My girls were previously at a private school, there were SO many things they did far better than our current public school. And they were heavily skewed to gifted due to who could afford to send their kids. But the leadership so did not get levels of gifted and the difference between the 125-135 that they saw day in day out v. 140+ that they had maybe one per grade (still a lot for a school with 50 kids max per grade).
This totally screwed up preschool and school entry for my kid and we left. We left KNOWING she'd likely be better off there in another year, but she'd burned her bridges with them (or rather they with her). And sure enough the public school that were happy to skip her into the bottom of a composite class made for a much better year, but now that she's caught up (a year later), I do find myself praying to be able to afford to send her back to different but similar private school ASAP. Not an option at the moment and it kills me...
I'm not in the USA, our public and private systems are different and I'm a firm believer in the right school for the right child, I don't think private is always better. But in our town the system is such that there is a massive "brain drain" to private schools where you do get smaller classes, much more flexible instruction and they are all k-12 so more scope for extension via upper school teachers/resources. Also Special Ed is taught by specialist qualified teachers, not untrained assistants and there is SO much more support available, at both ends of the spectrum.
My point being that even being able to see that theoretically the school had much more for my DD, even having been ecstatically happy with it for my older 2e daughter, their failure to "get" my HG+ 4yr old and subsequent misshandling (holding her back in preschool because ahe was "too young" to start school with her friends, despite being more ready than many of them) left her curled in the fetal position sobbing and begging not to go to school.
Last edited by MumOfThree; 08/12/13 02:26 PM.
