strong to begin with.

I don’t believe that all children at Speyer are genuinely gifted. It often feels more like a choice made by parents who want to believe that about their child.

Yeah, the fundamental question with Speyer is who would rationally choose to go there in kindergarten; if your kid is actually all that gifted then you can send them to Hunter for free and have a guaranteed high school spot, and if they fall just short of that you can send them to a private school with bigger classes and nicer facilities and, likewise, a guaranteed high school spot. Hell, if you live in that neighborhood and specifically want a school within walking distance you can send them to Ethical. I'm sure there are anecdotal examples of kids turning down Dalton or Trinity or whatever to go to Speyer, but I can't imagine there are very many. So by its very nature it's ending up with the second tier of smart kids because the first tier have better options.

You are assuming the process is a meritocracy which is a naive take. Your child can be top 10 smartest in the city and the process will still be a challenge to get admitted due to how heavily curated the classes are (gender, race, wealth, connections, alumni status, etc…).

And also the fact that, assuming we’re taking about K entry, these kids are 4 or 5 years old. There’s a ton of randomness to the process, and no the smartest kids don’t all end up at Hunter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think kids who get into top-tier schools or Hunter necessarily choose to go to Speyer. If a child is truly gifted, shouldn’t they at least pass the first round of the Hunter exam?

I actually know quite a few kids who attend Speyer. Among students who later get into top-tier high schools, many transferred from public schools in grades 4–6—and they were already academically strong to begin with.

I don’t believe that all children at Speyer are genuinely gifted. It often feels more like a choice made by parents who want to believe that about their child.

Yeah, the fundamental question with Speyer is who would rationally choose to go there in kindergarten; if your kid is actually all that gifted then you can send them to Hunter for free and have a guaranteed high school spot, and if they fall just short of that you can send them to a private school with bigger classes and nicer facilities and, likewise, a guaranteed high school spot. Hell, if you live in that neighborhood and specifically want a school within walking distance you can send them to Ethical. I'm sure there are anecdotal examples of kids turning down Dalton or Trinity or whatever to go to Speyer, but I can't imagine there are very many. So by its very nature it's ending up with the second tier of smart kids because the first tier have better options.

You are assuming the process is a meritocracy which is a naive take. Your child can be top 10 smartest in the city and the process will still be a challenge to get admitted due to how heavily curated the classes are (gender, race, wealth, connections, alumni status, etc…).

Sure, but this would also apply at Speyer. (maybe less so at Hunter, and if your child is truly that level of genius they'd have a strong chance at getting in in there) Nevertheless, to the extent that any spots at private schools are going to kids based on genuine merit, there are a bunch of other schools above Speyer in the pecking order that are likely to grab most of the smartest kids.

[Anonymous]

Speyer definitely fills a niche- especially for white/ORM bright children with late cycle birthdays. Hunter accepts only 25 boys/25 girls, equally spread across birth dates and demographics - so even if your child made it to Round 2 and did well at the play visit, it doesn't necessarily translate to a spot. TT schools redshirt the summer birthdays. Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years. If your child is truly advanced, and the options are a 2T this year, redshirting for a potential spot at a TT, or Speyer, it's understandable why Speyer becomes a compelling option.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years.

This is highly school-dependent - I went to a school that would barely qualify as a 3T by NYC standards and they had an excellent accelerated program. There are definitely schools that refuse to differentiate as a matter of educational philosophy, but there are other schools that will be more than happy to; they certainly all have enough resources for it. (in some cases it's as simple as 'how is your schedule constructed' - they might for example be delighted to skip your kid a grade in math if the blocks line up cleanly enough that your kid would be able to keep doing it throughout their school career)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years.

