Our kids attended Somerset, though it was some time ago (they're now tweens and teens). They all got a solid education there, with teachers who were mostly quite good, and a great peer group. The oldest went on to Westland, then switched to a "Big 3" school for high school. Having been disappointed in Westland, we moved the second one to the same independent school after Somerset. With the youngest, we saw the effects of NCLB and larger class sizes, and moved her at 3rd grade.

While we loved Somerset, and are glad that our kids all attended the school, we've found a number of advantages to the school our kids now attend:
the curriculum and smaller class sizes allow greater emphasis on writing, critical thinking and public speaking;
a stronger science and social studies curriculum at the elementary level;
a kinder, gentler environment (visit at lunchtime and you'll see what I mean);
art and music 2x/week, Spanish 3x/wee, PE 4x/week.

Math is more accelerated at Somerset than in the elementary grades in our independent school, but having seen the math curriculum at the upper school level, I don't think that's a problem in the long run. One of our sons is a senior and had a near-perfect score on the Math 2 subject test (SAT) and a 5 on the AP calc 2 (BC calc) exam.

Anonymous wrote:OP again. Finally, one more thing that attracted us during these school tours. The "social curriculum" for want of a better word. There appears such an emphasis on social justice, character development, learning to "do the right thing" etc. at some of these private schools. I don't feel like our kids get much of that. And its attractive to us.

I am somewhat familiar with the so called social curriculum both in a private school and a public school, both located in Bethesda and the approach could not be more different. The private school always taught compassion and character development. It was always about others. In the public school the emphasis was on its own community, the privileged and the wealthy, throwing a piece of the pie to the underprivileged. They never realized how arrogant and self righteous that seemed.

my son is in private and he does not have daily PE, music and art, etc. he has each once a week.

I know of families that left Somerset after / around 3rd because they thought chances of private school admission were higher. they did not want kids at Westland Middle.