They have to raise tuition to pay for the Washington Home white elephant.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One solution is to decrease the huge financial aid budget. Currently SFS has $7 million annual FA budget; 23% of students receive FA and the average FA award is $ 26900.

Does anyone know how much Potomac School provide in term of FA budget? I read somewhere around $2 Million. If that is true, much less than SFS.

Does most of the FA go to sport recruiting or academic, or both? Is it heavily on the athletic side?

Significantly less that Sidwell, and for Potomac, yes, mostly athletes.

If the above information is true, that's ridiculous. The school should reconsider its FA policies. Why to provide the high FA if the school can't afford? To buy the reputation?

Anonymous wrote:one of my kids is in 10th grade at SFS, been there since 3rd grade.

My husband read this thread and he bought up this idea to me last night. We have three more kids that are currently in 6th, 4th and 3rd grade. Instead of spending 125k/year to send them to SFS, why not keep them in Fairfax County Public School (e.g. Churchill ES, Cooper MS and Langley HS)? We can use that 125k to hire the best private tutor in all subjects. I mean literary pay someone to come to our house and help them with their school work. That is a much better ROI in the long run, right?

suggestions?

My child is at at k-8 school in DC (3rd) and we are paying additional money for tutors. So are 4 classmates and I see this is all of the lower grades. We are leaving btw. The school does a terrible job at differentiating and we are in one of the so called "progressive schools".

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have not read the entire thread but some pages. Quite a few PP said something like "can't afford then leave". As a Sidwell parent, I feel this type of expression is harmful to the Sidwell community. When we selected Sidwell over other schools several years ago, one of the important factors was the welcome feeling at Sidwell.

Our oldest entered SFS just as the building frenzy was ramping up. Our youngest is now a senior. Over that decade and a half the school culture has changed significantly and not for the better. The vibe is more ostentatious and smug. We're glad to be getting out now.

I don't see this at all at SFS. Not the vibe in our 4 years there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have not read the entire thread but some pages. Quite a few PP said something like "can't afford then leave". As a Sidwell parent, I feel this type of expression is harmful to the Sidwell community. When we selected Sidwell over other schools several years ago, one of the important factors was the welcome feeling at Sidwell.

Our oldest entered SFS just as the building frenzy was ramping up. Our youngest is now a senior. Over that decade and a half the school culture has changed significantly and not for the better. The vibe is more ostentatious and smug. We're glad to be getting out now.

Can you say more regarding what the smugness is about? We’re applying to Sidwell among other places, but we have some reservations about private school in general and ponying up $40k-plus.

Anonymous wrote:I have not read the entire thread but some pages. Quite a few PP said something like "can't afford then leave". As a Sidwell parent, I feel this type of expression is harmful to the Sidwell community. When we selected Sidwell over other schools several years ago, one of the important factors was the welcome feeling at Sidwell.

Our oldest entered SFS just as the building frenzy was ramping up. Our youngest is now a senior. Over that decade and a half the school culture has changed significantly and not for the better. The vibe is more ostentatious and smug. We're glad to be getting out now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One solution is to decrease the huge financial aid budget. Currently SFS has $7 million annual FA budget; 23% of students receive FA and the average FA award is $ 26900.

Does anyone know how much Potomac School provide in term of FA budget? I read somewhere around $2 Million. If that is true, much less than SFS.

Does most of the FA go to sport recruiting or academic, or both? Is it heavily on the athletic side?

Significantly less that Sidwell, and for Potomac, yes, mostly athletes.

How on earth would you know this unless you sit on the financial aid committee? In any event, I thought at all schools financial aid is based on need not merit.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In other parts of the country, i.e., the South and Midwest, you can go to the best private school in town for $10-12K (kindy) to less than $20K (9-12). I know this, because we are in Georgia right now, and I went to a similar school in Alabama. DH is military, and we are waiting to see if we'll move back to the DMV next year, where, obviously, we won't even consider private on our combined income of $200K.