This is highly school-dependent - I went to a school that would barely qualify as a 3T by NYC standards and they had an excellent accelerated program. There are definitely schools that refuse to differentiate as a matter of educational philosophy, but there are other schools that will be more than happy to; they certainly all have enough resources for it. (in some cases it's as simple as 'how is your schedule constructed' - they might for example be delighted to skip your kid a grade in math if the blocks line up cleanly enough that your kid would be able to keep doing it throughout their school career)

Would love to know which schools would do this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years.

This is highly school-dependent - I went to a school that would barely qualify as a 3T by NYC standards and they had an excellent accelerated program. There are definitely schools that refuse to differentiate as a matter of educational philosophy, but there are other schools that will be more than happy to; they certainly all have enough resources for it. (in some cases it's as simple as 'how is your schedule constructed' - they might for example be delighted to skip your kid a grade in math if the blocks line up cleanly enough that your kid would be able to keep doing it throughout their school career)

Would love to know which schools would do this?

My suburban NJ public did this - usually a few kids a year. And this was in the late 80s. In 6th grade a few kids got bumped to 7th grade math. In 8th grade they went to the HS for first period then bussed back to middle school - HS started earlier so the timing worked. Most took BC in 11th grade. This was long before it was trendy to accelerate kids and there weren’t enough to create a whole class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years.

This is highly school-dependent - I went to a school that would barely qualify as a 3T by NYC standards and they had an excellent accelerated program. There are definitely schools that refuse to differentiate as a matter of educational philosophy, but there are other schools that will be more than happy to; they certainly all have enough resources for it. (in some cases it's as simple as 'how is your schedule constructed' - they might for example be delighted to skip your kid a grade in math if the blocks line up cleanly enough that your kid would be able to keep doing it throughout their school career)

Would love to know which schools would do this?

My suburban NJ public did this - usually a few kids a year. And this was in the late 80s. In 6th grade a few kids got bumped to 7th grade math. In 8th grade they went to the HS for first period then bussed back to middle school - HS started earlier so the timing worked. Most took BC in 11th grade. This was long before it was trendy to accelerate kids and there weren’t enough to create a whole class.

Thanks. I was specifically asking about the 2T/3T schools that do this in elementary, as the PP mentioned above.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years.

This is highly school-dependent - I went to a school that would barely qualify as a 3T by NYC standards and they had an excellent accelerated program. There are definitely schools that refuse to differentiate as a matter of educational philosophy, but there are other schools that will be more than happy to; they certainly all have enough resources for it. (in some cases it's as simple as 'how is your schedule constructed' - they might for example be delighted to skip your kid a grade in math if the blocks line up cleanly enough that your kid would be able to keep doing it throughout their school career)

Would love to know which schools would do this?

My suburban NJ public did this - usually a few kids a year. And this was in the late 80s. In 6th grade a few kids got bumped to 7th grade math. In 8th grade they went to the HS for first period then bussed back to middle school - HS started earlier so the timing worked. Most took BC in 11th grade. This was long before it was trendy to accelerate kids and there weren’t enough to create a whole class.

Thanks. I was specifically asking about the 2T/3T schools that do this in elementary, as the PP mentioned above.

Sorry, I'm the PP and I was referencing the non-NYC private school I went to. I never looked at NYC private elementary schools for my kids and so haven't investigated this in those grades here; I can say that most of the middle schools I talked to indicated an openness to it if the kid was advanced enough, and allowed as how they had other kids doing it from time to time, so it seems pretty widespread. I would advise you to contact the admissions offices of any schools you're interested in to get a current read on that for elementary school.

[Anonymous]

Dwight does this for example. I know people who ended up transferring from TT to Dwight - I was surprised but it makes a lot of sense for a kid who is ahead in some areas and needs extra support in others. In some sense the acceleration is also a type of extra "support" that 2/3T schools like Dwight are willing to provide

[Anonymous]

1. A lot of Speyer kids are Hunter round 2 kids.
2. When Hunter curates its not the smartest kids. Its curating a class that spans skillset and factors birthday and ethnic diversity. I have a Hunter round 2 kid and they sat all the parents down and said any of them are good enough for the school. Its a number game and curation now.
3. I know Hunter Round 2 kids turned down by Speyer this year.
4. Speyer has a lot more resources than Hunter. Hunter is a 25/1 ratio. Speyer is 6/1. Hunter is ahead. Speyer has 0 ceiling to their differentiation. Some 8th graders at Speyer are taking Calc. That doesn't happen at Hunter.

