Have you noticed....

[usmbguest5318]

Private Schools had better be superior to public schools. If not, why would parents be spending thousands of dollars to send their kids there?

But many parents are not sending their kid to private school out of concern for their education. They are concerned about the type of students their children will interact with. Blacks, minorities, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, kids from poor families and the wrong side of the tracks

That is why kids get shipped off to private school

my Catholic school's classes back in the 80's were about 1/8 non-catholic, mostly Hindus and Buddhists. They wanted the discipline that came from Catholic Education, and were not concerned about the Religious teachings.

I remember the kids in my neighborhood who went to Catholic School. The parents would tell my parents that they wanted their children to receive a good Catholic School education. When we asked the kids why they went to Catholic School, the kids would tell us that their daddy doesn't like that so many negroes went to the public school

Okay. Fine. That's yet hardly enough data points to give credibility to the generalization you made. I'm sure there are individuals who send their kids to private school for the reason that man noted. You've got a long way to go to make the case that it's a frequent enough motivation that your generalization is apt. You've also got to establish the kids knew what they were talking about; they were after all minors and there's plenty that minors think is so, will articulate as much, and that is not at all so. There's practically no limit the the nature of things that fall into that realm.

 

[usmbguest5318]

Private Schools had better be superior to public schools. If not, why would parents be spending thousands of dollars to send their kids there?

But many parents are not sending their kid to private school out of concern for their education. They are concerned about the type of students their children will interact with. Blacks, minorities, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, kids from poor families and the wrong side of the tracks

That is why kids get shipped off to private school

my Catholic school's classes back in the 80's were about 1/8 non-catholic, mostly Hindus and Buddhists. They wanted the discipline that came from Catholic Education, and were not concerned about the Religious teachings.

I remember the kids in my neighborhood who went to Catholic School. The parents would tell my parents that they wanted their children to receive a good Catholic School education. When we asked the kids why they went to Catholic School, the kids would tell us that their daddy doesn't like that so many negroes went to the public school

Obvious lie. Provide some evidence, or stop making shit up to fit your lefty fantasies.

I see no reason to think rightwinger lied in relating the anecdote; however, even taking it as fully truthful in terms of his accurately sharing the details of the story as it happened, it's still insufficient to justify the generalization he made and for which he offered the anecdote as evidence of the generalization's verity.

 

[usmbguest5318]

I remember the kids in my neighborhood who went to Catholic School. The parents would tell my parents that they wanted their children to receive a good Catholic School education. When we asked the kids why they went to Catholic School, the kids would tell us that their daddy doesn't like that so many negroes went to the public school

At the school my kids attended, there was a higher percentage minority student population than the public schools. We are close to a number of those families still.

Which minority?
Let me guess........Asian

When I was in school, it really didn't matter to what minority group one belonged. One wasn't WASP, and that was all that mattered to the folks to whom it did matter. People had vile epithets to apply to whatever minority someone was. I didn't get the sense that the objects of such derision/hate felt any better or worse because the insult sent their way differed from the one another minority had to endure.

 

[usmbguest5318]

to avoid the liberal indoctrination so prevalent in public education these days.

Really? Where?

Admittedly I am familiar with a limited quantity of private schools, but all of the ones I know of provide a liberal education. One for example offers a course in spycraft. All of them have student organizations for whatever minority identity group one can possibly belong.

Truly, I don't see the point of sending one's child to any school that doesn't expose and educate them about a broad variety of ideas and experiences. After all, no matter what socio-political stance one may grow up to espouse, one can only do so with confidence if one is as well informed about strongest positions of one's own and the opposing point of view.

Think of this way. No good advocate enters a courtroom without knowing the weaknesses in his own argument. No good general goes to battle without knowing where he's weak and where the opponent is strong. The whole point of a high quality private school education is to provide kids with the very best all sides have to offer and leave them to decide for themselves where they stand.

If that's not what the school does, the child is being done a disservice. There may well be private schools that don't do that, but none of them ever made it onto my "radar" when choosing where to send my own kids.