FWIW, I (valedictorian) went to Berkeley, and the salutatorian went to Harvard. Other kids went to Princeton and SLACs. This was 1990, graduating class of 80 people. These days, plenty of kids going to state schools, especially now that they've all added full scholarships for their honors colleges, but large percentages of the class at the school here in GA and at my old school in AL are receiving acceptances to elite universities. Test scores are excellent, and the students do well when they get there. So whatever the 40K-a-year schools are doing, it's not educating kids better. I do believe they create better networks.

No offense, but the type of school you are describing is more a product of segregationist policies in the south.

You mean the south, like Washington DC, once one of the most segregated cities in America.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One solution is to decrease the huge financial aid budget. Currently SFS has $7 million annual FA budget; 23% of students receive FA and the average FA award is $ 26900.

Does anyone know how much Potomac School provide in term of FA budget? I read somewhere around $2 Million. If that is true, much less than SFS.

Does most of the FA go to sport recruiting or academic, or both? Is it heavily on the athletic side?

Significantly less that Sidwell, and for Potomac, yes, mostly athletes.

Anonymous wrote:One solution is to decrease the huge financial aid budget. Currently SFS has $7 million annual FA budget; 23% of students receive FA and the average FA award is $ 26900.

Does anyone know how much Potomac School provide in term of FA budget? I read somewhere around $2 Million. If that is true, much less than SFS.

Does most of the FA go to sport recruiting or academic, or both? Is it heavily on the athletic side?

I didn't make sense above.

"Middle Class" is defined by all US incomes, not relative to average income in your area. Even if you say, reasonably, that all costs will be less when incomes are less, the professional jobs that pay a "middle class" salary pay about the same all over the US. There are just more unemployed and poverty-level employed in some places.

However, in a very few areas of the country, there is a large enough concentration of the "super rich," which push up the cost of things like restaurants, rent, and private school.

So, in some parts of the country, your doctors, lawyers, and college professors can afford private school without TA, and your average Joe with a decent job can afford it with a little bit of TA. In DC, they can't.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In other parts of the country, i.e., the South and Midwest, you can go to the best private school in town for $10-12K (kindy) to less than $20K (9-12). I know this, because we are in Georgia right now, and I went to a similar school in Alabama. DH is military, and we are waiting to see if we'll move back to the DMV next year, where, obviously, we won't even consider private on our combined income of $200K.

FWIW, I (valedictorian) went to Berkeley, and the salutatorian went to Harvard. Other kids went to Princeton and SLACs. This was 1990, graduating class of 80 people. These days, plenty of kids going to state schools, especially now that they've all added full scholarships for their honors colleges, but large percentages of the class at the school here in GA and at my old school in AL are receiving acceptances to elite universities. Test scores are excellent, and the students do well when they get there. So whatever the 40K-a-year schools are doing, it's not educating kids better. I do believe they create better networks.

No offense, but the type of school you are describing is more a product of segregationist policies in the south.

Yep. We have to pay for the segregation you get for free in your public schools. How is that better again?

It’s not. That’s why it’s dumb to go private unless you’re very wealthy. Instead buy a home in a good school district and you’ll get your “tuition” back when you sell one day.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In other parts of the country, i.e., the South and Midwest, you can go to the best private school in town for $10-12K (kindy) to less than $20K (9-12). I know this, because we are in Georgia right now, and I went to a similar school in Alabama. DH is military, and we are waiting to see if we'll move back to the DMV next year, where, obviously, we won't even consider private on our combined income of $200K.

FWIW, I (valedictorian) went to Berkeley, and the salutatorian went to Harvard. Other kids went to Princeton and SLACs. This was 1990, graduating class of 80 people. These days, plenty of kids going to state schools, especially now that they've all added full scholarships for their honors colleges, but large percentages of the class at the school here in GA and at my old school in AL are receiving acceptances to elite universities. Test scores are excellent, and the students do well when they get there. So whatever the 40K-a-year schools are doing, it's not educating kids better. I do believe they create better networks.

