FAQ: Comparing Public versus Private School Education
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SAM2
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I've grown tired of the public vs. private debate hijacking so many threads lately, so I decided to create this thread. Also, I remember from years past that this public vs. private debate always gets more vicious around this time of year, perhaps because it's when people are applying to public magnet programs and private schools. Maybe all the people who want to argue this issue can keep their bickering on this thread. Also, when the public vs. private debate threatens to disrupt an ongoing thread, maybe someone can post a link to this thread, and encourage the combatants to take it over here.
Since I like keeping things organized, I'll even update this opening post periodically to summarize the best reasons in support of public and private schools, respectively. Reasons Public School Education is Better than Private School Education 1. It's free! 2. 3. Reasons Private School Education is Better than Public School Education 1. 2. 3. Personally, I think there's no one-size-fits-all answer. It depends on the particular schools you're comparing, and maybe even the particular grades. It definitely depends heavily on the particular student, and what she needs out of a school, and also on what her family is able to provide her. But if people really want to fight about this stuff, here's a place you can do it without annoying everyone else. Thanks. I hope this is helpful. |
Anonymous
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More diverse
Bigger classes Less resources, sink or swim. Kid will be tough More elitist Less diversity Better curriculum |
Anonymous
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Agree that it's mostly about each individual school and individual child, but here are my thoughts:
1. Public school has more resources, I think, especially for kids with special needs. 2. Keeps your child as part of his/her neighborhood community. 3. Frees up more money for you to spend on extracurricular activities/enrichment 4. Math is generally better at the higher grades. 1. Private school generally has much smaller classes in the early years. 2. There seems to be more focus on character building in private schools. 3. No NCLB. |
Anonymous
| Private is better if you can afford it. If not, many publics are fine. |
Anonymous
| SAM2, the goal of many readers is to share or gather information about specific schools people are interested in applying to. We can go to a school's website or Independent Schools' website for the official line. We want the inside info on specific schools not all Imdependent Schools. They ARE independent, after all, aren't they? Many people ask me ALL the time to share my personal experience with my children's specific schools. Would it be okay with you if posters specified which public school and which private school they have experience with? I really think this is the sort of information people are seeking especially since times are tight. Many people can afford these schools but, at what sacrifice? That is the question we ALL need answered openly and honestly. Please let ALL people from ALL schools ask questions, get stuff off their chests, gather information. My experience in both public and private are VASTLY different than what has been posted including "private is better if you can afford it. If not, many publics are fine." |
Anonymous
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Reasons Public School Education is Better than Private School Education 1. It's free! Sort of, since those who own pay with property taxes. And remember: you get what you pay for....so you might get your $0's worth. 2. Community connection 3. Getting a public school education for relatively small outlay out of pocket is better than paying for **certain** private schools 4. Diverse student body in general. Diverse in race, HHI, etc. Reasons Private School Education is Better than Public School Education 1. Favorable student-teacher ratios. Sometimes two times as good as in public 2. Higher outlay on science, art, facility resources per child 3. Better outplacement than most publics. The comparison is between an A- kid in a "Top 3" private versus an A- kid in your local public. Obviously, comparing the top public and top private brings other issues into question 4. In top privates, "better" education than most publics, in part because of part (2) |
Anonymous
I think you are giving me much more authority than I actually have. To be clear, I have absolutely no authority and no power at DCUM. Jeff has never consulted me on anything, and I would not expect him to. I am just some parent who is interested in these issues. You should not ask my permission for anything. To answer your question about specific school info, I personally think posters should always identify the specific schools they are writing about. That is one of the points favoring anonymity, isn't it? Identifying a specific school also eliminates the problem of generalizations, where someone posts something like "private is better, but public is fine" which may be true in some limited circumstances, but definitely is not true in all situations. But to repeat again, I have no control over anything, so post as much or as little specificity as you want. My goal in creating this thread is definitely not to stifle discussion of this issue. My only goal is to create a place for discussing this particular topic, so it will be less likely to disrupt other good discussions on other topics. I hope this helps. Sam2 |
