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[quote=Anonymous]If you are comparing Hunter to a TT private, Hunter almost certainly means a better chance at an elite college.  If you compare Hunter to a less prestigious private, it’s not as clear because while the less rigorous private has a less impressive college matriculation list than the TTs, your kid may have a better chance re college there (as compared to Hunter or any TT) if he or she is at the very top of their class at the lower ranked school and it will be easier to attain that rank at the less rigorous school.

Re the Hunter curriculum, in the early years, it’s not much different than a TT private, but they move faster because the privates devote time to social/emotional learning and Hunter spends very little time on that. The curriculum is more flexible than at a traditional private and if a kid has a real aptitude for a subject they allow them to go a little deeper.  It’s definitely not an emergent curriculum, though, like you’d find at a progressive private. Sometimes Hunter is thought of as progressive but it’s not. By second grade, Hunter starts to move quite a bit faster and there also are more opportunities for kids to pursue individual interests. Not all subjects are equal.  For example, in elementary school Hunter’s foreign language program is an introduction to Spanish, but the goal isn’t for kids to learn to speak because they don’t devote enough time to it.  The kids become familiar with basic words, pronunciation and sentence structure.  If they really want to become proficient, they have to supplement outside or wait until HS which begins at 7th grade when there are more and better language options.

Hunter probably is better at teaching gifted kids just because 100 percent of the kids fall in to that bucket. They use a lot of games and creative approaches. And everything is treated as an opportunity to learn. But it’s the kids not the curriculum that is the biggest differentiator. The kids are all v smart and most are curious. Hunter is a place where nerds are wholly accepted and kids think chess and physics and overall learning are cool. There isnt much social pressure to wear nice clothes or certain brands or to be good looking or popular. There is some premium placed on being a good athlete but less than you’d find at most other schools. The downside to the celebration of academic passion/achievement is that on average the kids are not as socially adept and the school provides much less support for social and emotional development.

For better and worse, young kids also have more independence and less supervision at Hunter than at most other schools.

I have a kid at Hunter. We like it but don’t love it. My kid is getting a phenomenal education but I think social/emotional education and support is more important than academics and they aren’t getting much of that. There are people that never would have considered private because it would have been totally out of reach or because they don’t believe in private school.  There are others who easily could afford private but chose Hunter because it was the perfect fit for their kid or their family.  Those are the groups that love the school. Among upper middle class parents who could pay for private but whose finances aren’t so comfortable that the money means nothing, I think most would have preferred private but chose Hunter because it’s tuition free. We would have gone to private if the money wasn’t meaningful to us. Because the money was meaningful to us, we went with Hunter and decided that if our kid wants to explore other options later—particularly in 7th when Hunter kids start HS or in 9th when a lot of seats open at the privates, we will support that. I doubt our kid will want to move because friend groups are so important at those ages but we will support it if they do.

Among the top HS students more come from the cohort that enters in 7th grade because the HS entrance exam test is identifying kids who have both ability and real intensity since all kids study for that exam and it’s competitive.  The kids who enter at K are on average more creative and may rely more on innate ability and passion. Think physicists vs engineers.

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