Anonymous wrote:"The public school that our house is assigned to sucks."

Well that's a mature and friendly way to improve relations with your neighbors.

Anonymous wrote:My mother's funny tactic has always been to cut people off by insulting me. It's kind of an Asian thing - the kids are raised to be very confident in the home, but in public humility is important. Nothing stops the conversation better than an answer like "oh my child is very lazy and needs private school so she's watched more closely."

I love your mom's humor. I'm going to use this and I'm white.

I have never even thought about this. What do parents in Alexandria City think of those who send to private? My neighbors have never mentioned it, but now I wonder.....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a public parent (though I briefly toyed with the idea of private). I'm here because the private school online fights are really entertaining and snippy. I think the public school parents are a more earnest bunch, so the fights are more full of graphs and such.

so true!

Hey--the private school parents can be earnest too...haven't you read the threads about which cotillion classes are the best and which ones you really need to avoid?

My mother's funny tactic has always been to cut people off by insulting me. It's kind of an Asian thing - the kids are raised to be very confident in the home, but in public humility is important. Nothing stops the conversation better than an answer like "oh my child is very lazy and needs private school so she's watched more closely."

"The public school that our house is assigned to sucks."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:!8:37 I agree with you 100%. Public schools need active, engaged, smart, demanding parents in order to be pushed to be the best. If parents simply opt out, you are, in fact weakening the public school system. It is the reason Warren Buffet advocates doing away with private school (not something I agree with, but his point is well taken). If everyone had to be in the public school system then, theoretically, those engaged parents would improve the system for all.

What makes you think public schools want active, engaged, smart, and demanding parents? Mine sure didn't. They'd do whatever they could to keep parents away and were more than happy for those active and engaged parents to take their children somewhere else and stop rocking the boat.

Public schools don't want PITA parents (your "rocking the boat") any more than private schools want them. Having had kids in public and private schools, I can say that the desire to help PITA parents move elsewhere is universal among school administrators of all stripes.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think you are projecting OP. nobody really cares, and if they do they probably are asking a fact based question about why you made the choice.

Don't fool yourself. People want to know why -- we get asked this question all the time and it is a real conversation stopper. No matter what you say, it's hard not to sound defensive. Also, they always make a point of saying how great their child's experience is in the public school.

Just a guess here, but... maybe their kid did have a great experience in public school and they were being truthful?

You do sound fairly defensive, even in that one post above. But you don't have to be defensive, just own your own choices and talk about them with confidence.

Anonymous wrote:I think you are projecting OP. nobody really cares, and if they do they probably are asking a fact based question about why you made the choice.

Don't fool yourself. People want to know why -- we get asked this question all the time and it is a real conversation stopper. No matter what you say, it's hard not to sound defensive. Also, they always make a point of saying how great their child's experience is in the public school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
We all pay taxes.

What planet, exactly, are you living on?

Please give me an example of a household that pays no taxes.

The great majority of FCPS funding, by way of example, comes from property and personal property taxes. There are plenty of people who don't pay either one of those. The fact is that those who own real property subsidize public education for those who do not. The poster above who pointed out that World Bank employees pay no tax may be correct (I don't know one way or the other) but that's an edge case.

I own a home and pay a significant amount of property tax. My DDs are in private school and I don't begrudge the subsidy I pay. I do get pissed at the pseudo-moralists who pass social judgment on my decisions.

Even renters pay enough and that money goes to taxes as the rent rate is based on the cost of the area.

Unless we start talking housing the the government pay the rent which pays the taxes, which goes back to the government.

Like my neighbor said. He has no kids in school now. He said taxes that fund schools raise property values. It's not a bad deal even for those that do not have children

Anonymous wrote:!8:37 I agree with you 100%. Public schools need active, engaged, smart, demanding parents in order to be pushed to be the best. If parents simply opt out, you are, in fact weakening the public school system. It is the reason Warren Buffet advocates doing away with private school (not something I agree with, but his point is well taken). If everyone had to be in the public school system then, theoretically, those engaged parents would improve the system for all.

What makes you think public schools want active, engaged, smart, and demanding parents? Mine sure didn't. They'd do whatever they could to keep parents away and were more than happy for those active and engaged parents to take their children somewhere else and stop rocking the boat.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you withdraw your child from a particular public school because you do not like it, that doesn't improve the public school. In fact, it might make that public school worse, because you no longer have any incentive to work to improve that public school.