 

[usmbguest5318]

at least you get a CHOICE of which private school you use. Not so with public.......

What? What is a magnet school if not one that kids can choose to attend?

 

[usmbguest5318]

Private school teachers have the luxury of caring parents for all students, public school parents get the caring of some parents-but certainly not all.

Me thinks you haven't enough exposure to the home lives experienced by a lot of kids at boarding schools. Not all, but a fair number of kids are sent to boarding school, in part, because the parents either won't or don't know how to be caring parents. Boarding school is great way to get surrogate parents for the majority of the year and only have to deal with one's kids during the "fun" times.

I was sent to boarding school, then in the summer I was off to camp for four to six weeks, depending on whether my school sponsored a summer trip abroad, in which case I was going whether I wanted to or not. Basically, once I got to the ninth grade, I saw my parents at Thanksgiving, Christmas time, Easter, and for whatever time was left when Mom went to the shore. When she did, Dad showed up for one week and on the weekends. That was my situation and it was quite similar for many of my classmates and campmates.

My mother was caring. My father just cared that I didn't screw up, get out of line or embarrass him and my mother, which were about the only times he had much to say. My parents did what they were duty bound to do -- make sure I was well prepared to be a contributing member of society -- and they did a very good job of that. All the same, I was grown before I really came to know my father. I got to know my mother pretty well up to my teen years.

 

[westwall]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. Why do you think politicians pay lip service to public schools but send their kids to private schools? I'm paying for my girl to go to private school. Any sane person would.

 

[westwall]

Private Schools had better be superior to public schools. If not, why would parents be spending thousands of dollars to send their kids there?

But many parents are not sending their kid to private school out of concern for their education. They are concerned about the type of students their children will interact with. Blacks, minorities, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, kids from poor families and the wrong side of the tracks

That is why kids get shipped off to private school

Bull poo. Typical progressive "all white people are racist" horse shit. The school my girl attends mainly has State employee's kids in it, they are black, Hispanic (mainly), Filipino, Native American, white and the one group that is under represented is Asians. We only have two Asian kids in the school. Of course we have very few Asians in the State so that stands to reason.

The reason why parents send their kids to Private school is safety, education standards, and connections. That's it.

 

[Unkotare]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. ....

A simple overgeneralization.

 

[rightwinger]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. ....

A simple overgeneralization.

Wrong

 

[saveliberty]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That's a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Three kids from private school here. One Chemistry and two Math degrees. Did you have a valid point or just trolling?

See emboldened text above. In those statements/clauses, you'll find the point of the OP.

Do you not recognize one's sharing an observation when you see it? Seemingly not....

Three kids from private school here. One Chemistry and two Math degrees.

Have you in mind a baccalaureate or graduate educational program? Or perhaps a high school program from a non-U.S. nation? I'm asking because you wrote "degree" and in the U.S., that term refers to one's achievement at college/university, not in K-12, which is the context noted expressly in the OP.

Also, am I talking to three people using one USMB ID, or are you not three people; thus you mean something other than what you actually wrote?

My three kids went to college and earned the degrees listed. Hope that helps. The reason I mentioned them is it speaks to what a K-12 education can do for you in life.

 

[westwall]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. ....

A simple overgeneralization.

Not really. I actually talk to the other parents and those are the three main reasons cited. This is a sample population of over 200 and taken over 6 years. I am pretty diligent in my research before i make a decision like that.

 

[saveliberty]

Before we made a decision where to send the kids to school, we met with the public school principal. He flat out told us we could get a good education at the school system, but if we expected him to say it was better than the private school, he could not.

That made the educational decision easy, but there were still questions about costs. The private school was generous with us.

 

[Unkotare]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. ....

A simple overgeneralization.

Not really. I actually talk to the other parents and those are the three main reasons cited. This is a sample population of over 200 and taken over 6 years. I am pretty diligent in my research before i make a decision like that.

That depends on where you live.

