Key is a very good school (it is our public too and we thought about it very hard) but classes are much larger than at private. Space is at such a premium that there are even trailers for later years. We have good friends who' son went to STA after Key but Dad was an alum. Other friends were not so fortunate and are now trying to decide what to do next. It is a much bigger gamble. Still, the cost of private is overwhelming. It is insanely expensive truly, and yes, we struggle to paybforour kids. That said, DS was accepted for STA for next year and I doubt it would have been as low stress if he had been coming from Key.

A financially stressed family undermines the otherwise good outcomes you might expect from a quality school. You have a quality school in hand now. So...

Do think about how comfortable you are sending child to teachers/associate teachers with, on average, quite low years of teaching experience. Youth has advantages and disadvantages of course. Impossible to know what a child will need, so we error on the side of experience. B has wonderful facilities, serves to create a social connectedness among its families, has very well educated teachers, but low total years of teaching experience on average compared to some other schools. Key has some teachers who have been fantastic for many many years.

Anonymous wrote:OP here: thanks for the responses so far. We have no connections to STA and would just be applying in 4th like everyone else if we turn down Beauvoir. We do love Beauvoir for Beauvoir, I just get a huge pit in my stomach wondering if we can make the finances work...

If you have a huge pit now, just wait. Every time they come around asking for money (annual fund, auctions, being generous for financial aid for other middle class families because "the need is so great" ha ha), the pit will be so big that your stomach will disappear.

And after you get the numbers to work for four years of Beauvoir you have to still make the numbers work for many more at St. Albans. Wonderful schools certainly, but none are worth putting your family in financial straits to attend.

OP here: thanks for the responses so far. We have no connections to STA and would just be applying in 4th like everyone else if we turn down Beauvoir. We do love Beauvoir for Beauvoir, I just get a huge pit in my stomach wondering if we can make the finances work...

You should talk with admissions at St. Albans. It is my understanding that they like to get kids from DCPS, but that not that many apply. So while the overall numbers may be low coming from Key, it might be that not that many kids apply. The nice thing about key is that it is a neighborhood school, and it is really nice to have friends down the street. But they are really different. Our kids are in private school, and while we are happy, I keep thinking how happy our friends are with kids at Key and Mann -- and how much less stressed we would be financially

Anonymous wrote:DS was accepted to Beauvoir for K. We love the school and ultimately would like to see him at St. Albans. Our hesitation is the price tag. Just can't decide if we should really really stretch to make the finances work, or just go with Key and hope that works out.

One question: is your DH an STA alum, or did you yourself go to NCS, if not you probably have just been handed your best chance for your DC to get into Saint Albans. When your DC is in 3rd grade, Saint Albans will have about 15 spots for non-Beauvoir boys. Of those 15 spots , about 7-10 will be taken by boys whose fathers or aunts and unles went to STA or NCS and , they decided to sit tight and save money for 4-12.

That leaves about 5 spots for all the boys who will be applying from all over DC,MD,NOVA and yes, some from overseas. How lucky do you feel ?

That being said, I don't think anyone should take a Beauvoir spot unless they really want Beauvoir for Beauvoir ( and seems you have already saved 30K by siiting out Pre-K, no)

If you want STA go to Beauvoir. To me this is a no-brainer assuming you can swing it financially (even if it will be tight).

Could you go to Key and dedicate some of the $140,000 savings to getting him into St. Albans (tutoring, developing unusual skills like fencing, Swahili, ukulele, cool travel/service trips and educational consultant) during the application process and still be $100,000 ahead?

How many is "lots?" I can't imagine it's more than a few.

Lots of kids go to private school--Field, STA, NCS, Sidwell, Potomac, Maret--from Key every year and they do fine.

I know a few boys who went from key to STA in recent years. It is possible but it is much more difficult than coming from Beauvoir. That is just the hard truth. I don't know that he would get any better of an education at Beauvoir but it does set him up for STA barring any major issues.

Beauvoir

These are completely different schools. Only you can figure out if the financial commitment works for you. if you are sure about StA, it will certianly be easier coming out of Beauvoir.

DS was accepted to Beauvoir for K. We love the school and ultimately would like to see him at St. Albans. Our hesitation is the price tag. Just can't decide if we should really really stretch to make the finances work, or just go with Key and hope that works out.