Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Private School-Is It Worth It for a Gifted Child?

As some of you know, our son used to attend a public charter school that moved kids up or down according to level. (You can see my previous post about why we left that school.)

DS has been attending the local public (spa)...school for the last four-ish months and I can safely say it's been like summer camp for him. He's learned a lot of recorder music, P.E. games and how not to get his head squished like a nut in a cracker by the "he's never had any problems with social issues" kid.

So, my DH and I are looking for a school for next year.

We went to a local private school and met with the admissions officer and took a tour. Very nice tour. I asked a lot of questions and the officer answered a lot of questions with political aplomb.

Long story short, we went to the open house and were underwhelmed by the teachers he would have and the books, etc. he would be using.

Is this really worth $8,000 a year?

NOT!

I'm really disgusted by what is passed off as a "rigorous" education.

So, my "off-the-cuff" plan is to let DS continue in the "spa school" and get to the real learning during the summer when we are home together.

I'm so tired.

This is Open-House season - so, why not look at all the private school options in your area before you make your decision?

This old post on assessing schools has a roundup of links on school fit, which just may present a few new questions to ask and answers to look for.

Would your child be interested in shadowing anyway? The small school that my kids are at, we initially dismissed at the info session since it did not seem to be what we were looking for at all, but we ended up going with it after meeting with neuropsych on best options for DS and his results which stunned us.

We did have an added issue of DS missing public school cutoff by just one day (and some private schools that were more rigid about that, we ignored). It ended up being nothing like we thought it would be, and the best fit for DS (and DD is there now, and it is working well for her too).

That sounds like a good plan.

Are there online classes that can be taken?

I think it depends. DD (is a DYS) attends a small private school. We love it and so does she! No, the work is not necessarily hard for her but it is about a year ahead of our local public school. It is engaging though, she always has interesting projects to work on, papers to write, and tests to study for. It is engaging and that makes a huge difference in terms of my child's happiness at school. The big thing though is that the level of work required preparation and organization, for everybody! Is she working hard, probably not. Is she working and developing executive function, for sure. Every student that has left the school she attends graduates in the top three at public high school (our public schools average around 2,000 HS students).

As with most things, it depends. I'm assuming you have exhausted options for acceleration or other "Non-spa" like treatment at public school.

Our kids are at a parochial (private, but not exceptionally pricey) school. They've been very good with flexibility re: acceleration and always listen to our concerns/suggestions.

We tried a pricey (11k/year), highly touted private school w/DYS OS. Disaster. No flexibility, they were sure he wasn't gifted, nasty to us (the Tiger Parents... and they were dumb enough to leave their internal emails about it in his file, which they gave us when he left). I'm convinced there is as much variation in schools as there is in people (ah, because people run schools!).

In your case, are there other options?

Agree with the above posters...schools vary a lot. Just wondering though, how do schools educate kids for $8K or $11K/yr? Around here, private schools cost $30K, and public schools spend $20-25K/yr per student. Parochial schools might be more around $10K, but the archdiocese takes on a lot of the cost.

I do think, in general, private schools are more accommodating than public schools. You are paying to have your kid go to the private school, and you (and your money) can leave. Threatening to leave the public school really doesn't have the same impact.

We looked at a local private gifted school for ds11. They told us they didn't think he could handle their math program, which is +1 to the local schools. The program he was in had him in is +2 by 7th grade (Algebra I) . He is beyond that and is currently +4 (taking Algebra I as a 5th grader).Needless to say, the school turned him down with his IQ just below DYS cut off.

It does kind of when your child is one of few pulling in high scores on state high stakes tests and you mention you might have to look at other educational options if there can't be some sort of resolution. They didn't want to lose those precious scores. Doesn't work if your school has tons of high scores, they can handle a high score walking away.