Anonymous wrote:We have been a GDS family for about eleven years and have had kids in the LMS and the HS. Don’t believe everything you read on this Board. Some people are irrationally anti-GDS, and others are irrationally pro-GDS. It is an excellent school, but no school is for everyone. On the whole, the teachers and administrators are very good at what they do, and care deeply about the kids. The LMS has vastly improved since we first came in 2010, and is a kind place that really wakes up kids’ love of learning. The MS used to be very stressful for kids, and now they have changed the curriculum so that kids are prepared for HS without being overly stressed or burdened. The new building is beautiful and it is nice having the whole school in one location. The HS is a great place, and benefits from the influx of new kids in 9th. People on this Board like to trash GDS for how many kids are admitted at 9th, but most schools would benefit from an influx of new kids at 9th. The HS tends to meet kids where they are, and not push them into competition. Some kids are super driven, and operate with a high degree of stress, but others are pretty low key and happy go lucky. And some happy go lucky kids are top students, and others are not, but everyone is supported. We have been pleased with the college placement process, which we found to be well informed and empathetic. I would talk to people you know who have kids there and do whatever virtual events you can. Regarding excessive displays of wealth, that has not been my experience. There is no top private in DC that does not have a lot of wealthy families—that’s the unfortunate nature of the private school model, and holding GDS to a different standard than other privates in the area seems unfair. GDS as an institution shies away from ostentatious displays of wealth. There is no annual auction for instance, which is usually the wealth flaunting Super Bowl for most schools. So I do think they try to demonstrate their commitment to their mission in how they operate.

Anonymous wrote:Parent at another school with child at least two grade levels ahead in math. If your child really loves math they are likely going to want to do math outside of school. Not a knock on any particular school at all.

Anonymous wrote:huh. I have many friends at GDS and they are very down-to-earth. We're at another Big3 which always seems much wealthier in comparison. I think of GDS as having the largest contingent of public school transplants and "normal people" among the Big3 (a good thing).

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Anonymous wrote:Love GDS. Nurturing, supportive, rigorous. And fun.

How’s the learning though?

Great. My kid is very advance in math and he has customized exercises and one on ones. Their approach is build a good foundation for learning and then learn a lot. I do not know how to say it better (sorry, I am a foreigner

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Anonymous wrote:Love GDS. Nurturing, supportive, rigorous. And fun.

How’s the learning though?

Anonymous wrote:Love GDS. Nurturing, supportive, rigorous. And fun.

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Anonymous wrote:Most of the GDS students that I know are anything but competitive.

Too kumbaya to develop competitive spirit, even in sports or test taking. That will have to be developed elsewhere or by parents.
The meeting children where they’re at includes not pushing students who don’t push themselves.

Wanted to emphasize this post, b/c this is a big GDS Fact (and why we ultimately did not send one of our DC’s to GDS). GDS is *great* for a self-starter. In fact, that’s kind of the learning model. One of our DC’s was self-starting for some things, but for a lot of things, we felt like it would be failure to launch if we left it up to DC. We’re all for growing the plant you have, but some plants will shoot up out of the ground on everything no matter what, and others need more fertilizer. GDS is a dream for a kid who is brimming with self-motivation, because the sky’s the limit. Less so for a kid who needs a little nudging and structure to meet their potential.

I am the PP who said GDS meets kids where they are at, and I don't disagree with either comment above. I will say however, that another way to look at this is that some top schools push every kid as if they are going to Harvard, when most are not. I would not necessarily say that less motivated kids are not pushed. They are pushed by the work product they are expected to produce and by the cohort they are part of, which includes many, many hyper-motivated, and yes, competitive kids. Also the teachers have the bandwidth to get to know the kids and suss out their strengths so that maybe a kid is not an A student, but he or she has other great qualities that should be acknowledged. What GDS does not do is make the less motivated (or less capable) kids feel bad about themselves or like they are failures. Russell likes to say that they are trying to raise healthy thirty-five year olds, and its one of my favorite Russellisms. It's an acknowledgment that while some 17 and 18 year olds are ready for lift off, others are still percolating, but that does not mean they don't have potential to do great things. I have a DC at a different top school whiich they love, but the whole ethos is to push, push, push constantly with a refrain of "this was good, but why wasn't it better?" That works for some kids and my kid loves it, but there must be kids at that school who feel crushed by the expectations. I think GDS balances that well.

