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Those numbers are over 8 years. That means 1 1/2 Lamplighter kids attend Cistercian each year. That's impressive?
I would pay much more attention to the huge numbers attending both Parish and ESD. As I posted earilier, HPISD would be better than ESD, and, to me, Parish is even lower on the totem pole - below Plano, Coppell, and Southlake. If you go the Lamplighter route, that could be your ultimate fate.
SMS_Parent makes a number of excellent points in defense of the Catholic education system. I'm not going to say theloneranger is wrong, but you have to think about the cause/effect of what he says.
The Catholic elementary schools do not have incredibly selective admissions policies. As such, you'll have a wider range of both economic status and academic abilities. It's much more likely that the "dunce" of the high school class will come out of a Catholic elementary school, compared to, say, Lamplighter. Is that a reflection of the school's quality? Not always.
It may be that his talents were developed more in the Catholic system than they would have if he has somehow managed admission to Greenhill or what not. And it certainly doesn't mean that if you send a bright child to the Catholic school, he will not become as smart as he would at a private school.
To some extent, you can make the same arguments for/against HPISD. Is it really a superior education, or are the starting materials (the offspring of rich people) genetically predisposed to perform better academically?
Check my math here. Its 7 years, not 8. And 25/7 = 3.5+ per year...every year (assuming same amount every year). From what I read on this board, to put between 3-4 boys into Cistercian every year sounds impressive (?) They put 8+ boys into St. Marks every year (58/7). I dont know any of these schools personally yet, so not saying what is good, bad, otherwise...but yes, I found those statistics impressive given what I read on this board (?)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Big G
Those numbers are over 8 years. That means 1 1/2 Lamplighter kids attend Cistercian each year. That's impressive?
I would pay much more attention to the huge numbers attending both Parish and ESD. As I posted earilier, HPISD would be better than ESD, and, to me, Parish is even lower on the totem pole - below Plano, Coppell, and Southlake. If you go the Lamplighter route, that could be your ultimate fate.
SMS_Parent makes a number of excellent points in defense of the Catholic education system. I'm not going to say theloneranger is wrong, but you have to think about the cause/effect of what he says.
The Catholic elementary schools do not have incredibly selective admissions policies. As such, you'll have a wider range of both economic status and academic abilities. It's much more likely that the "dunce" of the high school class will come out of a Catholic elementary school, compared to, say, Lamplighter. Is that a reflection of the school's quality? Not always.
It may be that his talents were developed more in the Catholic system than they would have if he has somehow managed admission to Greenhill or what not. And it certainly doesn't mean that if you send a bright child to the Catholic school, he will not become as smart as he would at a private school.
To some extent, you can make the same arguments for/against HPISD. Is it really a superior education, or are the starting materials (the offspring of rich people) genetically predisposed to perform better academically?
All of Big G's points are valid. Big G is right on that the dunces at Ursuline and Jesuit are very likely to have been educated at parochial schools. Jesuit and Ursuline give admission preference to graduates of Catholic schools, so you are going to find graduates of Catholic schools at both the top and the bottom of the class. (In fact, the preference given to Catholic school grads may have been the deciding factor that got the dunces into Jesuit or Ursuline -- and just to be clear, the "dunces" we are talking about are probably scoring in the 1800s on their SATs vs.the kids at the top of the class who are at 2100+.)
If you are choosing Lamplighter, you have a really good shot at Parish and ESD, which are good schools and produce high quality graduates, but are not a hard admit in high school. Big G is right that they are probably roughly equivalent to the good suburban public schools, but there are still environmental factors that might lead you to choose ESD/Parish over the best of the suburban publics. If you are looking for the private school environment -- low class size, motivated families, interesting course offerings, religious environment, less social pressure to conform to a certain standard of wealth, well maintained facilities, freedom from political interference with school and the ability to chose where to live without regard to school boundaries -- I wouldn't let the specter of ESD/Parish deter you from choosing Lamplighter.
The best and the brightest Lamplighter grads each year go on to the more selective schools, but if St. Mark's is the goal, then you really need to start there. If Cistercian or Jesuit are the goals and your kids are at that level, then a Catholic parochial school willl get them there at a much lower cost to you.
May 2002 through May 2009: 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 = 8 years. And I was working off the attending figures - 12 kids over 8 years.
That means a miniscule fraction of the Lamplighter kids attend Cistercian. I'm more impressed with Lamplighter's success getting kids into Greenhill and St. Mark's than with their Cistercian hit rate.
Going back to SMS_Parent's figures, I think the Catholic system holds up pretty well compared to Lamplighter.
Disclaimer: I don't have a dog in this fight - I'm in the Plano ISD and quite satisfied with it. PISD's mega-school approach to education would not fit lynnsl's desires at all, however.
Forgot to mention the old rule of thumb for HPISD vs Private Schools. From a purely financial point of view....
If you have 1 child, private school + living outside HPISD makes most sense
If you have 2 children, break even. Can choose to live in HPISD or outside with 2 tuition pymts.
If you have 3+ children, HPISD is best financial deal.
Ok, makes sense. I wasnt looking at whether kids decided to go, but was looking at how many kids were offered admission...to me a much better measure of how many are "getting in" so to speak. 3 boys offered Cistercian admission every year...not sure whether that is good or not. Are other schools consistently getting offers to 3 boys every year?