 

[usmbguest5318]

I didn't create this thread with the aim that it morph into a public vs. private school debate, yet that appears to be the nature of what people want to talk about. I don't know why for the behavior I described is that of parents in response to discovering the private school to which they sent their child isn't as great as it was purported to have been or as they perceived/expected it to be. Additionally, the questions I've asked in the OP have to do with the timing of parents' griping about the schools their kids attend; the temporal theme is found in all three paragraphs of the OP. How does one miss that? ....Yet people would become temerariously pissed at me were I to ridicule their reading comprehension skills....

The central theme is that people "bitch and moan" about private schools after the kid graduates, whereas they do so about public schools before their kids attend, and presumably after their kids graduate. Some people likely deride public schools when they don't even have kids or haven't recently had any who were in a K-12 school.

I didn't introduce the matter of whether or to what extent public schools are better or worse than private schools. I'm sure that topic has been amply covered in the Education sub-forum of USMB. It doesn't even make sense to me that is the line of discussion onto which people have lurched given what I did write in the OP, and yet here we are with you, a moderator, having failed to adhere to the theme/topic introduced in the thread's OP. (Expand the quote below to see what is the theme of the OP; I've emboldened the sentences that contain it.)

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, see folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That's a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

It would really do you some good to do your own research. Maybe then you'd know what you are talking about, or you'd at least be able to express what you mean (as compared to what you wrote) in a way that aligns with reality. Read on to see why I say that.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. Why do you think politicians pay lip service to public schools but send their kids to private schools? I'm paying for my girl to go to private school. Any sane person would.

On what are you basing that claim? Surely it's not a claim resulting from your analysis of the public and private schools in Nevada? Perhaps you're sending her to a school outside of Nevada?

• Public High Schools in Nevada
• Private High Schools in Nevada

Based on the information found at the two links above, NV has several public schools that are at least as good, if not better, than the private schools there. (Your ID shows you as being in NV, so that's why I focused on NV. Is the location indicator on your ID a mistake?) Perhaps you have some other metric/dimension that gives credence to your claim?

Have you made the claim above (in whole or part) to interject a deflection into the discussion? It seems so given the theme of the central question the OP asks is why people don't complain about private schools before it's too late and there's ample indication that the nation has lots of very good public schools. Moreover, it appears that most students at the nation's top universities graduated from public schools:

• Harvard -- 63% public school grads
• Yale -- 68% public school grads
• Williams College -- 58% public school grads
• MIT -- 67% public school grads
• About half of the students at Ivy League colleges and universities come from public schools.

Note:
Interestingly, I could not find the same metrics for the four public colleges for which I sought it -- UC Berkeley, UVA, Univ. of Michigan Ann Arbor, and Univ. of Connecticut. Do state colleges/universities not track that data point? I don't know. I would think they must....Maybe it's "out there" and I didn't dig deeply enough to find it?
​

The claim that "public schools suck" seems highly inaccurate given that roughly a 2/3rds majority of students at four of the nation's top universities/colleges graduated from public high schools.

Additional info that suggests public schools don't "suck." I realize some are good and some are not, but that's so too of private schools. Merely being a private school doesn't make a school be good.

• Confessions Of A Six-Figure Father: Why I'd Never Send My Kids To Private School

Why do you think politicians pay lip service to public schools but send their kids to private schools?

You would need to ask the politicians who you think have paid "lip service" to public schools. I can't speak for them.

Of course there are politicians who send their kids to private school and politicians who send their kids to public school. Merely claiming, as you did, that politicians "send their kids to private schools" carries about the same intellectual and discursive value as saying "mammals swim."

I can find information about where schools federal level politicians send their kids to school. I cannot find similar information about state and local level politicians. With the exception of Jimmy Carter (He later sent her to Holton Arms), I believe modern Presidents have sent their kids to private schools, but were talking about a very small number of people when we consider the matter of where Presidents send their kids. Among members of the U.S. Congress, 41% of representatives in the House and 46% of U.S. senators send or have sent at least one of their children to a private institution.

