Stay at TT or Retire to Suburbs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On a very basic level, it just takes a lot of time away from learning and skills. Kids spend a lot of mental energy trying to answer these big questions about how they may or may not need to fix a world they don’t even know yet. They aren’t naturally interested in it, and it kind of deadens their enthusiasm. Would you want to be stuck in an HR lecture all day?

It also turns the admin focus and the teaches focus away from the individual kids and their achievement. If a kid wins a math tournament, instead of it being like woah, look at that, good for you, let’s get more kids up there with you — it becomes a discussion among adults about what that child’s race says about whether they as teachers are racist or not.

It also means spending a lot of money for a group of educational professionals who aren’t in the classroom and don’t know the kids but have a lot of power to tell teachers how to teach. It just creates a lot of busy work for the faculty and mainly benefits adults who like meetings.

Mississippi is leading the nation at teaching poor children of all races reading, writing and math and it’s doing none of this. How that isn’t equity is a mystery to me, but it isn’t according to the people who are really into equity.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the entire point of TT is for status and networking. It goes along with the country house, classic six and charity events.

It’s debatable whether the education is better than a suburban public and probably not. Your kid is simply more likely to befriend someone whose parent is a billionaire and travels via PJ.

One issue I see is that kids at NYC privates don’t have PT jobs. A PT job is instrumental in teaching life skills. It’s a humbling experience and important. Given AI, I’m more focused on my kids learning life skills than some elite resume.

FWIW I attended a selective private and then a public HS. I didn’t think either was really better just different. The public had more diverse makeup. Not racial but socioeconomic and the kids were meaner. Better athletics and math. At the private I was constantly told how special I was and a lot of brainwashing about public schools and how terrible they are.

I went to a top ranked public school in NJ. In no way are public schools able to match the quality of private school education, especially now with the focus on equity (with the possible exception of science magnet school). Of course, there are very good private schools in the suburbs as well. Presumably your budget will cover that as well.

Genuinely curious, how has the focus on equity changed curriculums in public? I've heard anecdotally that standards keep on getting lowered but have no direct experience with this nor have spoken to other parents in depth about this. Was the top ranked school district you attended similar to a Summit, Princeton, Mountain Lakes, Tenafly, etc.?

Frankly what you're describing is much, much worse at private schools than at public schools, and worse at fancy suburban public schools than urban ones. The place where your kid and their teachers will spend the *least* amount of time worrying about equity is a DOE public school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes I think it’s fair to consider that upper level calculus is not a foundation to succeed in life. I’ve never taken anything beyond calculus AB and I guarantee many would consider me successful. We’re really splitting hairs here on how important these types of math classes are. And in any event, most of the TTs have them so it’s moot.

Anonymous wrote:Maybe, but of the basic things you should or want for your kids out of school is math. Reading may only be the more important basic skill set. Are we really going to argue about whether math should be an important part of a solid educational foundation to succeed at life?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Math, like music or a language, is best taught as quickly as possible as fast as possible. True quants think the math at most of these private schools is absolute bullshit and enroll their kids in Russian math. I thought it was achievement culture that they did this, but it’s truly not. They want their kids taught math in a way that works and encourage individual skills. These private schools don’t do differential learning until way too late to cultivate longterm talent.
There is so much educational research from other counties and other states on how the way we now teach math doesn’t lead to longterm success. Singapore has great math scores, but the Singapore math they teach in these schools is sold by one corporation. Its research backs its curriculum but it’s like edtech — it’s not vetted by an outside agency. Speyer and it sounds like Horace Mann are the only two I know that seem to know how to teach math to accelerated learners. All people at these schools use to judge the quality of their kid’s education is exmissions to HYP.

Or maybe they and their kids don't care much about math. Can you believe that different people have different interests? Nuts, right?

Agree with this. I took the most basic calculus and people would definitely consider me successful in my career. But my career has nothing to do with upper level math skills.

I think upper level math skills are really important for students for whom math is their “thing.” Or students who want to continue to college where math is a must have skill.

I don't think anyone would argue that proficiency with calculus is critical to success. However the way that math is taught in LS is borderline disastrous. Kids abroad, especially in Asia or Eastern Europe, start getting taught some basic elements of Algebra, probability / combinatorics, geometry, etc. starting in third grade. Meanwhile it feels like most schools in NY have barely begun to cover division. Compared to 20 or 30 years ago the curriculums of many countries abroad have gotten much more advanced while across the US it feels like it's all regressed. Not sure if it benefits our kids to be satisfied with any curriculum where they are 2 to 3 years behind a peer in China, Korea or Singapore starting from when they are 8 or 9.

