Reply to Looking for an honest assessment of GDS

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Well, my kids are at GDS and I love the school and everything it stands for. The diversity, the acceptance, the social justice that it teaches. And it is predominantly Jewish - there is no need to shy away from this! The person who writes that less than half the kids are Jewish is quibbling. Every school is predominantly something. St Albans is predominantly WASP, the Catholic schools are predominantly Catholic! I don't know why we need to run away from this and insist it isn't true. GDS is welcoming to everybody. There will also be a LOT of bar and bat mitzvahs in 7th and 8th grade! [/quote]

Saint Albans is not predominantly Protestant. There are are many Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Agnostics, Jewish, and at least one Athiest. I don't get it either why people protest so much that GDS is not overwhelmingly Jewish. It is. So is Sidwell. [/quote]

I am sure there are many people of other faiths and backgrounds. But you would argue that most kids are not of a Protestant background? That is demographically impossible. [/quote]

I'm a different poster.  St. Albans actually is pretty diverse religiously.  I believe I was told by a chaplain that the single largest religious denomination is Catholicism.  I believe that the total number of Protestants in the aggregate, no separation by denomination (Episcopalians plus Baptists plus Presbyterian plus Methodists plus AME etc), is higher than the number of Catholic students.  Probably Judaism is third, and, yes, also Hindu, Sikh, Muslims as well as those who are not religious.  Even with the Protestants who attend, STA doesn't strike one as a particularly WASPy place compared to, say, a Groton or St. Paul's.[/quote]

First, WASP, by definition encompasses all protestant denominations - though STA isn't drawing many (if any) bible thumpers.  Second, the "Catholics" at STA are CINO and are WASP wannabes. No one cares about religion at STA.[/quote]

Actually, I've always thought of "WASP" as a class thing too -- the Cabots and Saltonstalls and Lowells, old money mainline Episcopalians.  I think if you see how it is used in literature/popular culture you'll see a fair amount of support for that conception of "WASP" -- and even by its own terms, there is "Anglo-Saxon" as part of the acronym.

Second, I've met a number of boys at St. Albans who are quite serious about their Catholic faith, so I think your comment about "CINOs" is overblown.

Third, although you say "no one cares about religion at STA" if you go to a chapel service (or read through the book of homilies from Chapel that is published by the student vestry every year), you can see the faith component.[/quote]

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