No offense, but the type of school you are describing is more a product of segregationist policies in the south.

Yep. We have to pay for the segregation you get for free in your public schools. How is that better again?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're truly "middle class" you shouldn't be attending this school in the firs place.

Face it. Private school is for rich people, period. Don't believe anyone who tries to tell you otherwise.

+1.

This. The actual middle class in America doesn't send their kids to private school.

They do in other parts of the country. 40K+ for grade school is an up-East/California phenomenon. Are the schools substantially better? Maybe? No real way to compare. They're substantially better connected, for sure, and they are shinier (or ivy-er, whichever).

Again those are not middle class families. DCUM has a distorted belief of what is a middle class family. A family of 4 making 75k is not sending their child to a 40k private school. Unless they are recieving significant aid, which isn’t the point of the complaint on this thread...

In other parts of the country, i.e., the South and Midwest, you can go to the best private school in town for $10-12K (kindy) to less than $20K (9-12). I know this, because we are in Georgia right now, and I went to a similar school in Alabama. DH is military, and we are waiting to see if we'll move back to the DMV next year, where, obviously, we won't even consider private on our combined income of $200K.

FWIW, I (valedictorian) went to Berkeley, and the salutatorian went to Harvard. Other kids went to Princeton and SLACs. This was 1990, graduating class of 80 people. These days, plenty of kids going to state schools, especially now that they've all added full scholarships for their honors colleges, but large percentages of the class at the school here in GA and at my old school in AL are receiving acceptances to elite universities. Test scores are excellent, and the students do well when they get there. So whatever the 40K-a-year schools are doing, it's not educating kids better. I do believe they create better networks.

Middle class families still aren’t sending their kids to private schools in those areas. The average income would be much lower, still making your 10-20k unaffordable.

So, on this thread, people have argued that rich = anything over 75K, and now you're arguing that in DC, rich = ? 400K?

Average income where we are now is $41K. It is 75K in DC, the highest in the nation.

Plenty, plenty of people here make $100K-$150K a year. That's not hard, particularly if both spouses work, even here in a mid-sized city in GA (not Atlanta). You can do $10K-$20K/yr on that with some sacrifices. And it's not hard to find people who make more (including us, an Army officer and a very part-time professional).

The jobs that pay enough to come up with $40K-$80K/yr (assuming two kids in school) are much harder to find. Two kids in school already exceed the average income, and are more than half of doubling that income, which is still an easily-obtainable income ($150K). At a tuition of $15K/yr, two kids is still less than the average income where I am, and 1/3 of doubling it. It's 1/5 of $150K/yr.

The scale is different, true. But the doctors in GA are the same in terms of SES as they are in DC. If they're middle class in DC, they're middle class for the US as a whole.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have not read the entire thread but some pages. Quite a few PP said something like "can't afford then leave". As a Sidwell parent, I feel this type of expression is harmful to the Sidwell community. When we selected Sidwell over other schools several years ago, one of the important factors was the welcome feeling at Sidwell.

I hear you but I don't understand you. Sidwell is by nature a very exclusive community in a number of ways anyways. I think the original comment is far more damaging to the community. It is complaining and calls oit someone by name and insults him. That is not productive.

These are more productive ways to deal with this than venting negatively and lashing out on DCUM:

1) Go to the board
2) Find a way to make an extra 1500 somehow. If you have a high schooler, have him/her get a job.
3) If you can pay 41K but not 42K, you are very well off, and you can investigate a whole slew of other school options.
4) Go to the school and ask for FA to cover the difference if you have no other way to cover the gap.
5) Make a spreadsheet of the costs from now to graduation and think hard about what you want to do. Going public is not a punishment btw!

No one is saying "leave" as an insult. It is being said as a reality check.