Which DMV area top private school pushes students like you described? I am not aware of any of them like that. Please name it, or you are a troll.

Um… Sidwell. Duh

Holton.

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Anonymous wrote:Most of the GDS students that I know are anything but competitive.

Too kumbaya to develop competitive spirit, even in sports or test taking. That will have to be developed elsewhere or by parents.
The meeting children where they’re at includes not pushing students who don’t push themselves.

Wanted to emphasize this post, b/c this is a big GDS Fact (and why we ultimately did not send one of our DC’s to GDS). GDS is *great* for a self-starter. In fact, that’s kind of the learning model. One of our DC’s was self-starting for some things, but for a lot of things, we felt like it would be failure to launch if we left it up to DC. We’re all for growing the plant you have, but some plants will shoot up out of the ground on everything no matter what, and others need more fertilizer. GDS is a dream for a kid who is brimming with self-motivation, because the sky’s the limit. Less so for a kid who needs a little nudging and structure to meet their potential.

Agree.

We sent our “bare minimum” kid there early on because we thought she’d be more interested in choosing her project topics and customizing her work like progressive schools tout. Well she just spun her wheels with lack of structure and expectations and didn’t even learn the basics well. And the lack of spelling or math tests or even standardized testing really doesn’t help parents know what kind of learner they have. Even the dismal ERB results later were sent out with heavy caveats that GdS doesn’t cover most of those materials, they “go deeper and narrower” even in the lower grades math and reading comp. Whoops.

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Anonymous wrote:Most of the GDS students that I know are anything but competitive.

Too kumbaya to develop competitive spirit, even in sports or test taking. That will have to be developed elsewhere or by parents.
The meeting children where they’re at includes not pushing students who don’t push themselves.

Wanted to emphasize this post, b/c this is a big GDS Fact (and why we ultimately did not send one of our DC’s to GDS). GDS is *great* for a self-starter. In fact, that’s kind of the learning model. One of our DC’s was self-starting for some things, but for a lot of things, we felt like it would be failure to launch if we left it up to DC. We’re all for growing the plant you have, but some plants will shoot up out of the ground on everything no matter what, and others need more fertilizer. GDS is a dream for a kid who is brimming with self-motivation, because the sky’s the limit. Less so for a kid who needs a little nudging and structure to meet their potential.

I am the PP who said GDS meets kids where they are at, and I don't disagree with either comment above. I will say however, that another way to look at this is that some top schools push every kid as if they are going to Harvard, when most are not. I would not necessarily say that less motivated kids are not pushed. They are pushed by the work product they are expected to produce and by the cohort they are part of, which includes many, many hyper-motivated, and yes, competitive kids. Also the teachers have the bandwidth to get to know the kids and suss out their strengths so that maybe a kid is not an A student, but he or she has other great qualities that should be acknowledged. What GDS does not do is make the less motivated (or less capable) kids feel bad about themselves or like they are failures. Russell likes to say that they are trying to raise healthy thirty-five year olds, and its one of my favorite Russellisms. It's an acknowledgment that while some 17 and 18 year olds are ready for lift off, others are still percolating, but that does not mean they don't have potential to do great things. I have a DC at a different top school whiich they love, but the whole ethos is to push, push, push constantly with a refrain of "this was good, but why wasn't it better?" That works for some kids and my kid loves it, but there must be kids at that school who feel crushed by the expectations. I think GDS balances that well.

Which DMV area top private school pushes students like you described? I am not aware of any of them like that. Please name it, or you are a troll.

Um… Sidwell. Duh

Sidwell is most definately note a "push push push" school. Are you sure your kid isn't feeling peer pressure rather than from teachers or the administation? It has been our experience that the kids are self-motivated and self-starters, and the faculty guide via group projects, class discussion etc.

Please define what you mean by the push push push thing.

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Anonymous wrote:The wholeness is a gloss over the fact that it’s a schools of massively rich people who are conflicted by their money in really strange ways.

+1 And a smattering of scholarship kids and no one in between.

Does GDS give scholarship? I thought it is all need-based FAs.

It's all need based. And as a parent, I have no idea who received financial aid and who doesn't. There is no social divide as far as I can tell.