Reply to How do private schools manage to get through everything?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]As others have mentioned private schools don’t get through everything.  Do not believe anyone who tells you they do or that all privates result in better educational outcomes than public.  Study after study has proven this untrue.

What private do: Private schools educate to a narrower band of abilities and a smaller class size making it potentially easier to move through material while limiting certain types of disruption or needs that arise for disability or mental health needs.  Because they are not held to yearly state standards and standardization testing, they can choose to cover just the basics and then pick and choose which topics to apply greater depth.  This can be good or bad. Since most view childhood as a time of exploration, if they go in depth on something your child is interested than it can be great.  If not, it can be somewhat stifling and cause kids to miss opportunities to discover interest or challenge themselves in an area of interest.  Also because the class sizes are smaller, it can limit the course selection each year, particularly electives, as students get to higher levels. To this end, their is a lot of tutoring and enrichment being funded by parents.  Same is found in public by families of means.  The difference being public school families are not paying tuition first.

Another difference is school day and where privates apply focus.  Particular at the lower level the focus is less academic.  Because of this kids have more fun, which makes parents feel good and feeds into the idea of youth being magical and all about play.  This can however be quickly derailed as kids move through the levels and are forced to quickly catch up on academics and encounter academic intensity both in class and via homework.

Ultimately its a scale.  You as a family decide which things are important/unimportant and if that balances in the end.[/quote]

Interesting post, but I can’t say that it meshes with our experience. I don’t know anyone doing tutoring or enrichment in our private lower/middle school. Perhaps it starts in upper school?

You are right that the lower school was much more play based, and the rubber hit the road in middle school! Definitely a big adjustment, but the kids seem to be doing beautifully (at least mine and his friends). We’re certainly not experiencing this as a derailment. I’m glad that the intense academics didn’t start earlier, as I think he’s much better equipped to deal with it now.

For what it’s worth, though, I think the answer to OP’s question is that the actual number of school hours is the same, that’s all. Not a complicated story. The public school near my kid’s private school starts at the same time but gets out 1.25 hrs earlier. That’s more than six extra hours a week, which accounts for any differences in the calendar.

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