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Here are a few articles that I found that speak of college students who are required to take remedial coursework after high school graduation. One article even mentions students with GPA's above 3.0.
America in general (some with emphasis on a particular state)
Part of the reason you don't see as many minorities in private school is cultural.
If you went to private school you are far more likely to send (or want to) your child to private school. Just the way it is. Research bears this out. Mommiepremed is an example of this -- she went to Marist and is looking for private schools for her 2 year old.
In my community, I hear it all the time, there is nothing wrong with the neighborhood school, but I (or we) went to private school and that is just what our family does. I know a family in Walton district where the kids go to boarding school in the NE because that is what the family has done for generations.
African Americans and other minorities didn't have those opportunities until about 20 years ago.
This is a great point. I grew up very upper middle class, but attended public school. The neighbors and friends of my mother tried to get my Mom to send me to Sidwell Friends of National Cathedral and she refused. Instead I attended one of the best public schools in the nation. My husband and I both believe in public schools , and when its time for our kids to attend school we will be moving to East Cobb.
I know this may sound bad (and I'm prepared to get flamed). But honestly, private school is just SO expensive. I'm young (25) with no children; but it would be hard for me to agree with sending my (future) children to private school. With the average tuition at these "elite" institutions running around $20k/year. Compound interest tells me that if I redirected my $20k into a savings vehicle at 6% per year for the 13 years (k-12) I would end up with apx. 400k - and thats per child . So my rationale is to send them to a good (and free!) public school and have an extra 400k per child at graduation time. This can be used towards college, their first home, etc. I know this may sound selfish. I know education is important. and I know I'm young... so maybe I just don't understand. But unless you are very very financially well off, I just don't see the point. But who knows, maybe my opinion will change by the time my wife and I have school aged children.
I'm African American, a product of a private school in Atlanta, and have a young son in a different one, so I feel a little qualified to speak on the subject.
Why my parents sent me: I grew up in SW, nice safe middle class neighborhood zoned for Therrell, but kids in my neighborhood also went to Westwood (and later Mays, which opened after I was deep in high school). Simply put, education was extremely important to my dad, and I was working two grade levels above the grade school I was in. My parents weren't impressed with the education my older sibs got from the local public schools. He could afford it (barely), so off we went. It wasn't close, we carpooled. Seriously considering leaving for Mays when it opened, as about 1/4 of the AA students at my private school did.
What I observed: When I was in private school, I dated a girl in honors at Mays. We used the same chemistry book. She was a year ahead, but we were learning more, doing the advanced problems (not just me, the whole class). I used to help her with the basic problems, her school didn't teach the advanced problems. That's when I understood the difference. Mind you, I personally know people smarter than me that graduated from Mays, went to Ivys, and are now very well off. What I'm saying is that the curriculum in our honors program taught more than the honors curriculum at Mays, but I know for a fact that smart kids at Mays turned out just fine. I can't tell you whether they had to work harder in college since they might not have been exposed to certain material, I just don't know. It is easily verified that the top private schools offer more AP courses than virtually all (except maybe one or two exceptional) public schools, and I definitely felt an advantage freshman year in college.
Now this brings up a key point: If my kid was of average intelligence, I would have a hard time justifying private school over a top public school, and I probably wouldn't. I would move to an area with the best schools, tutor him up, and hope for the best. Unfortunately for my wallet, my son is freakin' brilliant. Atlanta-area public schools aren't set up to challenge gifted students to my liking, and I feel obligated to give my kid every opportunity to be a rocket scientist, so we're at private school. I think it's my job to educate my kids, but I believe I can outsource more of the effort to a private school, whereas the public school will require me to do more myself. Also, I have no patience for the mandated government testing and the wasted time spent preparing kids for the tests.