Yes, a high proportion of elected officials do send their kids to private schools. In D.C. I sort of get why they do, at least for high school. D.C. public high schools are average at best, even the one in the "posh" part of town. But that's not necessarily the case at all public schools. Indeed, there are several nationally ranked ones in the D.C. 'burbs and there's not much reason to send a child to private school if going to one of those schools is also an option.

For public officials, as with other celebrities and their kids, there is also the security and privacy factors that are important. People don't want their kids at a school where the press and fans/na'er do wells have easy access/visibility to their kids. Look at the Sidwell campus vs. the St. Albans campus, which is right next door. They are equally good schools, but St. Albans sits in a sort of bowl-shaped parcel of land poised on a slope just below the highest crest in the city that allows people from the street fairly unfettered visibility to the kids when they are outside. You can sort of get a sense of that from this photo if you look at the top left corner. (You can sort of tell from the Google map too.)

In contrast, Sidwell, sits on top of the very same crest. From the street, all one sees is the front lawn.

This, however, is the actual campus. As you can tell, the buildings themselves restrict visibility, to say nothing of their being nestled behind the landscape so even they aren't all that visible.

One can from the back of one side of the campus -- where the sports fields are -- see onto the fields, but the kids aren't on that part of the campus except for sports events and practices. (Click your way around the block to see what you passers by see. Not much is what folks see.) One also cannot see into the classrooms.

In light of the security considerations that public figures and celebs face that the rest of us do not have to deal with in quite the same way, private schools seem like they offer a higher degree of safety. Their campuses are more secluded usually and the smaller size of the student body also helps with that. Also, being private, there is far less cause for unknowns to even show up at or linger around the facility. I know those seem like "small things," but in the scheme of providing a secure environment for the kids of the rich and powerful, it matters.

Among people in general, when looking at public or private schools, the following factors come into play when parents choose one or the other:

• Academic reputation and college preparation -- for choosing for my kids, this was important
• School size and Class size -- this was most important
• Safety reputation -- this is always important, but I wasn't concerned about their safety in the way a celeb/politician would be
• Special programs -- this turned out to be important, but when I was deciding, it didn't play a big role
• Costs
• Religious and Moral instruction -- ethics, yes; religiously based morality, no
• Location -- this held some appeal, but wasn't a driving factor
• Ideology -- this was important

Ultimately, the decision to send a child to private school is one of personal choice for huge quantities of people (in large part because the majority of the U.S. population lives in urban/suburban areas more so than existential need, and invariably there're good public schools in every "metro" area. With magnet and charter schools making it possible for high achieving students to attend a good school even if the one serving their neighborhood isn't, having to send one's child to a private school isn't generally a necessity, though I realize there are exceptions. Exceptions, however, are just that, exceptions.

My own circumstance growing up is one such exception. I was sent to private schools because "it's where one went" as far as both sides of my family was concerned, and my parents are very WASPy, so there was that too. My family also lived in a city that didn't have high quality public schools.

People are, of course, free to send their kids to public or private schools for myriad reasons. Some of those reasons are supported by objective facts that give credence to them as reasons. Others, not so much. I sent my kids to private schools, but I could have, for vastly less money than the cost of 12 years of tuition for four kids, simply moved across the river (or into MD) and had a perfectly fine public school for my kids to attend. My kids might have gone to one of these schools had we bought a house in the corresponding neighborhoods instead of in D.C., but we didn't. We bought in D.C. more or less "across the street" from the school my kids attended until I started having to be on the road most of year.

• Virginia
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...-high-school-for-science-and-technology-20461
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...ounty-public-schools/mclean-high-school-20452
    
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...rfax-county-public-schools/langley-high-20448
• Maryland
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...-county-public-schools/walt-whitman-high-9150
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...ty-public-schools/winston-churchill-high-9153
  • http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...ounty-public-schools/walter-johnson-high-9151

I sent my kids to boarding school because I traveled a lot for work and was rarely able to be at home. But for my traveling, I would have left them at that school for all of their K-12 years. (I'd have been fine sending them to the boarding school in my neighborhood, but they didn't have a boarding spot available when I needed them to have four. They could have gone as day-hops.) I also wanted my kids to be in a rural setting, but that was not a first line priority. Lastly, I thought it best that they grew up among kids who are like them -- smart, motivated, curious, outgoing/assertive, and fortunate -- and where those qualities are encouraged and built upon.

