Anonymous wrote:I’ve been looking through the forums and past posts as I try to get a general idea of the private school landscape for our Northern Virginia family. We’re in Arlington and thought the kids would go to public schools because ‘the schools were great’. At some point in time we learned that the high schools were not as great and we might want to consider private for that. We made ourselves to the idea that we would apply private for middle school or high school. And then the last two years happened and now we’re wondering if we should consider private sooner since it sounds like admissions have gotten much more competitive. I’m trying to come up to speed on this earlier than I expected.

My questions:
a) I kept reading about going to school close to where you live. Obviously there is Potomac. What are other options in this area? Madeira is all girls so that’s not an option for one of our kids. Langley sounds great, but I’m weary about doing the application again in HS especially for my kid who is not super social - seems rough to pull them out of public, then Langley, then somewhere else for HS but maybe people do It and it’s fine. We like where we live and moving for a school seems daunting
b) Are there set “entry years” when more spots open up usually or does it vary at all schools? Does it make more sense to apply for K (missed that boat), 6th, or 9th grade?
c) We’re Catholic but I hadn’t really considered Catholic schools - I’m not sure why. I think maybe I inadvertently ranked schools in my head as public, then Catholic and then independents like Potomac and if we’re gonna pull them out of public then try to go all the way. But I’m open to suggestions if there are exceptional ones to consider. Is it common that catholic school families would apply / get into Potomac type schools for HS?

We want solid academics with less emphasis on devices and more emphasis on textbooks. Child loves learning and is not an athlete. We’re big on social Justice values (I feel a little guilty about potentially going private) and educating the whole child / inculcating values. And we’re minorities so a bit concerned about that as well, though I’ve mostly come to terms that private schools will not have the level of diversity I would prefer in an ideal world.

All suggestions welcome but please be kind to this newbie

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We’re in Arlington and getting into the city is really not a big deal. Further, many schools have busses from Arlington (Bullis, GDS, Landon, Field just to name a few) or are very accessible by public transit (as they get into middle/high school) (Maret, WIS, GDS, Burke).

Is the school bus free for these above private schools?Or need to pay any additional fee?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just to clarify, do you want textbooks specifically, or just something other than devices? A lot of independent schools don’t use textbooks in the lower school years, but also don’t use devices much. I have a third grader, and, for example, this week in science they were learning about magnetism through a variety of inquiry-based activities and experiments with magnets. For social studies they’ve been learning about native peoples using a range of primary source material including documents, guest speakers, and artifacts. They’re learning to do research in the library. They don’t have textbooks not because they’re on devices but because it’s much more hands-on.

Thank you for the distinction. I want hands on learning, reading, writing. I know school has changed a lot since I was there so it’s hard to say what I want specifically if not textbooks. I do not want a bunch of apps and worksheets from teachers paying teachers or whatever that have not been reviewed and validated as a curriculum would be

Anonymous wrote:We’re in Arlington and getting into the city is really not a big deal. Further, many schools have busses from Arlington (Bullis, GDS, Landon, Field just to name a few) or are very accessible by public transit (as they get into middle/high school) (Maret, WIS, GDS, Burke).

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been looking through the forums and past posts as I try to get a general idea of the private school landscape for our Northern Virginia family. We’re in Arlington and thought the kids would go to public schools because ‘the schools were great’. At some point in time we learned that the high schools were not as great and we might want to consider private for that. We made ourselves to the idea that we would apply private for middle school or high school. And then the last two years happened and now we’re wondering if we should consider private sooner since it sounds like admissions have gotten much more competitive. I’m trying to come up to speed on this earlier than I expected.

My questions:
a) I kept reading about going to school close to where you live. Obviously there is Potomac. What are other options in this area? Madeira is all girls so that’s not an option for one of our kids. Langley sounds great, but I’m weary about doing the application again in HS especially for my kid who is not super social - seems rough to pull them out of public, then Langley, then somewhere else for HS but maybe people do It and it’s fine. We like where we live and moving for a school seems daunting
b) Are there set “entry years” when more spots open up usually or does it vary at all schools? Does it make more sense to apply for K (missed that boat), 6th, or 9th grade?
c) We’re Catholic but I hadn’t really considered Catholic schools - I’m not sure why. I think maybe I inadvertently ranked schools in my head as public, then Catholic and then independents like Potomac and if we’re gonna pull them out of public then try to go all the way. But I’m open to suggestions if there are exceptional ones to consider. Is it common that catholic school families would apply / get into Potomac type schools for HS?

We want solid academics with less emphasis on devices and more emphasis on textbooks. Child loves learning and is not an athlete. We’re big on social Justice values (I feel a little guilty about potentially going private) and educating the whole child / inculcating values. And we’re minorities so a bit concerned about that as well, though I’ve mostly come to terms that private schools will not have the level of diversity I would prefer in an ideal world.

All suggestions welcome but please be kind to this newbie

Anonymous wrote:We are also in Arlington and sending our kids to private next year. They will all be in lower school, never thought we would head down this path, but i have no faith in APS at this point. DH and I are both from public school background. Lots of bus options to the Bethesda schools from N. Arlington/Mclean. Applied to Potomac, but were waitlisted. Its very difficult to get into with so many people going private right now, whether that will change as we get farther away from Covid, who knows. I think Covid just really highlighted how public school cannot be creative and pivot when the situation calls for it. I honestly don't see that changing and that's why we are going private. I'm cannot believe how much we have to pay for it though...i'm still processing that, but if I'm going to spend my money on something, my kids education seems like the right way to allocate it.

Anonymous wrote:Just to clarify, do you want textbooks specifically, or just something other than devices? A lot of independent schools don’t use textbooks in the lower school years, but also don’t use devices much. I have a third grader, and, for example, this week in science they were learning about magnetism through a variety of inquiry-based activities and experiments with magnets. For social studies they’ve been learning about native peoples using a range of primary source material including documents, guest speakers, and artifacts. They’re learning to do research in the library. They don’t have textbooks not because they’re on devices but because it’s much more hands-on.