People who ruin neighborhoods (like tkpk) by putting their kids in private school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At least they are supposedly decent neighbors, no crime, no noise and eye sores, and their children don’t create the challenges for public schools you mention in your OP.
Why is your frustration not directed at people who are exactly the root of the problems that your public schools face?
My kid goes to public but if I could afford it I would send him to private of course.

OP would prefer poorer, disruptive neighbors apparently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, my 3.5 year-old DD can read sentences, sing many different songs in full, tell elaborate stories of events that occurred last week/month/year with accuracy and can spell out almost any word out loud. I am already dreading that we live in a place with a 9/1 cutoff, and she was born on 9/5, so she is years away from attending K.

She would not be well-served by attending our local public, surrounded by kids who’ve never used scissors and can’t read or write yet.

This post makes no sense and is possibly a troll?

If you are worried about cut-offs, are you planning on public? Privates tend to be less rigid about age cut-offs and most privates I've interacted with would view an advanced child who was 4 days past the cut off as an obvious candidate for early admission if there are no social maturity concerns. There are even a decent number of public schools who would allow it.

Also the list of achievements for the 3 year old are weird? Reading full sentences at that age is unusual and very advanced, but singing a song from memory? Super common and many kids that age have crazy good short term memory because of how the brain develops. Being able to spell a word out loud confuses me... do you mean she can look at a word and correctly identify all the letters? That's not that advanced for a preschooler (a year of preschool with some focus on letter recognition will get you there) and I'd of course expect a child who can read full sentences to do that. But if you mean you can just give her any word and she will spell it correctly from memory and simply figure it out? That would be considered highly advanced, not simply above average but extremely unusual for even a 1st or 2nd grader because of the way written language skills are developed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When my kids went to public in DC, the school was hostile to parent volunteering, tracking, parent advocacy, reducing screen time, nutritional changes in the school lunches and increasing recess. Now my child attends a private more aligned with our educational beliefs.

This, except FCPS. I was ideologically committed to public school and specifically to our diverse local school. And we had a nice community there that I do miss. But we left for private to avoid huge classes, constant screen tme, no arts program to speak of, insufficient outdoor time, and my kid getting ignored because she wasn't behind. A nice benefit is that our left leaning private can talk about social justice issues and civil rights without somebody throwing a fit.

[Anonymous]

I hear you, op.

It’s particularly irritating when my social justice warrior colleagues correct me for using a word in an effort to question my street cred when they send their kids to fancy private schools while I’m walking the walk by sending my kids to public schools.

You need to realize your neighbors opted for your zip code to save money and shave time off their commute; both are critical when going the private school route.

[Anonymous]

OP, if you’re living in a neighborhood of $1.5M+ homes, assume most kids there will attend private.

[Anonymous]

OP - our Bethesda neighborhood is 50/50 public private. Kids play together after school all the time. Sure that will change as they get older but oh well.

Sounds like you need help finding friends? Nothing to do with schools and everything to do with your crappy attitude. Maybe that’s why you don’t have a sense of community.

[Anonymous]

I also hear you OP. I’m surprised though that you didn’t cite magnet schools. My kids went to an elementary school with a language immersion program. About 95% of those kids came from SS/TP/Wheaton and were white.

[Anonymous]

Clearly OP has elementary school kids. Lol.

[Anonymous]

I totally agree, OP. Public schools in those types of neighborhoods need the economic diversity so the parents with disposable time and imcome can volunteer and donate to fundraisers and help all the families along. That’s how it is at my child’s elementary school, which has a 40% FARMs rate (we have $1.5 million homes and subsidized apartments nearby).

[Anonymous]

OP doesn’t understand that a community functions best when there is a diversity of people with a diversity of beliefs and life choices, including where kids go to school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:More of a vent, but i am uttterly frustrated by people with money who move into nice MC neighborhoods like tkpk or silver spring with relatively good schools to get bigger houses and then choose to put their precious kids in private schools.

We are trying to build a community and bring the schools up and these people create a bad trend of pulling a whole group of UMC kids out of the public schools because they cannot handle the diversity and challenges of public schools. All while claiming to be left leaning and to have a social compass. But that is pure white flight. It is depressing. And they dont even seem to see how political and impactful their choice is.

I really wish they stayed out of my city and went to live next to the private schools they send their kids to.

I owe it to my kids to give them the best education possible. The needs of my kids comes before the needs of the public schools. You can have my tax money, but you can't have my kids. Sorry not sorry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I get where you are coming from OP, but I'd just give up on this argument. Focus on the people who actually are using the public schools and make the best environment you can. People who will jump to private if the local schools are not what them by are not going to be guilted into sending their kids to public for you. Even some of the most progressive UMC/rich people I know ultimately will tell you that it is not worth it to sacrifice their individual child's education to improve public schools for everyone. You will not change their minds, and rants like this only further alienate them.

Make the schools as good as you can. Some parents with other options will see it and take a chance on the schools -- the ones most open to it, the ones who value neighborhood schools and diversity. As the schools improve, you'll get more and more of them. Eventually people will send their kids to the public schools without even thinking about it, and some will even claim to have helped make those schools great. You will know the truth -- that they only showed up when the hard work was done and their kids could be guaranteed great facilities, access to top notch teachers and programs, robust after school and enrichment programming, etc.

You will never change their minds in the interim.

OP here, i know you are right. What is frustrating for TKPK is that i feel the trajectory is now downwards because we are starting to attract people who buy 1.5M$ homes . For the past 20 years the school trajectory was upward, just the mechanism you describe, little by little more and more people realized the public school could work and they joined.

And now that TKPK has good schools, richer people are coming because they see it as a symbol of "safe neighborhhod" that has the plus of bieng close in, but they come with the budget and mindset for private, which can ultimately send the schools back down....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP doesn’t understand that a community functions best when there is a diversity of people with a diversity of beliefs and life choices, including where kids go to school.

OP here, stay on topic please and no need to worry about me, i have plenty of friends

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP doesn’t understand that a community functions best when there is a diversity of people with a diversity of beliefs and life choices, including where kids go to school.

OP here, stay on topic please and no need to worry about me, i have plenty of friends

Oops sorry, responded to another PP that was just rude. Didnt mean to respond to your argument

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More of a vent, but i am uttterly frustrated by people with money who move into nice MC neighborhoods like tkpk or silver spring with relatively good schools to get bigger houses and then choose to put their precious kids in private schools.

We are trying to build a community and bring the schools up and these people create a bad trend of pulling a whole group of UMC kids out of the public schools because they cannot handle the diversity and challenges of public schools. All while claiming to be left leaning and to have a social compass. But that is pure white flight. It is depressing. And they dont even seem to see how political and impactful their choice is.

I really wish they stayed out of my city and went to live next to the private schools they send their kids to.

I owe it to my kids to give them the best education possible. The needs of my kids comes before the needs of the public schools. You can have my tax money, but you can't have my kids. Sorry not sorry.

+1

And I can’t speak for everyone but I’m also happy to donate to the local schools’ PTAs & EC booster clubs