I'm paying for my girl to go to private school. Any sane person would.

[Some of the comments in the preceding "section" pertain to the emboldened comment above.]

I don't see that as being a legitimate claim unless (1) there is a special circumstance(s) that augurs for doing so, or (2) you've opted to send your daughter to a "pipeline" (TSAO and very similar) school. Those schools send an inordinate quantity of their grads to elite colleges and universities. There are a variety of reasons for that. Certainly one of them is the child's scholastic performance. Another reason has to do with parents of those children being "legacies" not only at the high schools from which their kids graduated -- I'm a "legacy" alum, as are my sons, from my own high school -- at the colleges and universities to which they send their kids. Then, of course, there's the matter of the kids who went to those schools often enough being from families wealthy enough to, if need be and the parents are willing to do so, "donate" their kid's way into the school (not a lot of kids for whom that happens, but it happens).

Public Schools vary greatly in quality. The dilapidated state of too many urban and rural schools in the United States is a well-chronicled tragedy, and a large number of suburban public high schools offer many of the amenities of a private school as well as a lineup of strongly credentialed, dedicated instructors. Opportunities abound for the motivated and talented attending public schools. AP courses are typically plentiful and public schools actually offer more opportunities for International Baccalaureate (IB) and dual-enrollment courses. (You'll have to do your own "clicking" to see the details and course offerings pertaining to individual schools from that list.)

One may also gain an edge by being a big fish in a small pond, or if one prefers a less overused analogy, a gargantuan begonia in a miniature greenhouse. Moreover, it seems that attending a school surrounded by fellow academic superstars actually has a negative effect on your admissions chances at an elite college. (See also: Getting Into an Elite College Is Easier Than You Think) In other words, a student with a 1300 SAT at a public high school where the average SAT is 1000 will have an admissions edge over an equal student at a private school where 1300 is the average SAT score.

Holistically looking at the matter, literally millions of parents have lots of "sane" reasons for not sending their kids to private school.[/QUOTE]

 

[usmbguest5318]

...

But many parents are not sending their kid to private school out of concern for their education. They are concerned about the type of students their children will interact with. Blacks, minorities, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, kids from poor families and the wrong side of the tracks

That is why kids get shipped off to private school

Proof?

Wrong

That is why kids get shipped off to private school

What? How can a @unkatore's request be declared wrong? It's a request for information, not a statement of any sort. One need not agree or disagree with whatever is in @unkatore's head to know that he can't be right or wrong by asking for the proof that supports your claim.

Frankly, I too am wondering where you come up with the basis for your claim, rightwinger. Below are some of the best schools to which one can "ship off" one's kids. Each of them is the kind of place only the best and brightest students go and to which the country's most elite families -- the kinds of families that might plausibly have both the will and wherewithal to send their kids there for, among other reasons, the purpose you noted -- have long sent their kids.

• Deerfield Academy
• Andover
• Exeter
• Lawrenceville
• St. Paul's
• Hotchkiss
• Groton, which is Episcopalian
• St. Albans

You can look through the list of boarding schools found here and see what their diversity scores are. Looking at that list, and assuming your assertion were correct, parents would have to be literally oblivious to the facts of the student body's composition at those schools in order to think that by sending their kids to them, they'll, as you've implied, limit their kid's interaction with and to children from various religious and ethnic minorities.

I went to an ESA school. My kids went to them as well. When I was there (1970s), yes, the student body was WASP. Period. These days, not so much. One need only look at the photos on the schools' home pages and community life pages to see as much. Here is a video of the kids who attended Andover's prom. That doesn't look like a dearth of diversity to me.



Here's the golf team. One third of the students on the team are ethnic minorities.

