Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That hasn't been our experience at all. Most of our friends are products of private schools, K-12, and Ivy or equivalent colleges, and top grad school programs. I can assure you that your one example of the fu8k up guy who went to Harvard is the exception rather than the rule. Probably why he stands out.

Have you ever seen the 7 up series? Most people pretty much end up in life as expected.

Not sure what you're intending to say here. Most people end up where their *talents* would be expected to lead them? Most people end up where the *prestige of their school* would be expected to lead them?

Also, agree that an Ivy or equivalent diploma opens a lot of doors. But the world has changed since we went to school and, in particular, there's no longer a guaranteed path from private schools to the Ivies and equivalent and then straight on to Wall Street. Plenty of public school kids go to Ivies, MIT and Stanford. This isn't our grandparents' world of white shoe bankers who all went to the same schools and colleges. It may well be that "most of your friends" are fabulous successes after their private school and Ivy educations, but maybe your friends aren't particularly representative either (anecdata), in fact maybe they're all lawyers (the one profession where this seems to still matter).

Most of our friends are lawyers and investment bankers and I agree with you, those are the two professions where where you went to school still count.

Anonymous wrote:The best formula I see is private in the younger years then an awesome highschool, in MD,VA and even Wilson/Walls- you can't go wrong. This sets a nurturing foundation and love for learning well including all of the play based creative ways that are so important for brain development. I think many have it wrong pushing the private in hs to get into the good schools and fear of "bad elements" in the public schools. The heavy testing and focus on memorization pushing reading and academic skills in the rote ways they do is disputed by most experts.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have had kids on MCPS, Cathedral Schools, and what I would consider a second tier private school. In a nutshell, the Cathedral schools were worth EVERY penny, the 2nd tier private was not worth it, and MCPS was adequate considering it's free.

Thank you for your breakdown. It's appreciated.

Anonymous wrote:We have had kids on MCPS, Cathedral Schools, and what I would consider a second tier private school. In a nutshell, the Cathedral schools were worth EVERY penny, the 2nd tier private was not worth it, and MCPS was adequate considering it's free.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That hasn't been our experience at all. Most of our friends are products of private schools, K-12, and Ivy or equivalent colleges, and top grad school programs. I can assure you that your one example of the fu8k up guy who went to Harvard is the exception rather than the rule. Probably why he stands out.

Have you ever seen the 7 up series? Most people pretty much end up in life as expected.

Not sure what you're intending to say here. Most people end up where their *talents* would be expected to lead them? Most people end up where the *prestige of their school* would be expected to lead them?

Also, agree that an Ivy or equivalent diploma opens a lot of doors. But the world has changed since we went to school and, in particular, there's no longer a guaranteed path from private schools to the Ivies and equivalent and then straight on to Wall Street. Plenty of public school kids go to Ivies, MIT and Stanford. This isn't our grandparents' world of white shoe bankers who all went to the same schools and colleges. It may well be that "most of your friends" are fabulous successes after their private school and Ivy educations, but maybe your friends aren't particularly representative either (anecdata), in fact maybe they're all lawyers (the one profession where this seems to still matter).

Anonymous wrote:That hasn't been our experience at all. Most of our friends are products of private schools, K-12, and Ivy or equivalent colleges, and top grad school programs. I can assure you that your one example of the fu8k up guy who went to Harvard is the exception rather than the rule. Probably why he stands out.

Have you ever seen the 7 up series? Most people pretty much end up in life as expected.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only a few publics are as good as privates, and those are usually in wealthy areas. More benefits for the rich! we have a large family with mixed educational backgrounds. Overall the private school students do better in life. Better colleges, better jobs. but it costs the parents a small fortune. We have one in magnet and one in private. The magnet has a big name and is very hard. Its public so some of the teachers are awful. Private is not perfect, but all of the teachers are on a certain level, and they are very motivated to teach well. It is a sacrifice for us to pay the tuition, but our parents did it for us. Private is a much more supportive environment. We determined that our DC needed that, compared to our other one, who is OK in public.

This is interesting because it has not been our experience as adults. Perhaps at age 22, the private kids are in better schools, and at 25 they are in fancier sounding jobs. But my husband and my experience as we hit age 40 (public school, public college, and private grad school for both of us) is that our friends who have had genuine professional success are almost exclusively the product of the public track. When I say "professional success", I mean people who have had tremendous upward promotions, who haven't changed jobs too frequently but when they have, they moved into well-regarded organizations and roles, and people who are well-recognized in their industry. At 40, you kind of know who has genuine success.

