Reply to Will Negative Press Impact Applications/Admissions?

Forum Index » Private & Independent Schools

Reply to "Will Negative Press Impact Applications/Admissions?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I would be surprised if applications to all DC privates don't fall. [/quote]

Yes the party culture of DC private schools in the 1989's should make us all rethink private schools.[/quote]

Well, we're talking about people applying to the schools, right? Not people who are already enrolled? All the stories over the past how many weeks make private schools, to the outsider, look pretty bad. (I'm sure everyone with a child already in one of the schools though will slough it all off). If I was an admissions person at any DC private though, I would be worried. [/quote]

If you're applying, you already are interested in a private education.  If your theory is right, and a few change their minds, there are still plenty of others who will apply.  It's not like they have openings.  And your hypothesis depends on everyone thinking public schools have none of the same past behavior and therefore must be a better alternative.  Which is false.[/quote]

I think you're underestimating the damage that has been done to the image of private schools. [/quote]
The image in the eyes of the general public, who are paying attention to these schools at a casual level, may be damaged.

However, applicant families are looking at these schools close up, not based on news articles. If they are coming from public, those families are dealing first-hand with things like the John Hopkins audit of MCPS 2.0 and, for example, seeing their kids bored out of their minds with Chromebooks-focused homework (or whatever specific grievance is pushing them towards private - go read the public boards to get a taste of the many grievances that people have). In other words, when you are actually making this type of decision (which is usually at the elementary level, initially), you are looking at real, practical things that directly affect your child, not some sort of ivory tower analysis about a culture that may be quite different by the time your kid is a senior in high school (or that may stay on the periphery from what you and your child experience). Further, you are going to assume that you can parent your way around any cultural problems at the school - after all, most of us think we're the outlier/great parents that can overcome these types of things. For these reasons, I would be surprised if there are meaningful declines in applications.

What would really hurt applications would be a recession, or the nearby public systems catering towards upper-income families as opposed to focusing so much on closing the achievement gap (which seems to be one of the grievances that drives many full-pay families to private from public).[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics