If money was no object for you, would you do private instead of public?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If money were no object? I'd buy a great house in Chevy Chase and send my kids to the local MoCo schools there. Why?

First -- our child is several grades ahead of age peers in reading and math. After looking at many private schools it seemed pretty clear that the schools don't do much differentiation of curriculum, and that the selective admissions process still wouldn't necessarily result in a sufficiently large group of peers at DC's academic level. In fact, in the early years, the age requirements meant DC would have had to stay back a year, which would have been a disaster. MCPS, and the schools in that area specifically, have a commitment to differentiation, and there is access to admission only Highly Gifted Centers.

Second, in general I believe public schools can offer as much opportunity as private, depending upon which private/public you are comparing. I believe in public education as long as it is rigorous. I am not so interested in the supposed "social" advantages that private school might offer.

Third, since public schools offer a larger pool of kids, I think there are also more likely to be peers similar to my DC (both in terms of interests and academic abilities) while still exposing DC to diverse racial and socioeconomic groups. The large size of many public schools also offers better opportunities (IMO) for sports and extracurricular activities, particularly in the high school years, and since both my DCs are pretty outgoing, I don't believe that large class size would be to their detriment.

To the poster who crowed about their support of public schools -- I too support public schools (and am a product of them), but not at the expense of my child's school day experience. I can supplement DCs at home and do provide an atmosphere that emphasizes education, but I don't want their day at school to become a wasteland of boredom, with a result that they focus exclusively on the social aspects of school. If my local public school had a poor curriculum, poor teaching, or negative peer behavior, I would move (and did).

I was fortunate that when I decided to dump our local public school and move our kids to something more suitable for them, I had many family members promise to pitch in and cover the cost of their education anywhere. So in a sense money was no object, and my choice after looking around hard was the Chevy Chase/Somerset area.

Ultimately, after settling on this area, money did become a consideration in the sense that I didn't want to accept family help to buy a house. Instead, I found a relatively moderate rental home, and hope to save my pennies and increase my income and buy one day, perhaps when the kids are older and the wider school district boundary permits us to buy in a more reasonably priced neighborhood.

If a private school had offered a particularly good academic match or offered some special option that DC was really interested in, then I might have chosen that, but in the end, I found some public schools that I thought were a better fit for academic reasons.

Interesting. We had the opposite experience. We live in Chevy Chase (not Somerset though), and our DC is also several grades ahead in reading and math. We were specifically told by the principal of the public school that they could in no way guarantee differentiation--they said it depends on staffing, etc. In addition, when we asked if DC could be accommodated in ways that wouldn't at all burden teachers, such as being permitted to read appropriate books individually while the rest of the class was learning to read, we were told no. MoCo's gifted instruction is at the whim of the individual principal in the lower grades, and our local (otherwise well-regarded) school did not seem at all helpful in that regard. We decided to put DC in private school, at great financial strain, where they are truly providing differentiation and DC is thriving.

[Anonymous]

Interesting. We had the opposite experience. We live in Chevy Chase (not Somerset though), and our DC is also several grades ahead in reading and math. We were specifically told by the principal of the public school that they could in no way guarantee differentiation--they said it depends on staffing, etc. In addition, when we asked if DC could be accommodated in ways that wouldn't at all burden teachers, such as being permitted to read appropriate books individually while the rest of the class was learning to read, we were told no. MoCo's gifted instruction is at the whim of the individual principal in the lower grades, and our local (otherwise well-regarded) school did not seem at all helpful in that regard. We decided to put DC in private school, at great financial strain, where they are truly providing differentiation and DC is thriving.



What was your local MoCo school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Duh. Of course, private! And I would have lipo and I would have a breast lift and I would bump out the back of my house in a fab manner and.....

I am right there with ya!! Thanks for the laugh!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Interesting. We had the opposite experience. We live in Chevy Chase (not Somerset though), and our DC is also several grades ahead in reading and math. We were specifically told by the principal of the public school that they could in no way guarantee differentiation--they said it depends on staffing, etc. In addition, when we asked if DC could be accommodated in ways that wouldn't at all burden teachers, such as being permitted to read appropriate books individually while the rest of the class was learning to read, we were told no. MoCo's gifted instruction is at the whim of the individual principal in the lower grades, and our local (otherwise well-regarded) school did not seem at all helpful in that regard. We decided to put DC in private school, at great financial strain, where they are truly providing differentiation and DC is thriving.

What was your local MoCo school?

PP- What private school does your child attend?

[Anonymous]

I'm the PP, but I don't feel comfortable sharing our local public school or DC's private school.

[Anonymous]

What does it mean to say "money is no object."

As an older mom, I ask you:

1. Does it mean that you can guarantee NOW that you won't be a burden to your kids in old age

2. Does it mean that if you lost your job TODAY that you would still be able to fund college?

3. Does it mean that if you lost your job TODAY you could still pay for graduate school, provide your kid an advance on a house, take great extended family vacations around the work, provide a down payment on your child's career, or so on?


In short, you need to save for the unexpected.

[Anonymous]

3. Does it mean that if you lost your job TODAY you could still pay for graduate school, provide your kid an advance on a house, take great extended family vacations around the work, provide a down payment on your child's career, or so on?

I was with you until this. A lot of parents would actually find this set of financial goals akin to Advanced Helicoptering, harmful extended apron strings, what have you. Generally unhealthy. I'm trying really hard to think of a single friend whose parents paid for their grad school, AND their down payment, AND sent them around the world, AND got their business off the ground for them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

3. Does it mean that if you lost your job TODAY you could still pay for graduate school, provide your kid an advance on a house, take great extended family vacations around the work, provide a down payment on your child's career, or so on?

I was with you until this. A lot of parents would actually find this set of financial goals akin to Advanced Helicoptering, harmful extended apron strings, what have you. Generally unhealthy. I'm trying really hard to think of a single friend whose parents paid for their grad school, AND their down payment, AND sent them around the world, AND got their business off the ground for them.

But I wouldn't discount the previous items. So many people live near the margins, and our conceptions of what we and our children "need" can be broader than reality would requie or prudence would dictate. There are tradeoffs for all of us but the very wealthy. I would not pay for law school for my daughter (being a lawyer, I know that in my profession one can pay back the loans), but I'd probably want to provide her a financial cushion if she chose education or social work school. I wouldn't subsidize her home, but I'd want to contribute some $$ to her children's college funds. I also wouldn't want to paint myself into a corner where I could never choose to work part time if her needs or our family's needs required it.

[Anonymous]

If money were no object, I'd want my child to go to Sandy Spring Friends. But alas, it is, so it's a cheaper private school instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here...not necessarily. For whatever reason, there are folks that prefer public or private. Not sure why, based on what I've seen. I'm venting because I just feel that all kids, no matter the financial background of their families deserve a private school level education, AND shouldn't have to sacrifice their first born to pay for it.

I am guessing this is the person who makes $200k and wants financial aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here...not necessarily. For whatever reason, there are folks that prefer public or private. Not sure why, based on what I've seen. I'm venting because I just feel that all kids, no matter the financial background of their families deserve a private school level education, AND shouldn't have to sacrifice their first born to pay for it.

I am guessing this is the person who makes $200k and wants financial aid.

I'm one of those people who prefers public for my daughter, and I think that the "private level of education" to which you are referring is illusory. The public school in my neighborhood is outstanding, and I've seen many private schools that do not compare favorably to it. So you like private schools-- good for you. But my child is getting what children "deserve" at our public school. All children deserve an excellent education. That does not necessarily mean private school.