Correcting a few misconceptions: Private school is a fairly rare choice even among affluent whites. It's not like the top-earning 25% of white families send their kids to private schools only. Far from it. It's very much a lifestyle choice, a cultural choice, a values choice, or a religious choice, as much as it is an educational choice. Some are simply snobs, some are looking for top academics, some are seeking help for juvenile deliquents (okay, "misguided youth").
Financial aid is available, but the number of AA's with the means to afford full private school tuition is fairly small. Two kids will set you back $35-40k/yr in after-tax dollars for the top schools. Multiply that by 13 years (K-12) and we're talking $500k. We're talking some combo of wealth, sacrifice, and financial aid.
Another falsity: Geography isn't much of a factor. Parents interested in what private schools have to offer aren't going to pass on it because of the commute. I had classmates from Snellville, Peachtree City, Suwanee, Alpharetta, Palmetto, Norcross, you name it. Don't know how they did it, must have sucked, but they did it.
You spoke of your child's test scores being in the 99th percentile, and that is good, but could she have received an education at an excellent boarding school or a top private school that teaches more than the basics required by state and federal mandates.
Critical and cognitive thinking are two skills that taught in some private schools that a majority of public schools don't introduce into the curriculum because they are not required to pass standardized testing. Logic and reason are also not generally taught in a public school setting.
All A's and perfect test scores are fine, but can all children explain the hows and whys of what they are doing.
I will look for stats that I read about the fact that maybe 40% of highschool graduates must enroll in remedial classes the first year of college. If public schools were allowed to prepare students for college and not for tests statistics like the one I mentioned above would not occur.
I have spoken to many students who graduated from exceptional private schools, and many of them found college to be easier than high school.
Have you ever attended an information night at Woodward, Westminster, Pace, Lovett, First Montessori of Atlanta or another similar school? Many alumni return to speak of their college experiences and parents of current students are also on hand to share their stories.
What made you choose the schools your daughter attended?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Merin
This is a great point. I grew up very upper middle class, but attended public school. The neighbors and friends of my mother tried to get my Mom to send me to Sidwell Friends of National Cathedral and she refused. Instead I attended one of the best public schools in the nation. My husband and I both believe in public schools , and when its time for our kids to attend school we will be moving to East Cobb.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DPAT
I know this may sound bad (and I'm prepared to get flamed). But honestly, private school is just SO expensive. I'm young (25) with no children; but it would be hard for me to agree with sending my (future) children to private school. With the average tuition at these "elite" institutions running around $20k/year. Compound interest tells me that if I redirected my $20k into a savings vehicle at 6% per year for the 13 years (k-12) I would end up with apx. 400k - and thats per child . So my rationale is to send them to a good (and free!) public school and have an extra 400k per child at graduation time. This can be used towards college, their first home, etc. I know this may sound selfish. I know education is important. and I know I'm young... so maybe I just don't understand. But unless you are very very financially well off, I just don't see the point. But who knows, maybe my opinion will change by the time my wife and I have school aged children.
I think what we see on this thread is there's essentially a cultural/worldview gap between the private and public school advocates. I'm well aware of the difference between regurgitating facts and critical thinking, and it appears to me that plenty of the latter is being required of my child in her high school work. Private schooling families simply believe that private schools are superior, while those of us from public schooling families are unpersuaded.
In the case of my family, my child's grandfathers were both Ph.D. professors at top Canadian universities. Well, those were public universities, but in Canada, the top universities are public institutions. We certainly don't have a family tradition of low educational aspirations, but we do tend to think private schools are a waste of money. I do believe the super-elite institutions mentioned on this thread probably do provide a special experience not available elsewhere, but that would be way out of our price bracket and I'm still not persuaded it would be worth the cost, even if we had the money. It's really not that I don't care enough about my gifted child. I think sending her to public school, requiring her to get along with a cross section of the populace, is a better preparation for adult life than placing her in a private school hothouse.
A student at my daughter's high school, Lassiter, received a perfect 2400 score on the SATs this year, and will be heading to Harvard to study math and music next fall. Would his future prospects be even brighter if his parents had invested in sending him to private school? That seems pretty hard to imagine.
