College admission: Public vs. private

[Anonymous]

went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

Number less important than percentage

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will tell you, I think the problem is when the kids coming from publics, where they were not in heated competition with a large part of the rest of their class, tend to have a problem is when they are suddenly in at an elite college and not a shining star for the first time and/or the first time they fail at something in college. Kids coming from top privates have usually had both things happen to them before and have learned how to deal. Kids at the top at a middle road public rarely do. I speak from experience.

I speak from the opposite experience -I went to a big 3 and struggled the first year of college. I found the big 3 experience more demoralizing than humbling. My DC went to MCPS and had an easy transition to a competitive college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/private-vs-public-no-advantage/2011/11/16/gIQAfMlSTN_blog.html

Someone looked at it in DC. It didn't make a difference.

"Fisher noted that was too small a sample for any statistically valid conclusions"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For example, I know kids who graduated from Wilson H.S. and SWW in DC who did well for college acceptance. They would have been 'run of the mill' kids in private.

Parent of a "Big 3" student with lots of friends at Wilson and Walls. I know you were trying to be complimentary, but it comes off as patronizing. The students who do well at Walls and Wilson would do equally well at any of the selective private schools. They certainly wouldn't be run of the mill. Smart driven children are going to thrive anywhere that they are offered the opportunity to shine, regardless of their parents' ability to pay $40k/year.

+1 -- from another parent of grads/students at Big 3 with friends at Wilson and Walls and Ellington

I'll bite! Why did you choose a big 3 over Wilson, Walls or Ellington?

[Anonymous]

http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/Bethesda-Magazine/September-October-2014/College-Bound/
Actual numbers on MoCo public students being admitted to colleges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For example, I know kids who graduated from Wilson H.S. and SWW in DC who did well for college acceptance. They would have been 'run of the mill' kids in private.

Parent of a "Big 3" student with lots of friends at Wilson and Walls. I know you were trying to be complimentary, but it comes off as patronizing. The students who do well at Walls and Wilson would do equally well at any of the selective private schools. They certainly wouldn't be run of the mill. Smart driven children are going to thrive anywhere that they are offered the opportunity to shine, regardless of their parents' ability to pay $40k/year.

+1 -- from another parent of grads/students at Big 3 with friends at Wilson and Walls and Ellington

I'll bite! Why did you choose a big 3 over Wilson, Walls or Ellington?

It's as simple as not wanting to have deal with a school bureaucracy and tuition isn't much of a financial sacrifice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/Bethesda-Magazine/September-October-2014/College-Bound/
Actual numbers on MoCo public students being admitted to colleges.

So this would indicate that all of MCPS sends about as many students to the Ivies as SFS or NCS & StA or GDS alone. So PP who claimed his MCPS school sent more than all the DC privates combined might have been exaggerating just a little.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For example, I know kids who graduated from Wilson H.S. and SWW in DC who did well for college acceptance. They would have been 'run of the mill' kids in private.

Parent of a "Big 3" student with lots of friends at Wilson and Walls. I know you were trying to be complimentary, but it comes off as patronizing. The students who do well at Walls and Wilson would do equally well at any of the selective private schools. They certainly wouldn't be run of the mill. Smart driven children are going to thrive anywhere that they are offered the opportunity to shine, regardless of their parents' ability to pay $40k/year.

+1 -- from another parent of grads/students at Big 3 with friends at Wilson and Walls and Ellington

I'll bite! Why did you choose a big 3 over Wilson, Walls or Ellington?

We live in MoCo, so those weren't options, but, of course, this begs the question of why we didn't go with our MoCo public HS or one of the magnets. The reason is that we wanted our kids to experience a deeper, more probing educational approach -- one that encourages questioning and critical thinking. We also liked the emphasis on values at our kids' school. And, though our kids lean more toward STEM subjects, we didn't want the focus to be exclusively on STEM as it is in the Blair magnet, for example. We got what we bargained for, but I also think the public school options in DC and MoCo are excellent -- and needless to say, free.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

Number less important than percentage

That is such a myth on this site. You aren't competing with the kids who drop out of public school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

I call BS on this. If you are referring to the most selective Ivy's, then the matriculation stats you site don't hold up (see link). Using this same year as a comparison, SFS had a similar number of acceptances to H/Y/P alone as the combined acceptances on this list. Of course, in certain cases there were multiple acceptances for the same student, for both the publics and the privates. And when you eliminate the magnet school from the list, it isn't even close to the number from SFS, NCS, STA, GDS (which combined have a graduating class about the same size as one of the listed publics).

http://bethesdamagazine.com/College_Chart.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For example, I know kids who graduated from Wilson H.S. and SWW in DC who did well for college acceptance. They would have been 'run of the mill' kids in private.

