Anonymous wrote:You should read this thread from the private school forum. It’s quite lengthy and full of parents who are very happy that they moved from public to private.

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1304526.page

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

PP you replied to. I did not suggest it was the only consideration, but it is the most important one. My kids (one gifted, one with special needs) went through MCPS, and a brief stint in private in another country. I am the product of a posh international private in my home country. My husband survived rough public schools where he was bullied and he forced his parents to lie about their address so he could attend a public where he wasn't shoved into a locker every day. Our collective experience runs the gamut.

I taught my kids cursive and gave them a reading list of French and English classic literature every summer. I taught them everything I felt they should know that publics were not teaching. We paid for tutors and various enrichments because we weren't strapped by private tuition. And now, we can afford any college, graduate school, downpayment on homes, etc, because we invested the money we saved into the stock market.

I am here to tell you that yes, MONEY is the most important factor in your life and your children's lives. This is not something people talk about in face to face conversations, but it's the obvious truth. The arc of your children's lives is long and you don't know what the future will bring and what difference your money will make. What's clear is that with the rise of AI and the fracture of the old geopolitical order, their lives will not look at all like yours! If you have access to a relatively good public system, don't spit on it. Make it work! Your obligation to your children does not stop when they turn 18, or when they graduate from a 4 year college. There will be a lot of upheavals in their lives, that we in the western world did not experience when we were their age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

PP you replied to. I did not suggest it was the only consideration, but it is the most important one. My kids (one gifted, one with special needs) went through MCPS, and a brief stint in private in another country. I am the product of a posh international private in my home country. My husband survived rough public schools where he was bullied and he forced his parents to lie about their address so he could attend a public where he wasn't shoved into a locker every day. Our collective experience runs the gamut.

I taught my kids cursive and gave them a reading list of French and English classic literature every summer. I taught them everything I felt they should know that publics were not teaching. We paid for tutors and various enrichments because we weren't strapped by private tuition. And now, we can afford any college, graduate school, downpayment on homes, etc, because we invested the money we saved into the stock market.

I am here to tell you that yes, MONEY is the most important factor in your life and your children's lives. This is not something people talk about in face to face conversations, but it's the obvious truth. The arc of your children's lives is long and you don't know what the future will bring and what difference your money will make. What's clear is that with the rise of AI and the fracture of the old geopolitical order, their lives will not look at all like yours! If you have access to a relatively good public system, don't spit on it. Make it work! Your obligation to your children does not stop when they turn 18, or when they graduate from a 4 year college. There will be a lot of upheavals in their lives, that we in the western world did not experience when we were their age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

PP you replied to. I did not suggest it was the only consideration, but it is the most important one. My kids (one gifted, one with special needs) went through MCPS, and a brief stint in private in another country. I am the product of a posh international private in my home country. My husband survived rough public schools where he was bullied and he forced his parents to lie about their address so he could attend a public where he wasn't shoved into a locker every day. Our collective experience runs the gamut.

I taught my kids cursive and gave them a reading list of French and English classic literature every summer. I taught them everything I felt they should know that publics were not teaching. We paid for tutors and various enrichments because we weren't strapped by private tuition. And now, we can afford any college, graduate school, downpayment on homes, etc, because we invested the money we saved into the stock market.

I am here to tell you that yes, MONEY is the most important factor in your life and your children's lives. This is not something people talk about in face to face conversations, but it's the obvious truth. The arc of your children's lives is long and you don't know what the future will bring and what difference your money will make. What's clear is that with the rise of AI and the fracture of the old geopolitical order, their lives will not look at all like yours! If you have access to a relatively good public system, don't spit on it. Make it work! Your obligation to your children does not stop when they turn 18, or when they graduate from a 4 year college. There will be a lot of upheavals in their lives, that we in the western world did not experience when we were their age.

