how to approach school about having higher educational standards

[Anonymous]

Sorry; just did a search and realized Ideal Schools was renamed Loudoun School for the Gifted. http://loudoungifted.org/

[Anonymous]

I am the poster that used special needs centrial to describe the atmosphere at my childs school the last few years. I clearly offended a few posters, and for that I would like I do apologize. The term I should have used to describe the classroom environment which lead to us leaving the school was special needs centric - and I do believe this is the proper way to explain the shift in classroom focus once a number of families left and were replaced with children exhibiting a wide range of challenges - including serious behavioral problems.. Also - I would like to clarify that the problem was not specific to the children. Rather the problem had to do with the the school admissions department and the school administrators that encouraged so many children to enter the school with needs that clearly overwhelmed a staff unprepared to educate them in the mainstream classroom without directly impacting the rest of the children. What we encountered was a school over promising capabilities and unprepared to meet individual needs because they did not group the students - because that was their inclusive philosophy. The original poster asked how to approach a school about improving academic standards. My point was that small independents must be able to attract students that will thrive in the atmospheres they promise. My child is not highly gifted or being groomed for Harvard, but she can read without direction, is attentive, and was in line with the demands of the original curriculum we signed up for. She does not need a week of directions and review to write a paper, extra time on tests, excessive counseling on how to conduct herself or treat her peers and teachers, and is not old enough to understand why the teachers give answers to some kids on tests so that they get better scores. She does not like working independtly on stories, math and reading that is never graded or acknowledged while other kids get special reading or math time. She did not like group projects where kids could care less about completing the assignment, yelling teachers or things getting broken in the classroom. And I did not like listening to the parents of some of the most disruptive kids complain about the schools broken promises. The problem was the school, not the kids. Everybody loses in this situation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Abstractly, the problem is that private schools have a sense of what they want to be, but what they can be is a function of who enrolls (among other things).

So do you search for a school whose approach to education approximates your own or do you search for a school that has the cohort you want for your kid(s)? Or split the difference?

I'd love to find a school for brainiac kids that isn't a pressure cooker. But that doesn't seem to exist in this area.

Actually, most of the best schools are great for "brainiacs". The pressure cooker only exists if the kids ( and mainly their parents) want the kids to get straight A's, do a million activities and get into Harvard or Stanford. If the families are fine with their kids getting B's instead of straight A's and going to a good college ( but not an Ivy), then the kids can get a great education and enjoy their childhoods at any of the top independent schools here. (I have been teaching in independent schools for 28 years) If you are in education, you probably know what I am talking about. If not, watch the documentary "Race to Nowhere". The pressure depicted in that film is actually being applied by parents, not schools. Give up the dream of crafting the perfect transcript and allow your kid to have fun, enjoy learning, and accept that Stanford probably won't happen. The Ivy's accept about 6% of applicants now. 2-3% of those have a "golden ticket" of some sort ( legacy, large donor, athlete, musician etc). Only the truly brilliant kids are selected form the general pool of applicants. Most people are not truly brilliant. Life will go on.

I (the PP you quoted) am in education, I'm not invested in Ivy admissions, and my brainiac is getting a great education at a local independent school. That said, it's a pressure cooker. And here I think that the parents vs. school dichotomy is a false one. Collectively, the parents/families shape school culture as much as the administration and faculty. (Which was the point I was trying to make about depends on who enrolls). Fill a "progressive" school with type-A families in a city where the private school market is highly competitive and you'll find insane workloads. Schools will blame parents, but, of course, schools decide which parental demands they accommodate and which they don't. And parents don't assign homework or create the structure that determines workloads. So it's a dynamic. And it's a collective action problem. Yeah, individual parents can put more pressure on their kids than a school does, but it's much harder for individual parents to relieve the pressure a school environment creates. Exit is your most viable option. But then the question becomes "can you find a better alternative?" I've looked and I haven't. Friends have had the same experience.

I'd love to see a school (hell, I'd love to see our school) sit down and say here's what we think is reasonable to demand of bright, energetic kids (or what we want to encourage such kids to demand of themselves in school) and here's what we're going to do to create an environment in which school doesn't provide kids with the opportunity to do much more than that. And yes I have made this argument to administrators and other parents at DC's school. Thus far, lots of lip service to change but I don't see any movement beyond guest speakers who, again, blame parents.

Try having your kid do His/her homework without cell phone or computer (very few nightly he assignments require a computer) and you'd be surprised by how reasonable the homework load gets.

[Anonymous]

I'm the PP you're quoting and my kid doesn't have a cellphone. She does most of her homework at the kitchen table with pen and paper.

But she's intellectually ambitious and capable and when faced with open-ended assignments she'll work til she drops. At first I thought it was just a personality issue, but when the assignments are less open-ended, she works quite efficiently. It's not subject-specific either.

Throw progressive education into this mix (meet the student where she's at and help her take it to the next level) and expectations/standards can pretty quickly cycle out of control. Especially for a kid with broad academic interests.

I'm a teacher myself and I know how often we construct assignments without imagining ourselves doing them (much less doing them on top of all the other things our students have to do). But I also know that if someone told me I had to construct an evaluation that would tell me what I need to know about where my students were without taking more than X amount of time, I could do that. It would take thought and effort and it would probably require policies/reminders/a school culture that held me partially responsible for moderating the demands placed on the kids I teach.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am the poster that used special needs centrial to describe the atmosphere at my childs school the last few years. I clearly offended a few posters, and for that I would like I do apologize. The term I should have used to describe the classroom environment which lead to us leaving the school was special needs centric - and I do believe this is the proper way to explain the shift in classroom focus once a number of families left and were replaced with children exhibiting a wide range of challenges - including serious behavioral problems.. Also - I would like to clarify that the problem was not specific to the children. Rather the problem had to do with the the school admissions department and the school administrators that encouraged so many children to enter the school with needs that clearly overwhelmed a staff unprepared to educate them in the mainstream classroom without directly impacting the rest of the children. What we encountered was a school over promising capabilities and unprepared to meet individual needs because they did not group the students - because that was their inclusive philosophy. The original poster asked how to approach a school about improving academic standards. My point was that small independents must be able to attract students that will thrive in the atmospheres they promise. My child is not highly gifted or being groomed for Harvard, but she can read without direction, is attentive, and was in line with the demands of the original curriculum we signed up for. She does not need a week of directions and review to write a paper, extra time on tests, excessive counseling on how to conduct herself or treat her peers and teachers, and is not old enough to understand why the teachers give answers to some kids on tests so that they get better scores. She does not like working independtly on stories, math and reading that is never graded or acknowledged while other kids get special reading or math time. She did not like group projects where kids could care less about completing the assignment, yelling teachers or things getting broken in the classroom. And I did not like listening to the parents of some of the most disruptive kids complain about the schools broken promises. The problem was the school, not the kids. Everybody loses in this situation.

I really appreciate this. I'm one of the parents who was offended, though not so much by your post as the one saying our kids belong with their own kind. But what you describe here is much different than "too many special needs kids," its a school accepting children who are not a match for its program, or at least its program as it was pitched to you when you applied. So it really doesn't sound like the right school. And, again, I really do appreciate your follow-up, and see you as far different that the stay-with-your-own-kind poster (who knows one kid with SN and is therefore an expert.)