Another falsity: Geography isn't much of a factor. Parents interested in what private schools have to offer aren't going to pass on it because of the commute. I had classmates from Snellville, Peachtree City, Suwanee, Alpharetta, Palmetto, Norcross, you name it. Don't know how they did it, must have sucked, but they did it.
I agree. I know families who live north of Acworth and send their children to Woodward. Commuting for educational purposes is no different than commuting to work
A student at my daughter's high school, Lassiter, received a perfect 2400 score on the SATs this year, and will be heading to Harvard to study math and music next fall. Would his future prospects be even brighter if his parents had invested in sending him to private school? That seems pretty hard to imagine.
No reasonable person would claim that one must go to private school in order to ace the SAT and go to Harvard. The question is whether there are students at Lassiter who did not ace the SAT and are going to Georgia State who would have aced the SAT and be headed to Harvard if they had gone to Lovett. In my opinion, the analysis is all about probability when taking the attributes of the individual student into consideration.
Here are my two tests:
Given this smart kid, and this public school, is there a significant probability that he will achieve less than he should? If not, go public. If yes, go private (or go better public!).
Given this average kid, and this private school, is there a significant probability that he will achieve more than he would at this public school? If yes, go private. If not, go public.
I am the product of an appalling school system in a north Alabama rustbelt town. It was in its death throes around the time I entered high school. The only foreign language (Spanish) was taught part-time by an English teacher with a drinking problem. We shared the French teacher (also part-time) with two other schools. Private schools were not an option as my parents couldn't afford it. Diversity scholarships were nonexistent as these "seg academies" were established in an effort to avoid integration. (Note how many private schools in the south just happened to be established around the time of integration.)
As valedictorian of that school I did get a scholarship to a very good university. It was there that I discovered just how inadequate my "education" had been. I met kids who not only had five or more years of Spanish, but had been to Spain. They had exchange students with other countries! It was a wake-up call of monumental proportions. They didn't have remedial classes at my university, but I certainly could have used them.
Like most parents I would like for my child to have better than I did. Obviously I'm biased, but I think my son is brilliant. Of course he's only four years old so it's entirely possible that he may lack the drive or motivation to capitalize on that native intelligence. Regardless, I want the opportunity to be there should he choose to exploit it.
We bought our house in a neighborhood with good public schools. We would never do otherwise, but should an opportunity present itself for a scholarship or financial aid to attend better schools we'd be fools not to take it.
I know that this is not supposed to be a debate about private vs. public schools. I just wanted to make a point that I have seen lastminutemom make in previous threads. I think that there is a big difference in the experience a child receives at (take for example) Chamblee High School depending upon whether they are enrolled in the Gifted/Magnet program or are in the "general population." There are plenty of really bright kids in public schools who are shut out of the Gifted program for various arbitrary reasons. Maybe their cognitive and academic scores qualify, but they didn't meet criteria for the "creativity" component (I still don't get how they measure that, but whatever).
If I was a parent of a kid in that situation, I would probably also consider private school as opposed to the non-gifted curriculum at the public school.
Just my $.02.
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. So my rationale is to send them to a good (and free!) public school and have an extra 400k per child at graduation time. This can be used towards college, their first home, etc. I know this may sound selfish. I know education is important. and I know I'm young... so maybe I just don't understand. But unless you are very very financially well off, I just don't see the point. But who knows, maybe my opinion will change by the time my wife and I have school aged children.
We certainly don't have a family tradition of low educational aspirations, but we do tend to think private schools are a waste of money. I do believe the super-elite institutions mentioned on this thread probably do provide a special experience not available elsewhere, but that would be way out of our price bracket and I'm still not persuaded it would be worth the cost, even if we had the money. It's really not that I don't care enough about my gifted child. I think sending her to public school, requiring her to get along with a cross section of the populace, is a better preparation for adult life than placing her in a private school hothouse.
