Cons of private school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wish I had dug a little deeper and realized how little they push the kids in math.

I stupidly went into this thinking that smaller class size means my kid gets a lot more attention than in public. Actually my kid is getting a little bit more attention, because all of the families are expecting their kid (and themselves as parents/consumers) to get a lot more attention than in public. I also stupidly thought that all the kids at our not-that-competitive private would be bright and have no major issues, when in fact many of them are at this school precisely *because* they need extra help and were falling behind.

This was the big surprise for me. I pulled my public school kid thinking they would be more challenged and surrounded by better behaved kids and it was exactly the opposite. Be very careful where you go. We had lots of behavioral problems - including one girl who basically should be institutionalized yet was allowed to remain in the class terrorizing all of the boys and girls and barely passing - mostly Ds and Cs. But she would not have survived public school - she would have drowned - so we were "graced" with her presence.

Yes! And the parent denial of special needs. Oh, she just needs a smaller class size. Oh, he's an active boy. No problems here. In the public system, disruptive kids are often identified as ADHD or ASD and sometimes the parents try private school to avoid a diagnosis. So the kid struggles. It's hard to watch.

We had the opposite experience. Public avoids identifying kids because it makes more work for them; private identifies it right away and strongly recommends private evaluations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Conspicuous consumption competition. The other kids have designer this and limited edition that and all the latest tech. It’s impossible to keep up. We preach non-materialism at home and our kids are mostly believers, but having constant conversations about reigning in jealousy and us always having to say no really drains me. And it drains the kids.

I could have written this exact statement. I have noticed this too at our child's private middle school. It pains me bc I grew up in a family that struggled to make ends meet, and I worked very hard to get to where we are today. Our child thinks we are poor, whereas we have no trouble paying for food, shelter, and discretionary expenses within reason. Our teaching of non-materialism isn't sticking the way we had hoped, though maybe this is just a phase.

Also, the kids live throughout the DC area so it's really hard to get together outside school.

We might switch back to public - each has its pros and cons.

Or you could try a less wealth-oriented private school.

[Anonymous]

Transportation: I hate driving. In public, I was grateful that my DC could leave the house on his own power, catch a bus and return home the same way almost every day.
Clubs, Sports: The downside of a smaller school is that they just don't have as many options. Really hard to predict what a child will be interested in from one year to the next.
Friends far away: We live on one side of DC, some of his friends live on the other side. Really tough to plan a 1-hr round trip drive just to hang out for a few hours. Public transport is great, but it doesn't always go where you want it to...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kids of major donors get a pass when they kick your kid in the shins….

I think we were at the same school.

[Anonymous]

I was a MoCo public school kid many years ago and my mom taught at top MoCo public school (now retired). My husband and his family are die hard for private schools, even though we live in MoCo with great public schools. We are lucky to have family help pay for a top private school. I figured it would be hard to look that gift horse in the mouth, but the cons have been surprising to me:

-no real diversity. Plenty of wokeness - which is generally good, but it feels more like they're conditioning kids to see lower middle and poor as "others" to be pitied and donated to, NOT actually developing any true understanding or empathy which is a HUGE con. It is important to develop social responsibility and a "give back" ethic, it should be with empathy and understanding. Maybe in the upper grades that comes in?
- keeping my kids (one in particular) from becoming a spoiled brat is now 1000000 times harder.
- smaller classes does not mean effective teaching. We are spending additional thousands on a tutor (who finds teaching our kid easy, so not really sure what happened in classes). Obv this is one that's highly depending on the student.
- It feels like people are there more for the reputation and networking, not actually the "values" the school is known for.
- Feeling like it's SOOO not worth the $ since we live in MoCo - is worth the $ if you'd be at most DC public schools. I should mention that I really don't like "brands" where people flock without regard to the quality or function, so it is reasonable to say that I don't think the school is really all that fabulous (not bad, but does live up to my expectations). I'm also not so rich that I don't have to work and/or have no sense of $. Again, this one is probably VERY student specific
-Later on it'll be harder to get into college from this school vs a public school (unless they're really top of the class and even if I assume kids are capable, they are not looking like they're quite that motivated and I am not going to be crazy pushy)

[Anonymous]

You tend to get stuck in an little bubble and start to believe outlandish things, like $400k being a middle-class salary.

