I should have kept my kid at Wilson; college admits are much better than the Big3

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So a Wilson parent came to the private school forum to crow about a handful of college results and the private school parents are the whiny ones?

Hopefully, they can return the STA backpacks and phones before they leave….

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is a troll post. My daughter who went to Wilson is at Yale now. Not a legacy. She certainly works very hard but got all As her first and second semester at Yale. She was not even the valedictorian at Wilson. It was a difficult year for her. Maybe if she went to GDS it would have been easy but she stepped up and handled it just fine. Same for her friends who are at Columbia and Brown. AP exams are not graded by DCPS teachers. They are graded anonymously by AP graders. You have to know your stuff to do well on APs. Wilson is a mixed bag but the top 25% of kids there are very good.

Not top 25%, more like top 10%. Otherwise, your post may be somewhat accurate, but they do, as you pointed out, have a steeper learning curve once they get to college. For the really naturally intelligent ones, like your daughter, they can overcome that in a semester or two. But for those who are getting in for other reasons, you really have to wonder if Ivies are the best places for them. I know a Wilson kid committed to an Ivy for their sport who recently declared they will study something like "bio-medical engineering." Okay. Good luck with that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

In my small world there is - I know of no Wilson kids getting hired yet am surrounded by kids from the Big 3 who are pulling 250k and up in their late 20s and early 30s.

[Anonymous]

Sad that peoples’ lives revolve around getting “just the right college”.

If your kid is smart, they will be fine, wherever they end up.

[Anonymous]

Wilson is home to a cohort of extremely intelligent, flinty students who learn how to navigate a dysfunctional system. Adversity does teach lessons. The secret is that most systems are dysfunctional to an extent but privates are better able to hide that dysfunction blinding their students to the reality of life. In the real world you have to team build with disparate elements. Many private schools can dump the lowest performing students because there’s a line at the door. That’s not how the real world works.

[Anonymous]

I’ve taught in public and private and sent my children to both. The good private schools offer a better education to be sure, but kids who are bright and hard working will do well anywhere. They may not start college with the same background information, but this isn’t an either/or situation. Make the choice that is right for your budget and for your family and child, take them to the library/read to them and show them that education is important to you. Two people can start in different places and end up in the same place, and the reverse is true as well. Unless you’re very wealthy, every student will have to prove themselves in school and then again in the real world. I will challenge the idea that having to navigate dysfunction makes for more capable kids in every situation. Some students will thrive in a smaller, more nurturing environment that builds their confidence and would get discouraged in a larger, less-responsive system, but yes, others will develop more assertiveness. I’m suspicious of anyone who is zero-sum about all of this. I have stronger opinions about virtual learning, which I think fails most kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve taught in public and private and sent my children to both. The good private schools offer a better education to be sure, but kids who are bright and hard working will do well anywhere. They may not start college with the same background information, but this isn’t an either/or situation. Make the choice that is right for your budget and for your family and child, take them to the library/read to them and show them that education is important to you. Two people can start in different places and end up in the same place, and the reverse is true as well. Unless you’re very wealthy, every student will have to prove themselves in school and then again in the real world. I will challenge the idea that having to navigate dysfunction makes for more capable kids in every situation. Some students will thrive in a smaller, more nurturing environment that builds their confidence and would get discouraged in a larger, less-responsive system, but yes, others will develop more assertiveness. I’m suspicious of anyone who is zero-sum about all of this. I have stronger opinions about virtual learning, which I think fails most kids.

Wow! Quite a sensible post. The bottom half of kids at Wilson would no doubt be better off at small, structured private schools but these families generally don’t have the $$$. Life isn’t fair. Instead of bashing public school kids, just be grateful you were able to give your kids a leg up in life. Your kid really isn’t all that special but lucked out in the lottery that is life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

There are too many variables to track long term success. Private school kids often come from wealthy families with important connections. They often will graduate from college and graduate school with no loans. Parents will often buy them a house, etc.
Public school kids more often than not have to figure things out on their own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a troll post. My daughter who went to Wilson is at Yale now. Not a legacy. She certainly works very hard but got all As her first and second semester at Yale. She was not even the valedictorian at Wilson. It was a difficult year for her. Maybe if she went to GDS it would have been easy but she stepped up and handled it just fine. Same for her friends who are at Columbia and Brown. AP exams are not graded by DCPS teachers. They are graded anonymously by AP graders. You have to know your stuff to do well on APs. Wilson is a mixed bag but the top 25% of kids there are very good.