Our private school friends (most of whom we met in our prestigious grad schools) often had fantastic-sounding jobs straight out of school, but much has turned out to be fluff over the past 15-20 years -- frequent job changes without any substantial upward movement, lots of women who finished grad school, did 2 years of working and then became sahms (so you never got to see how successful they would have been), lots of men who quit their corporate jobs 4 years out to do a start up (clearly funded by parents' money - but without any evidence that it's been successful), and lots of people who ended up in fancy sounding but not necessarily substantive jobs that were gotten through friends or family (i.e. family business, family medical practice, small law practice, family real estate development, etc).

It's actually not the result I would have expected, but the contrast is pretty glaring at this point.

One of my closest girlfriends is a product of public school, then good but not stellar private college and grad school. Her husband was the product of very prestigious boarding school and then Harvard, and he is a total f-up, and gets fired at least once a year. Despite not having any money (see previous comment about his regular job-losses), she is insistent their three kids all need to go private starting at K. Without saying it outright, I've tried to gentry point out the non-success her husband has had on that path. But they are obsessed with the notion that "it's not where you end up, but the path you take", and that the experiences her husband had during his exclusive education were so important despite the fact that those experiences apparently robbed him of any ability to function in society. It's just an anecdote, and he's obviously an extreme example, but I find it an interesting glimpse of their thinking on the issue.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We pay full freight mostly for the sticker and the opportunities for my real estate maven wife to hawk her wares like a Parisian hooker during the G7. The opportunity to tailgate before each and every sporting event is an added bonus. My old man rocks espadrilles and I still have an add a bead necklace and some Dean Sweaters. We live in a bubble of self-entitlement and were damn proud. Care to sneak a peak over the fence? We pay full-freight.

Lol. I trust you overbid at the auction as well?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only a few publics are as good as privates, and those are usually in wealthy areas. More benefits for the rich! we have a large family with mixed educational backgrounds. Overall the private school students do better in life. Better colleges, better jobs. but it costs the parents a small fortune. We have one in magnet and one in private. The magnet has a big name and is very hard. Its public so some of the teachers are awful. Private is not perfect, but all of the teachers are on a certain level, and they are very motivated to teach well. It is a sacrifice for us to pay the tuition, but our parents did it for us. Private is a much more supportive environment. We determined that our DC needed that, compared to our other one, who is OK in public.

This is interesting because it has not been our experience as adults. Perhaps at age 22, the private kids are in better schools, and at 25 they are in fancier sounding jobs. But my husband and my experience as we hit age 40 (public school, public college, and private grad school for both of us) is that our friends who have had genuine professional success are almost exclusively the product of the public track. When I say "professional success", I mean people who have had tremendous upward promotions, who haven't changed jobs too frequently but when they have, they moved into well-regarded organizations and roles, and people who are well-recognized in their industry. At 40, you kind of know who has genuine success.

Our private school friends (most of whom we met in our prestigious grad schools) often had fantastic-sounding jobs straight out of school, but much has turned out to be fluff over the past 15-20 years -- frequent job changes without any substantial upward movement, lots of women who finished grad school, did 2 years of working and then became sahms (so you never got to see how successful they would have been), lots of men who quit their corporate jobs 4 years out to do a start up (clearly funded by parents' money - but without any evidence that it's been successful), and lots of people who ended up in fancy sounding but not necessarily substantive jobs that were gotten through friends or family (i.e. family business, family medical practice, small law practice, family real estate development, etc).

It's actually not the result I would have expected, but the contrast is pretty glaring at this point.

One of my closest girlfriends is a product of public school, then good but not stellar private college and grad school. Her husband was the product of very prestigious boarding school and then Harvard, and he is a total f-up, and gets fired at least once a year. Despite not having any money (see previous comment about his regular job-losses), she is insistent their three kids all need to go private starting at K. Without saying it outright, I've tried to gentry point out the non-success her husband has had on that path. But they are obsessed with the notion that "it's not where you end up, but the path you take", and that the experiences her husband had during his exclusive education were so important despite the fact that those experiences apparently robbed him of any ability to function in society. It's just an anecdote, and he's obviously an extreme example, but I find it an interesting glimpse of their thinking on the issue.