Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Keep your kids in pubic school. No, that was not a mistake.

Have you ever read the Maryland Public Schools forum on DCUM? Plenty of SO MUCH HATRED there too.

Oh, but NOTHING like the private school forum! The back-biting about class, race and inter-school rivalries in the private school forum is in a league of its own. Sadly.

I read both, and I disagree.

Fortunately, I have kids in public and private schools, so I get to read both fora.

The fights on the MCPS forum are about 2.0 and magnet programs, individual schools, and what to do with bad teachers. Oh yeah, and some trolls: the anti-immigrant nutjob, the crazy Tiger Mom who thinks everything MCPS does is to exclude Asian kids from magnets, and the bizarro private school parent who keeps showing up on the MCPS forum to tell us how much public schools suck.

The fights on the Private School forum are all about class, household income, whether you can get and/or deserve FA on $200K/year.

For shear entertainment value, the Private School forum wins, hands down!.

Yes, I agree with this. The MCPS forum is just as vituperative, but the Private School forum is much more entertaining.

Anonymous wrote:Different "big 3 parent here." It shocks me that the person above would equate the tone and content of this web site with anything in the "real world." And I've certainly never experienced anything like it in any of the numerous parents in various grades with whom I've interacted. Hard to imagine that your "big 3" school is so different from mine (and so different from anything I've ever experienced in adulthood), but I suppose anything's possible.

No school could stay in business, maintain waiting list, etc, if this was the tone of school. Nobody would stay, and I'm not talking about the few who leave from every school for various reasons.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Keep your kids in pubic school. No, that was not a mistake.

Have you ever read the Maryland Public Schools forum on DCUM? Plenty of SO MUCH HATRED there too.

Oh, but NOTHING like the private school forum! The back-biting about class, race and inter-school rivalries in the private school forum is in a league of its own. Sadly.

I read both, and I disagree.

Fortunately, I have kids in public and private schools, so I get to read both fora.

The fights on the MCPS forum are about 2.0 and magnet programs, individual schools, and what to do with bad teachers. Oh yeah, and some trolls: the anti-immigrant nutjob, the crazy Tiger Mom who thinks everything MCPS does is to exclude Asian kids from magnets, and the bizarro private school parent who keeps showing up on the MCPS forum to tell us how much public schools suck.

The fights on the Private School forum are all about class, household income, whether you can get and/or deserve FA on $200K/year.

For shear entertainment value, the Private School forum wins, hands down!.

OP -- it's never good to generalize. If you want specific information about a specific school - - then ask or google. You can get some decent information.

Anonymous wrote:OP Here: For those of you that were constructive, thanks for the feedback. For those that were rude, I guess I get it now ..I wasn't even asking about a particular school and was subjected to insults. So some folks are just angry, I guess. So I have read through as much as I can on this forum and from the postings it is clear that ...
StA's is overprivileged
Sidwell full of perverts
Landon is for felons
Maret is only for DC residents
Bullis is not academic
Sheeesh! I guess I will go back to the drawing board and stick with my visits and my gut. Or, if anyone has anything constructive to say about these, I am all ears.

If you are making your decisions based on what you read in DCUM, then you are a welcomed addition to its family, the crazy side of the family.

OP Here: For those of you that were constructive, thanks for the feedback. For those that were rude, I guess I get it now ..I wasn't even asking about a particular school and was subjected to insults. So some folks are just angry, I guess. So I have read through as much as I can on this forum and from the postings it is clear that ...
StA's is overprivileged
Sidwell full of perverts
Landon is for felons
Maret is only for DC residents
Bullis is not academic
Sheeesh! I guess I will go back to the drawing board and stick with my visits and my gut. Or, if anyone has anything constructive to say about these, I am all ears.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking at private schools for our kids (currently in MCPS) and I thought to come to DCUM for some insight on the various schools we are visiting. I am amazed how angry and mean-spirited so many of the posters are. Can anyone recommend another site that offers analysis of private schools but without the vitriol?

I wouldn't consider Bethesda magazine to be the go to for academic education but they have an interesting (biased) take on what they consider the best. Some I agree with, some I don't.
http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/Bethesda-Magazine/Best-of-Bethesda-2013/

it is not their take. People vote for the best so any school can get their population to vote for that particular category. Not only is it extremely biased but it has no basis in any fact at all.

Your best bet is to visit schools and talk with current students and parents at the school. That will give you the bestidea of what the population of families is like and what the school atmosphere is like. Pay attention on your tour to bullentin boards of current classs work, what the books are inside the classrooms and howthe students seem to interact with each other. Also observe how the teacher's interact with students, and how well their classroom seem to be organized.

I agree with 8:50 ... much of the commentary here is what people would say out loud if they could do so without blow back. Hiding behind an anonymous tag allows them to say all the things they feel but know is not politically acceptable or polite in the real world. I know many nice, kind parents at my child's school ... I also know some real douches. Commenting on some of the latter's behavior on this web site helps me keep my sanity. So yes, although DCUM provides an exaggerated caricature of this crowd, it is not completely off and parents who find DCUM distasteful might want to consider carefully whether they wish to mingle with these folks in real life. Distasteful parents are readily present at all types of schools (private and public), but you may find yourself having to interact with them more closely and often in a small school community.

I enjoy the haters. But the schools are not much like what people say on this forum.

Different "big 3 parent here." It shocks me that the person above would equate the tone and content of this web site with anything in the "real world." And I've certainly never experienced anything like it in any of the numerous parents in various grades with whom I've interacted. Hard to imagine that your "big 3" school is so different from mine (and so different from anything I've ever experienced in adulthood), but I suppose anything's possible.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking at private schools for our kids (currently in MCPS) and I thought to come to DCUM for some insight on the various schools we are visiting. I am amazed how angry and mean-spirited so many of the posters are. Can anyone recommend another site that offers analysis of private schools but without the vitriol?

Wade throught the vitriol. You'll find many insights. Better than that crappy book I bought, or those other less than helpful school sites on the net.

This. I've found quite a bit of helpful info here.

Agreed. You've just got to learn to sift through the crap that some people post, so you can find the good stuff underneath. It's sort of like a flea market.

Agreed. But the vitriol is itself an insight. Big 3 parent here. Much of the vitriol on this forum are from insiders. I know of what I speak. If you can't handle it here, there's no f-in way you're going to make it in the real world.

I love this forum. It is my new guilty pleasure. Yes there is alot of garage but my favorites are often when people post references to third party articles. I love the fact there is no filter. I've been told I'm a great mom a horrible one that I need therapy and my kids do too. I ignore much of those comments but sometimes a poster will help me put things in the right perspective. DCUM is a lot cheaper than therapy anyway.

In serious response to the original poster, I pop in now and then to read this stuff out of amusement. Not sure why it's such a cesspool, but you're absolutely right -- contrary to others, I don't see much in the way of valuable information. If there were reliable information buried somewhere in here it would be impossible to know given the anonymity of the postings. Good luck finding the information you're looking for, though!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Keep your kids in pubic school. No, that was not a mistake.

Have you ever read the Maryland Public Schools forum on DCUM? Plenty of SO MUCH HATRED there too.

Oh, but NOTHING like the private school forum! The back-biting about class, race and inter-school rivalries in the private school forum is in a league of its own. Sadly.

I read both, and I disagree.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Keep your kids in pubic school. No, that was not a mistake.

Have you ever read the Maryland Public Schools forum on DCUM? Plenty of SO MUCH HATRED there too.

Oh, but NOTHING like the private school forum! The back-biting about class, race and inter-school rivalries in the private school forum is in a league of its own. Sadly.