This is interesting. I definitely think the better question is not public vs private, but public + supplementing at a cost that is still much less than private. While there are benefits to the time and stress saved by going private if you end up in one where you no longer have to supplement (or stress about it), and potentially behavioral, I think the decision is less clear cut when framed this way.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

PP you replied to. I did not suggest it was the only consideration, but it is the most important one. My kids (one gifted, one with special needs) went through MCPS, and a brief stint in private in another country. I am the product of a posh international private in my home country. My husband survived rough public schools where he was bullied and he forced his parents to lie about their address so he could attend a public where he wasn't shoved into a locker every day. Our collective experience runs the gamut.

I taught my kids cursive and gave them a reading list of French and English classic literature every summer. I taught them everything I felt they should know that publics were not teaching. We paid for tutors and various enrichments because we weren't strapped by private tuition. And now, we can afford any college, graduate school, downpayment on homes, etc, because we invested the money we saved into the stock market.

I am here to tell you that yes, MONEY is the most important factor in your life and your children's lives. This is not something people talk about in face to face conversations, but it's the obvious truth. The arc of your children's lives is long and you don't know what the future will bring and what difference your money will make. What's clear is that with the rise of AI and the fracture of the old geopolitical order, their lives will not look at all like yours! If you have access to a relatively good public system, don't spit on it. Make it work! Your obligation to your children does not stop when they turn 18, or when they graduate from a 4 year college. There will be a lot of upheavals in their lives, that we in the western world did not experience when we were their age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

PP you replied to. I did not suggest it was the only consideration, but it is the most important one. My kids (one gifted, one with special needs) went through MCPS, and a brief stint in private in another country. I am the product of a posh international private in my home country. My husband survived rough public schools where he was bullied and he forced his parents to lie about their address so he could attend a public where he wasn't shoved into a locker every day. Our collective experience runs the gamut.

I taught my kids cursive and gave them a reading list of French and English classic literature every summer. I taught them everything I felt they should know that publics were not teaching. We paid for tutors and various enrichments because we weren't strapped by private tuition. And now, we can afford any college, graduate school, downpayment on homes, etc, because we invested the money we saved into the stock market.

I am here to tell you that yes, MONEY is the most important factor in your life and your children's lives. This is not something people talk about in face to face conversations, but it's the obvious truth. The arc of your children's lives is long and you don't know what the future will bring and what difference your money will make. What's clear is that with the rise of AI and the fracture of the old geopolitical order, their lives will not look at all like yours! If you have access to a relatively good public system, don't spit on it. Make it work! Your obligation to your children does not stop when they turn 18, or when they graduate from a 4 year college. There will be a lot of upheavals in their lives, that we in the western world did not experience when we were their age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.

This reasoning, such as it is, doesn't consider, even once, the need of an individual child.

Yes, the financial component is an important consideration. But to suggest that it is the only consideration is incredibly myopic, and really says something about the PP.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Private school is only worth it if you are wealthy or live in a bad area and get grants / scholarships to pay for it. Otherwise if you can afford private school in a bad area, you can afford to move to a good area with better public schools.

We are not wealthy, but live in a wealthy area with "great" public schools. We switched to private because there was nothing really happening in elementary during public except encouraging bad habits (academic and behavioral). Maybe I'm traditional, but I think kids should learn to use pencils in K-3rd, not how to swipe on an ipad.

Agree. There are no “good” public schools. There are public schools were parents of the children there are wealthy and where kids have fewer social/emotional problems- but the school isn’t actually any better

Anonymous wrote:We have quiet, studious daughters. Yes, it's been worth it.

Anonymous wrote:No.

I've explained my reasoning multiple times on DCUM, but basically it boils down to private school not offering the best quality:price ratio before college.

That being said, you do pay for your child's public education - in that the best schools are in the best neighborhoods, which have expensive real estate. But at the end of your kid's K-12, you still have your house, and it will have turned into a solid investment, since everyone wants to buy into the good school district. If you pay for private instead, the money is gone.

We moved to be inbounds to the best school district that also worked for our commutes. We were house poor for a while, but now our investment has paid off.

If you can't move because you have a great mortgage, and your public school is crap... then that might be the only time when temporary private schooling might help you out.