This is one time when I believe you have made a claim based on what you think to be so, not based on what is so. Maybe you are indeed right, but regarding the boarding schools I'm personally familiar with -- a few ESA schools (New England), Georgetown Prep (MD) and St. Albans (DC) -- I don't see it, but maybe the sample from which I've drawn insight is not representative. Obviously there will be variability in the diversity found among the entirety of boarding schools.

Okay rightwinger ... You rated the post above as funny, yet you've not refuted anything I've written and you've not defended or explained the basis by which you made the claim I challenged with the post above.

I don't see what's funny about my post. I know I didn't deliberately put a humorous remark in it. Moreover, it strikes me as outré that you'd find the post funny and not identify what inspired you to laughter in light of the absence of explicitly jocular statements in the post.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

I remember the kids in my neighborhood who went to Catholic School. The parents would tell my parents that they wanted their children to receive a good Catholic School education. When we asked the kids why they went to Catholic School, the kids would tell us that their daddy doesn't like that so many negroes went to the public school

At the school my kids attended, there was a higher percentage minority student population than the public schools. We are close to a number of those families still.

Which minority?
Let me guess........Asian

As I wrote yesterday the failure of public school students fall on the parent and not the school nor the damn government...

Parents that send their child to private schools tend to be more active in their child education unlike public school parents.

So before bashing private schools and making claims why some parents send their kids to private school maybe the public education supporters should ask why so many parents refuse to partake in their child education?

That is my personal opinion when it come to parents that use Public Education for their children...

That's no explanation. Are those who do best at sports the ones who get the most parental involvement in that activity? My parents had no interest in sports, but only lack of talent prevented me from being successful there.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. Why do you think politicians pay lip service to public schools but send their kids to private schools? I'm paying for my girl to go to private school. Any sane person would.

Winning Through Creating Losers

Those who can afford private schools are the ones in power over the public schools. They purposely destroyed public education so that its graduates wouldn't be able to compete with their sons, who then only had to be mediocre in order to be superior.

 

[westwall]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. ....

A simple overgeneralization.

Not really. I actually talk to the other parents and those are the three main reasons cited. This is a sample population of over 200 and taken over 6 years. I am pretty diligent in my research before i make a decision like that.

That depends on where you live.

I think not. We have friends all over this country, and the world. The three most cited reasons for them to send their kids to private schools was the same. And they were sending their kids to private schools decades before my daughter was born. Your cryptic statements are simply not pertinent to the discussion.

 

[usmbguest5318]

....that people are quick to ridicule public schools, public school systems, and just about anything else having to do with the state provision of K-12 education? On the other hand, one, I at least, rarely, if ever, sees folks griping about private schools, at least not while their kids are in the private school in question.

I have on occasion hear parents grumble about how a given private school really didn't educate their kid any better than would have the public school the child could have attended, but that seems to only happen after the kid gets to college and it then becomes apparent that the kid isn't nearly as well prepared as the parents would have expected or surmised based on the kid's performance at the private school.

That a rather strange phenomenon, IMO, because there are plenty of private schools that really aren't materially better than their neighboring public schools, yet one must necessarily pay for both schools if one sends one's child to private school. I'd think parents would pitch fits while their child is in school rather than wait until the kid finishes and then complain.

Ummmmm, that's because public schools basically suck while private schools don't. But that is a simple fact. Why do you think politicians pay lip service to public schools but send their kids to private schools? I'm paying for my girl to go to private school. Any sane person would.

Winning Through Creating Losers

Those who can afford private schools are the ones in power over the public schools. They purposely destroyed public education so that its graduates wouldn't be able to compete with their sons, who then only had to be mediocre in order to be superior.

Okay. I see now. It really doesn't matter what the topic is. You just want to post whatever it is that comes into your mind. Discursive integrity and topical relevance don't really matter to you, not if your series of replies to me in this line of discussion is any indication. That's fine. You can do that. I can't stop you. I was hoping you'd be someone worth having a conversation with, but I was mistaken. Bye.