[Anonymous]

Teachers that are uncertified and/or can't get better paying jobs in public school

[Anonymous]

Very happy with our private. Otherwise we wouldn’t pay the $$$ to send our child there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was a MoCo public school kid many years ago and my mom taught at top MoCo public school (now retired). My husband and his family are die hard for private schools, even though we live in MoCo with great public schools. We are lucky to have family help pay for a top private school. I figured it would be hard to look that gift horse in the mouth, but the cons have been surprising to me:

-no real diversity. Plenty of wokeness - which is generally good, but it feels more like they're conditioning kids to see lower middle and poor as "others" to be pitied and donated to, NOT actually developing any true understanding or empathy which is a HUGE con. It is important to develop social responsibility and a "give back" ethic, it should be with empathy and understanding. Maybe in the upper grades that comes in?
- keeping my kids (one in particular) from becoming a spoiled brat is now 1000000 times harder.
- smaller classes does not mean effective teaching. We are spending additional thousands on a tutor (who finds teaching our kid easy, so not really sure what happened in classes). Obv this is one that's highly depending on the student.
- It feels like people are there more for the reputation and networking, not actually the "values" the school is known for.
- Feeling like it's SOOO not worth the $ since we live in MoCo - is worth the $ if you'd be at most DC public schools. I should mention that I really don't like "brands" where people flock without regard to the quality or function, so it is reasonable to say that I don't think the school is really all that fabulous (not bad, but does live up to my expectations). I'm also not so rich that I don't have to work and/or have no sense of $. Again, this one is probably VERY student specific
-Later on it'll be harder to get into college from this school vs a public school (unless they're really top of the class and even if I assume kids are capable, they are not looking like they're quite that motivated and I am not going to be crazy pushy)

My goodness..You're not invited to the pancake breakfast anymore

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

This. I'm not saying the way they teach is bad- but there's little pressure to keep up with the pedagogy and best practices. I like DD's teachers, but I haven't yet seen the kind of creative, innovative ideas that we saw and see in public. All these kids will be fine and they will go on to good high schools and colleges, so there just isn't the pressure to do better.

I beg to differ. In our private school in the South this year kids are
- creating a podcast about some current social issue, learning how to write scripts, public speaking, research,
- for Global Studies they will go to DC, visit Holocaust museum (they will have learned about Holocaust in class), visit an embassy and the Treasury
- in design engineering they pick a project (build a mouse trap, for instance), do the design, make a lost of materials, get the materials and build it using hammers, saws, power tools, etc.
- for history last year they did a mock trial over Christopher Columbus and had to play roles of persecution, lawyers, witnesses, jury.

Teachers go out of the way to make learning fun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teachers go out of the way to make learning fun.

This has absolutely been DD's experience, both at a so-called Big 3 and before that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Warped perspective on the world wrt socioeconomic situations

Depends on the school.

[Anonymous]

You aren’t going to get actionable feedback here, OP, because this is really a question about the specific schools in question. My kids went to public elementary, public middle, private middle, and private HS. Overall the educational quality of the private schools was markedly better, but that’s just the specific school experience my kids had. I think sending my kids to private has been one of the best parenting decisions I’ve ever made, but there are also parents who feel that moving their kids to public was one of the best parenting decisions they’ve made. It is super dependent on the kids and schools involved.

With that background, here are the negatives to private that we found aside from the eye-watering tuition cost:

Geographically diverse. It is hard having kids miles away from each other. I miss the neighborhood feel of the public schools. Even in middle school and high school, this matters.

Lack of socioeconomic diversity. There is plenty of racial and gender diversity, but less socioeconomic diversity. There is generous financial aid at the school, but that tends to be reserved for kids who are absolute rock stars. The school has very competitive admissions and anyone who makes it through the admissions gauntlet is good, but the kids who are receiving scholarships tend to be exceptional.

For my kid with dyslexia, it’s mostly been a better experience, but while the school does very well at supports, we don’t have access to the on-site dyslexia specialist we had at the public school (on the other hand, my kid isn’t suffering any more under the tenure-protected teacher who routinely mocked his writing in front of the entire class).

It’s very hard to get As at the high school and I worry about what that will do at college admissions time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow. With everything said above, what exactly is the point of private school? Seems like it’s worse than a good public school.

Depends on your perspective. Where I come from-- there is no such thing as a "good" public school.

[Anonymous]

Wait till you hear cons for public schools.

In our area public schools have 90% graduation rate and 60% reading proficiency.