How's the year been? (Asking as we debate leaving private for public)

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I'm the OP. Several responses have been helpful - thank you everyone. To the person who said I'm not confident, etc. - yup, you're right. I'm not. This is a hard choice for us. In any case, I feel like public options have been fine for most. I wonder if it will surround my older one (rising 6th) with phones... but maybe that will happen anywhere.

My 4th grader in a downcounty public school has a ouple of classmates with phones... but on the other hand, my 7th grader, who like my 4th grader doesn't have a phone, has other friends without phones. If you're coming from a school with a strict no screen policy, yes, you'll absolutely see more phones in MCPS, but it's hardly an epidemic in my experience. If your kdis don't have phones they won't be outcasts or unicorns.

Thank you for this!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm the OP. Several responses have been helpful - thank you everyone. To the person who said I'm not confident, etc. - yup, you're right. I'm not. This is a hard choice for us. In any case, I feel like public options have been fine for most. I wonder if it will surround my older one (rising 6th) with phones... but maybe that will happen anywhere.

At every school, many kids get them in 6th. For us, it was to communicate with us with activities/pick up. It is for our needs, not our child's needs and we put restrictions on it. If its abused, we take it. Its really no different than having an iPad or any other electronics.

[Anonymous]

My kids are finishing 4th and 6th. They've learned a lot, compared to the last 2 years. There weren't very many teacher absences or disruptions except in January. The 4th grader especially has had an awesome year. 6th grade hasn't been great socially - feels like the pandemic has deteriorated kids' ability to treat each other nicely. My friends who are teachers are exhausted by mental health issues and discipline issues they have to contend with - it's been a rough year for them.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:This year hasn’t been great for us. My kid did fine in the pandemic because we heavily supplemented. That meant DC was above grade level this year, especially considering learning loss in the pandemic. Result has been that DC is not progressing at all this year—scores are actually down from last year. Basically kids above grade level are ignored in class. The one exception is compacted math.

I would stay in private if you can afford it.

You are assuming that advanced kids are taught above grade level
At private when that is not always the case. So much depends on the private and public options in question.

We tried to switch to private for this year for MS. The ones with openings/would consider our child (or questionable openings where they might have some if they want your child) could not do the same math track and we'd have to pay extra for it or get a tutor/outside class. They start Algebra much later.

It depends on the school. My small Catholic parochial (under $10K per year) has several eighth grade students doing Geometry. Last year there were a few kids doing Algebra II in 8th. This is a tiny school with only one class per grade. It's been great having my daughter in small math and reading groups throughout her K-8 experience. There are only 9 students in her math class.

Catholic parochial’s are some of the bottom of the barrel and I am a Catholic. The kids you mentioned doing geometry I bet wouldn’t be able to in public and guarantee they are learning this from supplementing out.

Nope. My daughter is one of them. Never had to supplement anything and she has to work hard at it. She was lucky to be in person through the 2020-21 year, so she is not behind in math like the majority of MCPS and most public schools for that matter.

My kid is in a well regarded private and her old public school peers are AHEAD of her in math. So, no, all public school kids aren't behind in everything. Find some other reasons to help you believe it is worth writing that check.

You should unenroll then. Listen, I am not here to defend each and every private school. Just pointing out that generalizations should not be made. My kid is coming out if 8th grade unscathed. She scored in 99.9% in her standardized placement test for HS and many of her classmates did as well or in the 90s. I am saying that the schools that remained open for the most part have students who are well prepared and have less incidents of mental illness. Also our schools is not dealing with violence or other misbehaviors. Lots of learning happening vs. distractions and teachers giving everyone a pass.

And my kid came from PUBLIC school and scored in the high 90 percentile range for her ERBs when in private school - higher than her private school peers. Your kids test scores aren't impressive. You're just telling me what your daughter's private school peers scored. Do you know what the public school kids scored? Do you think Mr. IT/Scientist/Highly Paid Federal Government Worker's son and daughter really got creamed by your Catholic High School kid? Probably not. If your daughter really scored that well, she'll be in good company with the other PUBLIC school kids who scored just as well.

I just told you she was 99.9%. Doesn't get any better than that. Nice try though.

The days of MCPS students scoring well on standardized tests are over. Unless they are significantly subsidized, they aren't going to be impressive. The MAP scores are a disaster.

This is just a dumb statement. There are 158K students in MCPS. If we just died a general curve with 25% scoring below, 50% at level, and 25% above level, MCPS would still have more students scoring in the highest percentile. Stop the generalizations.

+100 I think some of the PPs don't know basic stats.
Also, a better comparison would be the MAP scores of the private score compared to the MAP scores of MCPS students with similar household income.
(The fact that you have the ability to pull your child from public, and send them to private, is something many parents in our district cannot do. Also, many of those same parents who cannot afford private also cannot telework, oversee virtual learning, or try to bridge learning gaps via enrichment/tutoring).
Maybe try to make an apples to apples comparison.