Open House - do you learn anything new from these?

[Anonymous]

Open houses are more important that DCUM’s opinion, which you should take it with a grain of salt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a bit biased because I am one of the parents who helps out at our school's tours, but I think an advantage of going to the Open House is talking to the parents that are there (if there are current parents on the tour). Obviously you are going to be talking to parents who like the school and choose to stay , but I think it is interesting to hear why parents like the school, and see if it aligns with what you are looking for. Also, I agree with the previous poster that tours during the school day are a nice way to see what the environment is like in the school. My kids' school takes the tour through the entire school, not just the ECE area, which I think also helps give a bigger picture of the school

I think there's merit to seeing and hearing from the parents. We severely downgraded a school that other Hill families think is god's gift because the entire parent group was yoga pant wearing SAHM. I am certain that was not ALL of the parents, but the fact that the school thought nothing of having that be the face of the school and that the yoga cabal had so much power was not a good fit for us.

To be clear, yoga moms, please don't bother to reply defending your fashion choices or SAHMs. That is NOT what's happening here. The point is not that there is anything wrong with it, merely that it was not a good fit for me or my kid or a comfortable environment for our family and that I discovered that at an open house.

[Anonymous]

I went to an open house and when the Head of School spoke every example of interacting with a student that she described was negative. This was for elementary: "If I see your child with shoes untied, I will tell them "untied shoes are not success!" That was a no for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a bit biased because I am one of the parents who helps out at our school's tours, but I think an advantage of going to the Open House is talking to the parents that are there (if there are current parents on the tour). Obviously you are going to be talking to parents who like the school and choose to stay , but I think it is interesting to hear why parents like the school, and see if it aligns with what you are looking for. Also, I agree with the previous poster that tours during the school day are a nice way to see what the environment is like in the school. My kids' school takes the tour through the entire school, not just the ECE area, which I think also helps give a bigger picture of the school

I think there's merit to seeing and hearing from the parents. We severely downgraded a school that other Hill families think is god's gift because the entire parent group was yoga pant wearing SAHM. I am certain that was not ALL of the parents, but the fact that the school thought nothing of having that be the face of the school and that the yoga cabal had so much power was not a good fit for us.

To be clear, yoga moms, please don't bother to reply defending your fashion choices or SAHMs. That is NOT what's happening here. The point is not that there is anything wrong with it, merely that it was not a good fit for me or my kid or a comfortable environment for our family and that I discovered that at an open house.

How did you know they were SAHM? Anyway, we didn’t even add one to the list after the open house because parents acted like it was a private school and we couldn’t imagine been around people like that.

[Anonymous]

It's really the only way to get an accurate sense of the facility. Our IB has two gyms (with natural light and wood floor) plus an auditorium and cafeteria. Other schools say they have those things but really it's a multi purpose room that is hard to schedule. If you care about physical activity, the facility matters.