Not top 25%, more like top 10%. Otherwise, your post may be somewhat accurate, but they do, as you pointed out, have a steeper learning curve once they get to college. For the really naturally intelligent ones, like your daughter, they can overcome that in a semester or two. But for those who are getting in for other reasons, you really have to wonder if Ivies are the best places for them. I know a Wilson kid committed to an Ivy for their sport who recently declared they will study something like "bio-medical engineering." Okay. Good luck with that.

As a college professor, I find it hilarious that people seem to believe the class material is somehow more rigorous at ivy league schools. Granted, there are certain majors at certain schools that will push you harder. I'm sure it's harder to do computer science at MIT than at university of alabama. But if we're talking top 100 schools, there is very little difference in the vast majority of majors and courses. Political science class at Yale is not harder than political science class at UT Austin. Math at Cornell is not harder than math at UMD. I have friends who teach these classes and they are literally teaching the same concepts and materials. My friend at Harvard is teaching the exact same class I am teaching at a state school. Like, literally, the exact same thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a troll post. My daughter who went to Wilson is at Yale now. Not a legacy. She certainly works very hard but got all As her first and second semester at Yale. She was not even the valedictorian at Wilson. It was a difficult year for her. Maybe if she went to GDS it would have been easy but she stepped up and handled it just fine. Same for her friends who are at Columbia and Brown. AP exams are not graded by DCPS teachers. They are graded anonymously by AP graders. You have to know your stuff to do well on APs. Wilson is a mixed bag but the top 25% of kids there are very good.

Not top 25%, more like top 10%. Otherwise, your post may be somewhat accurate, but they do, as you pointed out, have a steeper learning curve once they get to college. For the really naturally intelligent ones, like your daughter, they can overcome that in a semester or two. But for those who are getting in for other reasons, you really have to wonder if Ivies are the best places for them. I know a Wilson kid committed to an Ivy for their sport who recently declared they will study something like "bio-medical engineering." Okay. Good luck with that.

What is wrong with you? The kid has the discipline to excel at his/her sport and got in to an Ivy. Nothing here indicates they won’t do great in biomed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

In my small world there is - I know of no Wilson kids getting hired yet am surrounded by kids from the Big 3 who are pulling 250k and up in their late 20s and early 30s.

I stopped reading after the bolded.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

In my small world there is - I know of no Wilson kids getting hired yet am surrounded by kids from the Big 3 who are pulling 250k and up in their late 20s and early 30s.

I stopped reading after the bolded.

Yeah. Surprise, surprise. Kids whose families valued money go into fields that pay a lot. Details at 9:00…

[Anonymous]

Op here.

the point of my post was

1)My high school kid who left DCPS is now doing about 5 times the work in private. It's been a giant step up and a challenge. It's honestly surprised me how big the jump has been. We left DCPS for the challenge because my kid was excelling without every studying and we got it.
This is a good thing.

2)DCPS grading and expectations during the pandemic were even more of a complete joke than usual. My kids got close to (or above) 100% in each class. This current grade (2022) is applying to college with these joke grades. They were based on nothing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

In my small world there is - I know of no Wilson kids getting hired yet am surrounded by kids from the Big 3 who are pulling 250k and up in their late 20s and early 30s.

I don’t understand what this means.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everybody at these top colleges gets the same degree whether you purportedly struggled through or breezed through with all A’s. Seems to me the kids at Wilson get the best deal and the Big 3 parents resent it.

Is there a metric somewhere that tracks the long term success of Big 3 vs. Wilson or similar public high school? Not really interested in who is better at writing term papers but post college real world stats.

In my small world there is - I know of no Wilson kids getting hired yet am surrounded by kids from the Big 3 who are pulling 250k and up in their late 20s and early 30s.

I don’t understand what this means.

It means that PP isn’t very bright and has a small social circle.