[Anonymous]

This doesn’t address the “why Speyer over a higher ranked school” question though - either it *is* possible to detect smart kids in kindergarten, in which case most of them are going be found and snatched up by bigger schools with more prestige and more resources than Speyer, or it’s not possible, in which case this is all a crapshoot and there’s no reason to think Speyer kids are especially smart.

A more realistic assessment is that out of the large pool of kids who get rejected by the TT/2T schools and are deciding between their various 3T options, the parents who are high on “giftedness” lean towards Speyer, and they tend to also be the ones who push their kids hardest in test prep and enrichment and such.

[Anonymous]

Also: any reasonably smart kid can do 8th grade calculus with enough years of tutoring and parents pushing them to go farther ahead of their peers in math. Unless they’re planning to enter college at 15 I’m not sure what the point would be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This doesn’t address the “why Speyer over a higher ranked school” question though - either it *is* possible to detect smart kids in kindergarten, in which case most of them are going be found and snatched up by bigger schools with more prestige and more resources than Speyer, or it’s not possible, in which case this is all a crapshoot and there’s no reason to think Speyer kids are especially smart.

A more realistic assessment is that out of the large pool of kids who get rejected by the TT/2T schools and are deciding between their various 3T options, the parents who are high on “giftedness” lean towards Speyer, and they tend to also be the ones who push their kids hardest in test prep and enrichment and such.

People already answered the question. You are not familiar with the topic, so people have to spell it out to you in the most granular details as possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This doesn’t address the “why Speyer over a higher ranked school” question though - either it *is* possible to detect smart kids in kindergarten, in which case most of them are going be found and snatched up by bigger schools with more prestige and more resources than Speyer, or it’s not possible, in which case this is all a crapshoot and there’s no reason to think Speyer kids are especially smart.

A more realistic assessment is that out of the large pool of kids who get rejected by the TT/2T schools and are deciding between their various 3T options, the parents who are high on “giftedness” lean towards Speyer, and they tend to also be the ones who push their kids hardest in test prep and enrichment and such.

People already answered the question. You are not familiar with the topic, so people have to spell it out to you in the most granular details as possible.

The one relevant reply talked about Hunter and no other school, so no.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This doesn’t address the “why Speyer over a higher ranked school” question though - either it *is* possible to detect smart kids in kindergarten, in which case most of them are going be found and snatched up by bigger schools with more prestige and more resources than Speyer, or it’s not possible, in which case this is all a crapshoot and there’s no reason to think Speyer kids are especially smart.

A more realistic assessment is that out of the large pool of kids who get rejected by the TT/2T schools and are deciding between their various 3T options, the parents who are high on “giftedness” lean towards Speyer, and they tend to also be the ones who push their kids hardest in test prep and enrichment and such.

People already answered the question. You are not familiar with the topic, so people have to spell it out to you in the most granular details as possible.

The one relevant reply talked about Hunter and no other school, so no.

Speyer definitely fills a niche- especially for white/ORM bright children with late cycle birthdays. Hunter accepts only 25 boys/25 girls, equally spread across birth dates and demographics - so even if your child made it to Round 2 and did well at the play visit, it doesn't necessarily translate to a spot. TT schools redshirt the summer birthdays. Meanwhile, 2Ts don't have the same infrastructure to support a highly gifted child - they tend to focus on enrichment rather than acceleration, especially in the early years. If your child is truly advanced, and the options are a 2T this year, redshirting for a potential spot at a TT, or Speyer, it's understandable why Speyer becomes a compelling option.