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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I went to a mediocre public high school. From teaching at a top independent high school, I would say that the quality of education overall was higher. I taught my seniors as I did undergraduates at the Ivy League school I attended for my PhD. My colleagues were also great at exploring topics in depth and being creative in their curriculum. However, there were students who were more AP-test focused who wanted classes that were more closely aligned to the tests.

Also, I have a sibling who went to Amherst (from our same mediocre public school) and she was a bit overwhelmed with how much better prepared her prep school friends were. [/quote]

My husband went to Williams from a mediocre public school (in a different part of the country), and he also felt less well prepared than his many Williams classmates who came from elite New England boarding schools.  But those kids weren't smarter than him (for the most part, anyway, some obviously may have been), they had just covered a lot of college freshman material during their senior year in high school.  And, on average, they were better writers.  Within a year, my husband had caught up, and they were all on an equal footing.  So, the expensive prep school education provided only a temporary advantage.  Was that "worth it?"  It depends on many things.

The same cycle can repeat itself in grad school, too.  My husband went to Oxford for grad school, and he found that his classmates who had also been undergraduates at Oxford/Cambridge were better prepared than he was coming from Williams![/quote]

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