Parent of a "Big 3" student with lots of friends at Wilson and Walls. I know you were trying to be complimentary, but it comes off as patronizing. The students who do well at Walls and Wilson would do equally well at any of the selective private schools. They certainly wouldn't be run of the mill. Smart driven children are going to thrive anywhere that they are offered the opportunity to shine, regardless of their parents' ability to pay $40k/year.

+1 -- from another parent of grads/students at Big 3 with friends at Wilson and Walls and Ellington

Most students at Wilson, Walls, and Ellington could not get into the "Big 3" but I agree that two students with similar stats going into Sidwell and Walls (for example) would probably have similar success in college admissions since so much depends on the student. They would not, however, finish high school with the same class rank, which is what the previous poster was referring to. The rest of the argument depends on whether you believe that a student with a lower class rank might be crowded out of their college of choice because the college exercises some sort of quota for each school. That seems unlikely.

[Anonymous]

My big 3 grad got into a couple of private colleges (one highly ranked) but not the single Ivy she applied to. She also got into a highly ranked public university that she ultimately preferred. Doing incredible research which started freshman year. Has found that the big 3 gave her skills she thought were ordinary but gets noticed constantly. She can write a paper for any class at the drop of a hat. Never gotten less than a perfect grade and gets recruited to change majors because of it. Has a polish to her resume and interviewing that gets her picked instead of the competition. Finds that stress feeds her ambitions and gives her an edge in the high level stem classes. The best skills she got out of high school were time management and the ability to channel stress into results. Still there are many kids from public that are as smart or smarter than her and she appreciates their strengths. OP don't get attached to any set of schools. You can deal after you see where your DD gets in. Trying to pick the school in advance is like playing the lottery. Unless you already know the winning combination then you have no chance in hell. In my opinion the big 3 preselects where each grad goes then adds a fudge factor then holds their breath while doing an admission rain dance. They know sort of where your kid is going but cannot get the non Ivy kid in over the Ivy bound donor or their personal pet project that they have cultivated for a long time. There are many choices in life and it's not a bad thing to have a little uncertainty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

Number less important than percentage

That is such a myth on this site. You aren't competing with the kids who drop out of public school.

What does that even mean? Of course numbers don't matter nearly as much as percentage when you are comparing college admissions--especially when you are looking at the tiny anecdata coming from one PP's college.

And, by the way, you prove my point, I think. Big 3s are college prep schools, and they tend to be much smaller in size than their public counterparts. It is expected that close to 100% of graduates of the Big-3 will go onto college. Public high schools are not prep schools. Although it is true that may of them, esp in affluent neighborhoods, send a large majority (90%?) onto college, the percentage is not as high as Big 3.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:went to MoCo public school - and graduated summa from an Ivy. More kids at my Ivy from my public that year than from the Big 3 combined. And None of the Big 3 kids were magna, or summa.

I call BS on this. If you are referring to the most selective Ivy's, then the matriculation stats you site don't hold up (see link). Using this same year as a comparison, SFS had a similar number of acceptances to H/Y/P alone as the combined acceptances on this list. Of course, in certain cases there were multiple acceptances for the same student, for both the publics and the privates. And when you eliminate the magnet school from the list, it isn't even close to the number from SFS, NCS, STA, GDS (which combined have a graduating class about the same size as one of the listed publics).

http://bethesdamagazine.com/College_Chart.pdf

Actually I think this was true for DD's year - that particular top Ivy took a ton of MCPS kids just a few years ago. Note that PP qualified by saying "that year." There really is a lot of volatility in acceptances and one year of Bethesda Mag isn't the final word.

As another PP said, what matters is percentages. But the story there is really hard to disentangle, given the role played by legacy status, athletic recruitment, big donations, and yes, whether your ability to pay $40k/year telegraphs to colleges that your kid will be full pay. Were all the kids accepted last year by Yale from Whitman double legacies? Who the heck knows, and it's pointless to speculate.

All we can say for sure is that, if Yale took 5 kids from Sidwell/Whitman/St Anselm last year, the number will probably be different this year. We can also say that 5 kids going to Yale from a given area high school won't translate to a 5% shot (assuming class size of 100) at Yale for your kid (unless you and DH are Yale grads or high-level politicians or big, as in really big, donors).