if you had to choose between sidwell, beauvoir, and gds, where would you accept?

[Anonymous]

GDS also has great athletics,

Give me a break. My son has shown the potential to be a great athlete since he was a toddler. My husband was a great athlete in HS and college. We both believe that strong athletics are an essential component of education, help keep a kid on the right path, are important to the development of proper ambition and a healthy competitive spirit and drive. When we met with Jenny Stein at GDS when looking at PK/K for our son my husband asked about athletics. She made it perfectly clear that if athletics were important to us GDS was (probably) not the school for our son. After a bit more research we realized she was right and crossed it off our list.

[Anonymous]

Yup. When the school's teams are "The Grasshoppers" you know sports aren't a big thing. And a GDS student told me that!

[Anonymous]

I went to GDS and now have young kids. If you want your child to play Division I sports in college, GDS is not going to be your first choice. If you want your child to be able to play sports in HS, GDS has lots of teams and opportunities to play sports. Virtually anyone who wants to play makes it on a team, which is not true at some other private schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it is fair to say that GDS is the most liberal of the three schools mentioned (and probably among the most liberal in all of DC). It doesn't have to do with the academics - all these schools teach the essentially the same curriculum... In the lower grades: Chicago Math, Responsive Classroom, Writers' Workshop, etc. But the liberalism is seen in things both large and small. At GDS, the students call all teachers by their first names. This isn't a lack of respect for teachers, but a sense that respect does not come from titles alone. The kids (except the youngest) walk un-escorted through the halls from class to class... Because kids can be quiet in the halls, even if they aren't single file. At Beauvoir, the teachers teach the students how to be responsible, respectful, and kind - it can feel very didactic. At GDS the kids are encouraged to figure things out of their own - with guidance from the teachers, of course - but the learning is much more self-guided.

There's no religion at GDS, as there is at Beauvoir and Sidwell. GDS was founded to be a racially integrated school - the first in DC, public or private, and that tradition is still strong. The gay parents' and gay students' organizations at GDS are very strong - GDS is one of the first schools in the country to celebrate Gay Pride Day/Week at all levels and in all grades (age appropriately, of course). GDS students have traditionally been "artsy" and not "athletic" and those differences were and are respected and encouraged.

(Can you tell we've accepted a pre-K spot at GDS for next year?)

Good luck!

I have been told differenrently by attending familes. They say that even though most are loathe to admit it, it is Jewish in every way but name. For instance, the only religious holiday that GDS turns into an event, as in it is catered and a "big deal," is Passover. The majority of Board members are Jewish and Jewish kids in the school get special treatment (i.e., better treatment, less likely to get into trouble or kicked out for bad behavior). Those whom I have heard this from are upset because they applied and accepted believing they were sending their child/ren to school community that had no such bias, that had no religious orientation at all.

[Anonymous]

Atheist GDS parent here. Get real -- GDS is not a Jewish school. There's a Christmas assembly as well as a Passover assembly and if who cooks is to be the measure of which religion gets pride of place, I'd argue that a bigger deal is made over the Xmas assembly because so many people contribute food to it.

There's more religion at GDS than in the public schools I went to as a kid -- but it's a comparative religions perspective rather than a theological one.

Agree that the Board is not representative of the community as a whole though. Hope to see that change.

[Anonymous]

Wilson High School, Washington, DC

[Anonymous]

I wonder what Wilson will look like a few years from now. I think that the fact that some of the most successful AP teachers (Art Siebens and Joe Riener) have been driven out is really problematic.

[Anonymous]

To the OP -- pick Sidwell. It's the best choice. And GDS is a Jewish School. I don't know why people try to deny it...they should be proud about it.

[Anonymous]

They deny it because it's not true.

[Anonymous]

If GDS is a Jewish school, then so is Sidwell. Those two schools are equally "Jewish."

[Anonymous]

Interesting. As many time as I have heard that about GDS (and that is a large number), I have never heard that about Sidwell and I know many more Sidwell families than GDS families. Regarding reliogion at Sidwell, I just hear that anything at the school related to the Quakers is mere lip service or for show.

[Anonymous]

Really a bizarre series of comments that seem completely not based on fact. I have had kids at both GDS and Sidwell, and we are neither Jewish nor Quaker. GDS is not religious in any way. The major holidays are all discussed and celebrated in various events, and the major world religions are all studied in history classes in MS and HS. The school does not give a holiday on Rosh H or Yom Kippur, which results in lots of missing kids (versus Montgomery County where they are holidays). The only year that perhaps a kid who is not Jewish can feel a bit weird is in 7th grade, when the bar and bat mitzvahs season arrives, this does tend to overwhelm social events for the entire year in some classes that are majority Jewish, but this has nothing to do with the school (and I can imagine in a Catholic school the same type of thing could occur around confirmation events or sweet 16s). If anything Sidwell is MORE not less linked to a specific religion. It is a Quaker school, the head must be Quaker, there is required Quaker meeting every week for all students (just as at the Cathedral schools there are required religious events and classes). Many ways in which the school runs and deals with issues is very much based in Quaker theory and practice. It is not "lip service" or for "show". My daughter has been fascinating by meeting and learning about Quakerism, and feels it has been a major component of her experience there.

Anyway, no student is going to feel in any way marginalized at either school because they are not Quaker or Jewish in our experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If GDS is a Jewish school, then so is Sidwell. Those two schools are equally "Jewish."

I wrote the comment above, and I should clarify that i meant that neither school is affiliated with Judaism. I think those who call GDS Jewish are basing their comment only on how many Jewish students there are and, if e number of Jewish students is the criterion, the same could be said about Sidwell.

[Anonymous]

I think people know pp that GDS is a secular school. But, it does have a really big percentage of Jewish kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think people know pp that GDS is a secular school. But, it does have a really big percentage of Jewish kids.

But doesn't Sidwel have about the same percentage? Seems so.