Reply to New STA parent seeking advice, suggestions, or just plain "I wish I had known X" info

Forum Index » Private & Independent Schools

Reply to "New STA parent seeking advice, suggestions, or just plain "I wish I had known X" info"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]How would you describe the overall tone of the school?  Country club?  WASPY?  Down to earth?  Materialistic?   What's it like to be an average middle class parent in this community that has a reputation for having kids of political high-flyers and wealthy kids attending?

Is school predominantly conservative or is it a mix of liberal and conservative?   [/quote]

Second question first -- it's a mix of liberal and conservative.  The Episcopal Church is very progressive on social issues (e.g., same sex marriage) and the school is very supportive on diversity/inclusivity issues.  The student newspaper wrote an article about political affiliation at STA in the last year or two and I think basically said it was mainly Democratic but that conservatives didn't feel silenced and that there was good debate as a result.

Tone of the school?  Well, there's plenty of money.  They give a lot of financial aid for this area (STA and Sidwell give the most for the privates, and about the same amount) but the majority are still full pay students and $40,000 year is a defining amount.  Plenty of professional parents, two income parents, etc.  Doesn't seem flashily materialistic but I'm not a shoes/handbag type (I work).  There do seem to be a lot of families that belong to the Chevy Chase club but that seems more of a thing in the lower school with the Beauvoir kids and the class becomes more diverse (and less defined by country club, etc) once you hit high school.  I think the parent body is pretty nice, and the kids are very accepting of other kids and don't get hung up on possessions etc.  But, it's still a community where a lot of the kids will take fancy trips at breaks or over the summer.  In that sense I think any kid will at some point probably say "why don't we have this" or "why don't we do that" unless they are exceptionally mature and understanding (more mature than I was).

I think the local Catholic schools are more diverse economically for sure, but St. Albans is about as good as it gets for the "expensive day school" world.  Boys are pretty straightforward with each other and that's nice.[/quote]

+1 but I gotta clarify that Edmund Burke tops the independent schools in DC as far as financial aid; about 30 percent of their students receive partial or full funding.[/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