In any case, this thread has given us a lot to think about. We tend to start with an end goal in mind and work backward. What I think that we do know: we would like our boys to be at St. Marks, Cistercian, or Jesuit for High School. Now, what path to get there...that is the thing that we need to figure out. Lamplighter or Parochial seems to be where we are landing. While we could comfortably afford a house in the Park Cities, with money leftover for the camps, etc., I do not consider us to be HPISD rich. There is something to be said for the comments about kids feeling poor in their $1MM+ house in that district. We just arent interested in such a warped sense of reality. Stereotyping a bit and dont mean to be insulting, but SOME amount of diversity economically is important to us.
We really appreciate all the time put into these posts, especially over the Holidays, thank you!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Big G
May 2002 through May 2009: 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 = 8 years. And I was working off the attending figures - 12 kids over 8 years.
That means a miniscule fraction of the Lamplighter kids attend Cistercian. I'm more impressed with Lamplighter's success getting kids into Greenhill and St. Mark's than with their Cistercian hit rate.
Going back to SMS_Parent's figures, I think the Catholic system holds up pretty well compared to Lamplighter.
Disclaimer: I don't have a dog in this fight - I'm in the Plano ISD and quite satisfied with it. PISD's mega-school approach to education would not fit lynnsl's desires at all, however.
I know a family who was determined to get their boy in Cistercian. Smart smart kid - almost a perfect score on the SAT at age 12. But he was a socially awkward kid, non-athlete and was never able to get into Cistercian even though he tested well at 3 different grades started at 5th. I think they were told the school was looking for well rounded kids - scholar/athletes. This boy ended up at another private high school willing to take him a couple of years sooner than he should have entered high school.
My friends who have been through ESD...well, had they to do it over again, they would not do ESD. They all could compete with the wealth - and it's a Who's Who of the Dallas super wealthy and well-known - but, they said as the focus turned to athletics, the academics has started to suffer.
Parish Day, I'm still hearing has not reached enrollment capacity. I've heard good things about the school though. Not sure if it's any academic powerhouse, but is a good decent school to have your kids attend.
St. Marks is a fairly diverse school, I think it's 25% minority. I know families who bought houses near St. Marks in that Preston Hollow neighborhood that's behind it with the plan to have their boys attend and then lo and behold their boys didn't get accepted and then Plan B had to be developed.
St. Monica's, I only hear good about. It's a lot of bang for your buck. I also hear it's diverse. Bill Gates' wife attended this school. One of my son's little preschool friends was a boy who applied to kinder at St. Monicas, but they said he had to wait a year - which they tell a lot of their kinders - and even then that school year the school made 12 kinders they did accept on time repeat kindergarten. They are serious about not starting kids too early.
Since I had a kid at Shelton I heard from a lot of parents who had big plans for their kids - EDS, St. Marks, Hockaday, Cistercian - only to get called in to that dreaded school conference and told their child needed to be at Shelton or Winston or Preston Hollow Presby. But there's hope, a couple of my son's friends ended up at Jesuit, Ursuline, Parish, Bishop Lynch, Pope John Paul and others for high school, coming from Shelton. So, my point is, sometimes a child's learning pattern may impact which school they can attend.
Besides the lack of economic diversity at a lot of these private schools, you also have to consider the ability to pay tuition for the duration. While my son was at Shelton every year families ran out of money and their kids had to switch to their local public school (usually over the summer as you have to pay tuition in full up front). It's a problem if you are not in a public school district you like.
<<My friends who have been through ESD...well, had they to do it over again, they would not do ESD. They all could compete with the wealth - and it's a Who's Who of the Dallas super wealthy and well-known - but, they said as the focus turned to athletics, the academics has started to suffer.>>
I'm hearing this a lot and it's a shame the school has changed so much. I remember when they started out they were going to go against the grain and not do the typical Texas football obsession. It worked for a while, but I guess you have to go that route eventually if you want that money coming in. Sad.
<<My friends who have been through ESD...well, had they to do it over again, they would not do ESD. They all could compete with the wealth - and it's a Who's Who of the Dallas super wealthy and well-known - but, they said as the focus turned to athletics, the academics has started to suffer.>>
I'm hearing this a lot and it's a shame the school has changed so much. I remember when they started out they were going to go against the grain and not do the typical Texas football obsession. It worked for a while, but I guess you have to go that route eventually if you want that money coming in. Sad.
Yeah, I heard it's a combination of the influx of Jerry Jones family money to build the stadium and then someone high up in the administration who decided to upgrade the athletics.
<<experience with Lamplighter is not the first time I have heard of kids from Lamplighter with academic deficits. To be fair, however, Lamplighter offers a rather unique pedagogical approach that is probably more successful for some students than others – for reasons unrelated to academic ability -- and like all schools, it also admits students with a range of abilities. It is a truly cool school. Who wouldn’t want to go to school that has a barn on campus and that sells eggs to parents in carpool line?>>
Me! :-) I attended Lamplighter back in the `70s K-4th and did not enjoy my time there. It's clear to me now that I needed much more structure. I did have some academic deficits, mostly in math, and never did quite catch up with my classmates until college. Seriously. I was also not prepared for homework, there was none at Lamplighter back then, and didn't learn how to study for years. Having said that, I don't think the program at Lamplighter is quite as loosey-goosey as it was in those days and I also think it was simply a bad fit for me. Learning styles vary among kids and I think I would have done better in a more traditional and structured classroom, something my parents (bless their hearts) wanted to avoid.
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