I'm not willing to sacrifice my child on the altar of good intentions. I had to withdraw my child from public school because of an abusive teacher. I attempted to rectify the situation and learned that the public school administration wasn't interested in providing a safe place for children to learn. It meant more to them to protect their abusive teacher.

If the public schools were actually interested in parental involvement and improving the environment for children, it might be worthwhile to stick around. As it stands, the relationship is entirely one-sided and the only power I had as a parent was to pull my child and make alternate arrangements for his education.

And I wouldn't ask you to. Of course you should make the decision based on what's best for your child.

It's the difference between "I'm going to do what's best for my child, which may or may not be what's best for society" (you) and "What's best for my child is also best for society (and society should be grateful)" (the "school choice is good!" PP).

One of the benefits of school choice could potentially be schools that have to pay more attention to parents. Where I live, public schools are essentially a monopoly. I am assigned to an elem-middle-high and that's the set of schools my child will attend. When my child runs into an abusive teacher, there is no recourse. The administration functions to protect the teacher. I cannot "make" the administration switch my child to a different class. I cannot move my child to a different public school. I cannot even run for the school board to advocate for change.

If there were school choice, perhaps schools would have to pay attention to parents and children who are dissatisfied with the educational environment. Perhaps the school board would actually have to pay attention not just to the admin and teachers, but to the children who are at the mercy of the system for hours every day.

Currently, only those of us with extra money or time can pretend to have school choice in the form of opting for private or home schooling. The local publics have a captive audience and guaranteed income and they know it. Sometimes, the best thing to do for society IS to opt out of a corrupt and broken system. (I admit the experience I had may be influencing my extreme distaste for the public school situation in my area. I never anticipated sending my children to anything but public school.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:!8:37 I agree with you 100%. Public schools need active, engaged, smart, demanding parents in order to be pushed to be the best. If parents simply opt out, you are, in fact weakening the public school system. It is the reason Warren Buffet advocates doing away with private school (not something I agree with, but his point is well taken). If everyone had to be in the public school system then, theoretically, those engaged parents would improve the system for all.

So parents with kids at Whitman, Churchill et al. - What are they doing to improve public schools in the red zone? I know they have booster clubs that raise money for their own schools; do they do anything other than pay taxes in order to help red zone schools? How does someone sending their kid to Carderock help a kid at New Hampshire Estates?

It's all one school system. So if the Potomac/Bethesda parents scream and yell about putting more money put into the capital improvement budget, then the schools with poor kids benefit from this as well. If the Potomac/Bethesda parents scream about cutting bus transportation to magnet programs, then poor kids in magnet programs benefit from this as well. It's not perfect, and the de facto segregation in MCPS is shameful. But it's still more involvement and effect than there would be if the Potomac/Bethesda kids were all in private school -- or in their own separate public (for people like them) schools.

Also some of the PTAs in schools where people have a lot of money partner with PTAs in schools where people have little money. Ideally (in my opinion) there would be more of this.

Just don't say anything. It's not really their business. Some people will judge no matter what, public and private parents both. I went to private schools K-12 (excellent ones) and yet am choosing to send my DC to public because, for them, I believe the public education is superior. I've encountered occasional unpleasant nosiness about that decision from private school parents, which I assume is related to their own misgivings about private school. I think there is a segment of the private school population who cannot accept that rational parents could look at both private and public and conclude that public was educationally superior for their DC. I'm sure there's a segment of the public school population who cannot accept that rational parents might conclude the same about private (that it's superior educationally for their DC). But most people don't care too much and there's no need to engage.

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is this some kind of weird Sahm thing? I live on the hill, and I really can't imagine any of my neighbors giving a flying f about where each other's kids go to school. I am curious to hear about why they make the choices they do so I can learn more, but that's about it. If anything people are extra cautious to seem not to be criticizing each other explicitly or in

Lucky you... I think this is a weird suburb thing. People are definitely wrapped up in this shit out in CC/Beth.

Actually I have found the opposite. Kids in CC/Bethesda go to both private schools and public schools. People in my neighborhood don't really care and the public schools are excellent so there isn't a sense that the public schools being a lesser choice or that people are fleeing the schools. And the demographics don't look that different - plenty of wealthy people in both schools.

Capitol Hill seems a bit more bifurcated, esp for elementary school. There is definitely a group of very strong public school advocates there who do feel like people who are choosing private school are making the public schools weaker.

Lucky you, because in my Bethesda neighborhood, plenty of neighbors and friends care that we send our child to private....They care far too much, in fact!