Anonymous
| My DD's private is much more diverse than our public school would be --- in income, religion and ethnicity. |
Anonymous
+1 Also, if you live in a neighborhood with poorly performing schools, private offers you the option of staying in your current home while allowing your child to have a good education. |
Anonymous
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I am trying to decide between public in MoCo and private right now, so this is from the point of view of a parent without personal experience in either. From touring several schools, including my local public, my impressions were:
Pro/con-public + Great facilities + Free + Having dc's friends all be in the neighborhood + Having dc make a group of friends that will be together for a long time, including the transitions to MS and HS + Having a large, relatively diverse pool of potential friends + If dc is a self-starter, access to a lot of opportunities to accelerate academically and participate in clubs/groups (particularly in HS) - Much larger environment, can get lost depending on child's personality and school responsiveness. Not sure how much attention a teacher can give to a child in a class of 25-28. - School is not as accommodating to individual needs (e.g., principal won't meet with prospective parents, can't do playdates over the summer with potential classmates, since the class list doesn't come out until the weekend before school starts) - teacher-wise, it's very hard to tell. Some have been there for years, but there are several new teachers as well. - Most of the curriculum seems centered on reading and math (very little attention on science and arts/physical education) Pros/Cons private (the ones I liked best, this is not true for all) + Much richer curriculum in the arts (visual, performing, music) in the lower years + More science + More play (incl. more recess/PE) + Much more hands-on learning and integrated curricula + Low teacher turnover + Smaller classes + Lots of personal attention + Focus on educating "the whole child", including character development/being a good friend and citizen, etc. - Less diversity (main exception to this was Sidwell from the ones I visited) - Need to change schools more often (unless you go K-12, but I personally did not like the K-12 schools I saw) - Environment sometimes seemed too small On balance, I thought the good privates were better. We're trying to decide if they're "$30k a year" better, though. That's harder to determine. I'd happily pay $15k for the benefit of private school. But twice that is quite a stretch for our family. |
Anonymous
Are you close in? If you are in Rockville or further out, I have a couple of $15k-ish schools I could recommend. But I don't know much about the schools nearer to DC. We chose a small private over a Wootton cluster public elementary school and have been very happy so far. |
Anonymous
| It is so individual, and no one can ever do a real time comparison because a student can't be in two schools at once. For us, private was better because our local public was not the right fit. It often comes down to that. We are not rich. We are probably eligible for FA (not much) but choose not to apply.) |
Anonymous
| SAM@2: I just read over your FAQ about private schools in the area and wanted to say thank you for putting in that effort. So much information and very carefully written. Great job. I hope that posters will share their thoughts here also. |
Anonymous
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Please please please make this funny. I am so tired of the public vs. private wars. I can't make a single constructive comment to help someone without being accused of malice, being Octotroll, some school's PR dept. or being "that Langley mom" (uh, there are 2400 students there guys - did it ever occur to you that maybe more than one of them comments here?).
And I loved the "What I've learned from DCurbanmoms, pile it on" thread. That was just hilarious. Well, if you can't be humorous, at least be civil. I don't want to hear about the old Sidwell threads anymore. I've never set foot on the campus and never intend to. Yeah, I know, someone will be snarky and say "why do you read them?". I don't. It's because people keep reactivating old threads and they then pop up in "recent topics" so if one is scanning "recent threads" there they are. |
Anonymous
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12:29 pretty much summed it up. We looked carefully at both before deciding to go private. The only things we found different or in addition to 12:29 were:
Public - Facilities not as nice as private - Not all the families/kids value education so you have some groups of under-achieveing students Private + Fewer (or no) kids with true discipline problems + More creativity to make the curriculum fun We feel that private for our kids is definitely worth $30K more a year than our MoCo publics. |