Reply to Why did you choose private school over the local public school?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We chose private school in part because of my original bias (as a private school graduate and subsequent Ivy league graduate myself) and because we bought a home not accounting for the quality of the local elementary school (given our original bias for private).

I think if money was no object, e.g. if our HHI was around or more than very high six figures, 700k+, than I wouldn't hesitate to pay for most of the top-shelf privates around here. The benefits are well outlined in this thread.

That said, cost-benefit matters. Private school tuition has vastly outpaced inflation in the metro area. You are paying about 2.5x in real dollars today than what you would have paid in the 1990s (e.g. tuition apace with inflation at the top schools would be around $16-18k today not $30k+).

With an HHI in the 300s, shouldering two tuition payments puts a brutal crush on our budget. For this alone I would switch to an excellent APS or Fairfax County public- but I would have to bear the transaction costs of selling our home and moving to a better school pyramid. Frankly, within a couple years we will simply do this. We just can't' afford to keep paying $60k/year (increasing by 5-10% each year) in tuition.

I also think the price changes have vastly changed the demographics of private school in a negative way- a far more narrow range of professions and backgrounds seem to be reflected among families, at our private anyway. I find it to be a much more toxic and pretentious social environment than I found at my private school 25 years ago. We frankly stay out of the social scene outside of kids activities/events.

[/quote]

It sounds like you prefer the bygone "old school" days of the elite private schools in this area, when the connected and important, but economically middle-class members of the intelligentsia - government officials, regarded journalists, staid professors - could well afford to send their children to these Ivy League feeders for years on end.  Don't you think, given your own elite schooling, that you will probably continue to bear the sacrifice for your children?  I grew up in decidedly modest circumstances, but I imagine that it will be difficult for you to give up the trappings of the life you know and love.[/quote]

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