What level IQ score would be helpful for admissions to a selective private school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My children were tested. Both just under 150.

Why do people brag on an anonymous forum? And how does this answer OP’s question?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think IQ matters. My DC’s IQ was tested at 145, so pretty bright. Getting literally all Bs in high school at a Big 3 and working hard for them.

I agree with this completely. I’m not saying intelligence doesn’t matter at all but so many other things matter just as much, if not more.

[Anonymous]

OP you should explore private. Child will need to take an entrance test. Should do well. Good luck!

FWIW, my child took an entrance test at age 3. Tester wrote that she was low intelligence (I recently found the report and shredded it. My child graduated from Princeton last year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My children were tested. Both just under 150.

Very helpful. Thanks for sharing.

Btw, what is your IQ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 10 year old has an IQ test recently and two teachers and one administrator at their public school said to me something like "I shouldn't be telling you this, but you're selling yourself short. Look to private."

We've never considered private for financial reasons, unfamiliarity with that world, etc., but their comments made me curious. Is there a certain level IQ score that would really help a child get in? Or get financial aid if accepted? Sorry if this is a clueless question. I know very little about private school admissions.

Troll

No public school says this.

Private is not academically superior to public school, particularly for math and science.

Parent of an Andover graduate. Parent of a few public school graduates. Parent of a big 3 graduate. I should know.

How many kids do you have???

[Anonymous]

Unless it is a school for the highly gifted like Feynman it doesn’t help at all and your child would be better off in highly gifted programs through public school. I speak from experience.
A child with a very high IQ will NOT find a like peer group at DC privates. There will be a few others like them perhaps, but the rest are nice enough average to above average kids with money or an admissions hook who work hard. Teachers at these DC privates know nothing about how to teach very high IQ students. It’s actually painful at times.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP you should explore private. Child will need to take an entrance test. Should do well. Good luck!

FWIW, my child took an entrance test at age 3. Tester wrote that she was low intelligence (I recently found the report and shredded it. My child graduated from Princeton last year.

Those test at 3 are not good indicators of future success. Congrats!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP you should explore private. Child will need to take an entrance test. Should do well. Good luck!

FWIW, my child took an entrance test at age 3. Tester wrote that she was low intelligence (I recently found the report and shredded it. My child graduated from Princeton last year.

We had similar experiences with the WPPSI. One child scored in the 49th percentile at age 4. He still got into a top private and did very well and scored in the 90th percentile the last time he was tested. My other child scored in the 99th percentile when he was 4. The tester told us we should consider a special school, he’d likely be bored in his brother’s well-respected private. He now tests as slightly above average, although we suspect he’s much smarter than that.

[Anonymous]

WPPSI scores are enormously unreliable indicators of future "stable" IQ.

High-IQ and high-achieving are not the same thing.

A student who is high-IQ but not high-achieving may do better at a private that is able to provide support for whatever issues are limiting achievement -- poor executive function, needing more individualized attention, doing better in a small classroom with fewer distractions, etc.

A student who is exceptionally or profoundly gifted might also do better at a dedicated school for the gifted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 10 year old has an IQ test recently and two teachers and one administrator at their public school said to me something like "I shouldn't be telling you this, but you're selling yourself short. Look to private."

We've never considered private for financial reasons, unfamiliarity with that world, etc., but their comments made me curious. Is there a certain level IQ score that would really help a child get in? Or get financial aid if accepted? Sorry if this is a clueless question. I know very little about private school admissions.

Troll

No public school says this.

Private is not academically superior to public school, particularly for math and science.

Parent of an Andover graduate. Parent of a few public school graduates. Parent of a big 3 graduate. I should know.

How many kids do you have???

LOL. If we interpret "few" to equal at least 3, then this person has at minimum 5 kids and quite possibly more? Incredible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:WPPSI scores are enormously unreliable indicators of future "stable" IQ.

High-IQ and high-achieving are not the same thing.

A student who is high-IQ but not high-achieving may do better at a private that is able to provide support for whatever issues are limiting achievement -- poor executive function, needing more individualized attention, doing better in a small classroom with fewer distractions, etc.

A student who is exceptionally or profoundly gifted might also do better at a dedicated school for the gifted.

Agreed. Most local privates look at the WISC for IQ and Woodcock-Johnson for level of achievement/performance, along with grades for older students. I’ve seen speculation about WISC thresholds between 125-130 for some, but none ever seemed credible. Probably around 120, give or take a few points.

But those students who are highly-gifted—that is, two standard deviations above the mean for IQ—can be challenging to educate. Not the same as high performing students, who can learn more comfortably in local private and public schools.

[Anonymous]

We submitted our WISC during admissions. However, we only did this to provide context to our decision to skip them a grade. In hindsight, I would have moved to private much sooner and kept him in the same grade level, although no issues have arisen.

Our GT programs lacked funding. Instead of more challenging work or work at a faster pace, they increased the workload and would make students participate in a group that met during class time. DS would become anxious about missing material and completing missed assignments- it was a bad mix. It was essentially forcing students who were gifted to become high performers.

Sally eats two apples, John eats 1. How many apples does it take to bore a student to death?

PP said something very similar- It's not the rigor, it's the individualized attention that we knew would help DS thrive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My 10 year old has an IQ test recently and two teachers and one administrator at their public school said to me something like "I shouldn't be telling you this, but you're selling yourself short. Look to private."

We've never considered private for financial reasons, unfamiliarity with that world, etc., but their comments made me curious. Is there a certain level IQ score that would really help a child get in? Or get financial aid if accepted? Sorry if this is a clueless question. I know very little about private school admissions.

Troll

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are you buying into the premise that gifted children would do better in private school???
Ha ha ha ha.

Although, this may be a case of creating one's own reality. If the teachers believe this, you might be better off out of that school...

This.

Unless OP is in Manhattan the private schools in America are for those concerned their kid(s) can’t hack it in a testing or big school environment like a public district or magnet program.

So the coddling and small classroom sizes and small grade sizes seem like the small, intimate nurturing environment for their troubled kid.

g&T is something different. And FSIQ scores don’t say anything about work ethic, mental disorders, attitude problems, or well roundedness. Or common sense.

[Anonymous]

Hold out for boarding school and do enrichment in the meantime. Or you feel your kid is high Iq and puts in the time, speaks up, does some arts and sport well.