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[quote=Anonymous]This has nothing to do with college.  My kids will go to the college that fits them and what they want to do - we don't have any need for name value or prestige with that.  Anyone can get a good college education provided they can get into college.  There are great professors at 3rd tier schools, R1s and small privates.  You have flexibility to find those profs and work with them in college.  It's before then when you're stuck with whatever teacher you're assigned to.

I don't think my kid is unique because she tests 99th percentile.  In fact I don't think my child is particularly unique at all  There aren't many "unique" people in this world and those that truly are tend to be mentally ill or horribly eccentric.  People are pretty much just people. I get that - I'm not one of the "give my kid a ribbon for participating and a medal for their WISC score" parents. All those 99th percentile kids end up just like the 80th percentile kids or 50th percentile kids come college given similar work ethic and enthusiasm for learning.  Unless a kid is prodigious on the level of Mozart then test scores and IQ tests are just numbers.  Labels are just labels.  It eventually evens out at some point for all of us. Age is a great equalizer. Genius level IQs are commonplace in PhD programs, so who cares?  The label is meaningless, it's what you're doing with whatever brain you're given that matters.

Our concern is for a child who was a joyful and enthusiastic learner getting the life sucked out of her by a barrage of meaningless and poorly designed worksheets. It's not about grades or cachet or some golden ticket we don't want to an Ivy, it's about making a change that lets our child be happy at school again.  She's not an athlete.  She's not a fantastic dancer.  Her passion is in learning and building and doing.  Unfortunately those activities are tied to school.  Not exclusively obviously, but enough that school can kill those joys for a kid.  School is her "thing."  Any school will have issues, but finding a school with a curriculum that actually provides an outlet for questioning and curiosity and experiential learning is the goal here.   I'm not sure why I'm getting crucified for trying to find a better option for my kid and asking questions about how to facilitate that.  If she was a great pianist and she was unhappy with her teacher and hit a wall and asked for a change, I'd look for a teacher that was a better fit for her. If she loved swimming more than anything and the public pool got so crowded she couldn't swim laps then I'd look for a different pool to join.

It's a "private/independent schools" forum.  Not sure I understand the people who are trolling the forum to belittle someone for looking at private and independent schools.  I asked for advice on school recommendations initially as we are not from this area.  We got lots of helpful info, both public and private.  We weighed the finances and life changes and decided private made more sense.  So I come back on the private school boards to ask about whether or not financial aid is feasible at some of the privates we looked at.  This is an appropriate venue for that question.  The question itself seems like a logical follow up to the initial question.  If the schools don't view us as candidates for financial aid then they won't give it to us.  I'm not sure why applying is "hurting" anyone else.  If full pay families at schools that give financial aid don't think the schools should be giving financial aid then that is an issue to take up with the school.  Or hell, if we keep in the same tone as these comments, move and go to a private that doesn't give financial aid to anyone - they certainly exist in this area.

And our finances aren't precarious.  We'd like to keep them that way, that's the point.  That's why we're trying to find out what options there are that would be within our budget.  We don't live to the edge of our paycheck and won't do that - we save each month.  So no, 30K a year is not doable for our family, but that doesn't mean finances are precarious in any way.  It just means for that school to be an option we would need a tuition reduction - the whole point of the question was to find out if schools are actually offering those to new families given the current economy.  If someone can definitively say no then that saves us a 100 dollar application fee and some time.  We're decidedly middle class.  That will not change.  If a school wants a mix of kids at every socioeconomic level then some middle class kids will have to get FA for that to be possible at a 30K a year school.  If not, I can understand that and it isn't in the cards for us.

I'm just not sure I get the anger/condescension/judgment on these boards.  Most of the people here are asking questions in good faith.  I was really appreciative of the information I've received here so far.  People are taking their free time to be helpful to a stranger.  Lord knows the world can use more of that.  But someone thanks people for their input and that inspires anger?  That's kind of sad really.  [/quote]

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