[Anonymous]

1000 percent.

I want things like my kids being able to do sums in their heads. LS math in this city is terrible especially at TT schools. If I’d known, I might have just gone to the local public.

[Anonymous]

Hard agree — I wrote this and the school I experienced it at was TT.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:On a very basic level, it just takes a lot of time away from learning and skills. Kids spend a lot of mental energy trying to answer these big questions about how they may or may not need to fix a world they don’t even know yet. They aren’t naturally interested in it, and it kind of deadens their enthusiasm. Would you want to be stuck in an HR lecture all day?

It also turns the admin focus and the teaches focus away from the individual kids and their achievement. If a kid wins a math tournament, instead of it being like woah, look at that, good for you, let’s get more kids up there with you — it becomes a discussion among adults about what that child’s race says about whether they as teachers are racist or not.

It also means spending a lot of money for a group of educational professionals who aren’t in the classroom and don’t know the kids but have a lot of power to tell teachers how to teach. It just creates a lot of busy work for the faculty and mainly benefits adults who like meetings.

Mississippi is leading the nation at teaching poor children of all races reading, writing and math and it’s doing none of this. How that isn’t equity is a mystery to me, but it isn’t according to the people who are really into equity.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the entire point of TT is for status and networking. It goes along with the country house, classic six and charity events.

It’s debatable whether the education is better than a suburban public and probably not. Your kid is simply more likely to befriend someone whose parent is a billionaire and travels via PJ.

One issue I see is that kids at NYC privates don’t have PT jobs. A PT job is instrumental in teaching life skills. It’s a humbling experience and important. Given AI, I’m more focused on my kids learning life skills than some elite resume.

FWIW I attended a selective private and then a public HS. I didn’t think either was really better just different. The public had more diverse makeup. Not racial but socioeconomic and the kids were meaner. Better athletics and math. At the private I was constantly told how special I was and a lot of brainwashing about public schools and how terrible they are.

I went to a top ranked public school in NJ. In no way are public schools able to match the quality of private school education, especially now with the focus on equity (with the possible exception of science magnet school). Of course, there are very good private schools in the suburbs as well. Presumably your budget will cover that as well.

Genuinely curious, how has the focus on equity changed curriculums in public? I've heard anecdotally that standards keep on getting lowered but have no direct experience with this nor have spoken to other parents in depth about this. Was the top ranked school district you attended similar to a Summit, Princeton, Mountain Lakes, Tenafly, etc.?

Frankly what you're describing is much, much worse at private schools than at public schools, and worse at fancy suburban public schools than urban ones. The place where your kid and their teachers will spend the *least* amount of time worrying about equity is a DOE public school.

[Anonymous]

Which of the TT/2T schools have notably strong or weak math curriculum?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:On a very basic level, it just takes a lot of time away from learning and skills. Kids spend a lot of mental energy trying to answer these big questions about how they may or may not need to fix a world they don’t even know yet. They aren’t naturally interested in it, and it kind of deadens their enthusiasm. Would you want to be stuck in an HR lecture all day?

It also turns the admin focus and the teaches focus away from the individual kids and their achievement. If a kid wins a math tournament, instead of it being like woah, look at that, good for you, let’s get more kids up there with you — it becomes a discussion among adults about what that child’s race says about whether they as teachers are racist or not.

It also means spending a lot of money for a group of educational professionals who aren’t in the classroom and don’t know the kids but have a lot of power to tell teachers how to teach. It just creates a lot of busy work for the faculty and mainly benefits adults who like meetings.

Mississippi is leading the nation at teaching poor children of all races reading, writing and math and it’s doing none of this. How that isn’t equity is a mystery to me, but it isn’t according to the people who are really into equity.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the entire point of TT is for status and networking. It goes along with the country house, classic six and charity events.

It’s debatable whether the education is better than a suburban public and probably not. Your kid is simply more likely to befriend someone whose parent is a billionaire and travels via PJ.

One issue I see is that kids at NYC privates don’t have PT jobs. A PT job is instrumental in teaching life skills. It’s a humbling experience and important. Given AI, I’m more focused on my kids learning life skills than some elite resume.

FWIW I attended a selective private and then a public HS. I didn’t think either was really better just different. The public had more diverse makeup. Not racial but socioeconomic and the kids were meaner. Better athletics and math. At the private I was constantly told how special I was and a lot of brainwashing about public schools and how terrible they are.

I went to a top ranked public school in NJ. In no way are public schools able to match the quality of private school education, especially now with the focus on equity (with the possible exception of science magnet school). Of course, there are very good private schools in the suburbs as well. Presumably your budget will cover that as well.

Genuinely curious, how has the focus on equity changed curriculums in public? I've heard anecdotally that standards keep on getting lowered but have no direct experience with this nor have spoken to other parents in depth about this. Was the top ranked school district you attended similar to a Summit, Princeton, Mountain Lakes, Tenafly, etc.?

Frankly what you're describing is much, much worse at private schools than at public schools, and worse at fancy suburban public schools than urban ones. The place where your kid and their teachers will spend the *least* amount of time worrying about equity is a DOE public school.

So not true. Public school have been abandoning most gifted and advanced classes and even tracking for math and language arts ability at lower and middle school level for over a decade now

[Anonymous]

I think the depressing answer is it is a problem in both in NYC. It is not either — it’s both. One just costs more than the other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:On a very basic level, it just takes a lot of time away from learning and skills. Kids spend a lot of mental energy trying to answer these big questions about how they may or may not need to fix a world they don’t even know yet. They aren’t naturally interested in it, and it kind of deadens their enthusiasm. Would you want to be stuck in an HR lecture all day?

It also turns the admin focus and the teaches focus away from the individual kids and their achievement. If a kid wins a math tournament, instead of it being like woah, look at that, good for you, let’s get more kids up there with you — it becomes a discussion among adults about what that child’s race says about whether they as teachers are racist or not.

It also means spending a lot of money for a group of educational professionals who aren’t in the classroom and don’t know the kids but have a lot of power to tell teachers how to teach. It just creates a lot of busy work for the faculty and mainly benefits adults who like meetings.

Mississippi is leading the nation at teaching poor children of all races reading, writing and math and it’s doing none of this. How that isn’t equity is a mystery to me, but it isn’t according to the people who are really into equity.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems to me the entire point of TT is for status and networking. It goes along with the country house, classic six and charity events.

It’s debatable whether the education is better than a suburban public and probably not. Your kid is simply more likely to befriend someone whose parent is a billionaire and travels via PJ.

One issue I see is that kids at NYC privates don’t have PT jobs. A PT job is instrumental in teaching life skills. It’s a humbling experience and important. Given AI, I’m more focused on my kids learning life skills than some elite resume.

FWIW I attended a selective private and then a public HS. I didn’t think either was really better just different. The public had more diverse makeup. Not racial but socioeconomic and the kids were meaner. Better athletics and math. At the private I was constantly told how special I was and a lot of brainwashing about public schools and how terrible they are.

I went to a top ranked public school in NJ. In no way are public schools able to match the quality of private school education, especially now with the focus on equity (with the possible exception of science magnet school). Of course, there are very good private schools in the suburbs as well. Presumably your budget will cover that as well.

Genuinely curious, how has the focus on equity changed curriculums in public? I've heard anecdotally that standards keep on getting lowered but have no direct experience with this nor have spoken to other parents in depth about this. Was the top ranked school district you attended similar to a Summit, Princeton, Mountain Lakes, Tenafly, etc.?

Frankly what you're describing is much, much worse at private schools than at public schools, and worse at fancy suburban public schools than urban ones. The place where your kid and their teachers will spend the *least* amount of time worrying about equity is a DOE public school.

So not true. Public school have been abandoning most gifted and advanced classes and even tracking for math and language arts ability at lower and middle school level for over a decade now

I said "what you're describing" which was specifically kids being "stuck in an HR lecture all day." Which is definitely worse in private schools than anywhere else.

As far as tracking... between them my kids have attended 4 different public schools, 2 in the city and 2 in the suburbs, and all of them did a great deal of tracking and were unapologetic about it. Hell, IIRC even San Francisco had to turn around and drop their much publicized plan to cancel 8th grade honors algebra after parents got angry with them.

[Anonymous]

Have an accepted offer on a house in the burb. Moment of truth. Pull the ripcord or no?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have an accepted offer on a house in the burb. Moment of truth. Pull the ripcord or no?

My youngest is about to graduate from HS. I’m glad I stuck it out in the city. It’s a great place to be a teen.