Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Experiences with public vs private schools?

Ok. Let me confess I have not read all responses - got you G though :-) sage wisdom as always.

You cannot make a blanket comparison of public to private. There are some public schools I would pay to get into - those with self contained gt programs. There are some that allow real and meaningful single subject, and whole grade acceleration. There are some so knee-capped by NCLB and finances that they cannot withstand the demands of a gifted child. But what options do you have - in many cases private is not better. This is one of those socio-economic equalizers. Where we will even the most expensive private school does not serve gifted better than public (except for small classrooms and fancy facilities).

The question to review with your family is what options are available and sustainable. Within the options, what can they provide to meet the academic and social needs of a gifted child? Grinity is right on. Observe. Administrators at private and public toss the word differentiation around like candy - and in both cases it is often meaningless.

I'd want my kid to have the option that gets them time apart with like-minded kids, challenge (but more than challenge at that age - the absence of pure, boring, repetition)... It is unfortunate that you have to pause and wonder - is my kid too smart for our schools.

As everyone has said, the answer to the public vs private question varies greatly depending on the schools. We live in a very highly rated public school district that is great for the middle of the bell curve. My kids are in private but it is a private school for the gifted (PK-12) so they definately "get it".

We live in a great public school district, but to be honest, I have severe skepticism about the quality of any public school since the NCLB racket started. DH and I had boredom in school many many years ago when teachers taught to the middle and middle-upper students of a class. What is DD5 going to do sitting in class with a teacher teaching to the lower-end of the class? I was a people-pleasing kind of child, but I think even I would have had behavioral problems in school if I had to sit through that kind of teaching. And DD5 is a high-energy, active child whose mind NEVER stops -- although she is extremely mindful of rules and manners, I fear she will become terribly disruptive in a classroom that does not allow her to advance at her own pace.

DH and I had no advocacy as children regarding our education, so we feel very strongly about all of this in a way our parents do not understand. I'm so glad this forum is here!

I agree with others that the public versus private issue varies greatly by location. Your child's personality and level of giftedness also makes a difference. For example, there are several excellent private schools if you live in the Twin Cities metropolitan area, but if you have a kid who is an outlier among gifted, they don't have the best reputation. There are also several different types of public schools that work well with different types of gifted kids: regular gifted magnets, STEM schools, classical academies, arts magnets, and HG schools. Even among HG schools, there are differences. Some are more flexible than others.

For your particular situation, I'd recommend digging deeper than the guidance counselor. Is there a gifted teacher/coordinator for the district? That is where we started in our small city (we are not really in the greater twin cities area!) She helped us tremendously, before DS started kindergarten. We had some private IQ scores in hand, to help convince the school that our child would need something different. When we asked the gifted coordinator for advice, she arranged meetings with the principal and counselors at the school. It helped that our school district did not have an official gifted policy, even though the regular gifted programming didn't start until third grade, because they were receptive to our suggestions and ideas. The principal hand-picked a great kindergarten teacher who was good at differentiation. The teacher did a good job differentiating with reading, and the gifted coordinator ended up teaching higher math to DS. The next year we successfully advocated for a grade skip. Even though we ended up switching DS to an HG school when an opening came up, we were at a point at our local school where we felt that they got our DS and were able to differentiate for him. What was missing was same-age intellectual peers and a faster pace of instruction. That said, if the opportunity did not come up at the HG school, we would have been pretty happy at our local public, because they were willing to be quite flexible.

This is the reason my DH and I started our advocacy. We had rotten memories of sitting in class for years, bored to death, until college. We were pleasantly surprised that things are quite different from when we were kids! I think my biggest recommendation is to get on the good side of the principal so that he/she can recommend a teacher who is good at differentiation and who wants to have a kid in class like your DD.

I'll be sure to kiss up to the principal when we meet in the future!!!

We have had a struggle with our local public school district. They are one of the type that simply don't believe that acceleration is good for anyone, and never accelerate before third grade. Private school, here we come.

I called the local public school gifted coordinator when my son was 5 to ask about accomodations in kindergarten for a highly gifted child who was reading on 4th grade level.

I was told that I should start him on medication because, in their experience, ALL GIFTED KIDS ARE ADHD.

Needless to say, my kids did not go to the local public school.

The local private school for "average and above average students" has an average class size of 12 and has worked well for us.

I also have a friend with a gifted 2nd grade boy who has had a horrible time in school. She recently pulled him out (mid-year) and moved him from public school with a class size of 35 to private school with a class size of 14. He now loves school and is motivated to learn.

I guess I would say this means you should look at private schools as an option.

However, my most generic advice is this: make the best choice you can given the options you have available. Always look for other options and don't be afraid to make a new choice next week/month/year if there is a change in your options or the information that feeds into your decision. Sometimes the best choice today wasn't an option a year ago.

Good luck-
Mary

My in-laws ran into the K teacher that taught their children... geez... 30 years ago now. They were talking with her and happened to tell her about my DD5 to seek her opinion (can DD5 reading at a 3rd grade level successfully be in K?). The K teacher said she once had a child who read at a 5th grade level and it was challenging to have him in class.

This led me to ask the question, how common is it for a 5-year-old to read grade-levels ahead?? DD5 just turned 5 in January, and with her rapid acceleration, I could see her reading at a 4th or 5th grade level by the time K starts this fall. The K teacher had been teaching A LONG time and only had one child that was gifted like that (and this is in a district with a lot of highly-educated professionals).

How common is this??? Is DD5 possibly EG or PG????

I know this could not be definitively answered without IQ testing, but what your experiences with this???

I think it's not all that rare, at least among children from highly educated families. FWIW, I was told by a parent of a child there that our local state primary school had enough children who were "reading Harry Potter" on starting school that they had a reading group of them. Perhaps 4 or 5 children out of an intake of 60 or so, aged 4.5-5.5? (DS was AFAIK the only one like that at his school, though, out of 30-odd; parents at his (private) school are on average significantly richer but perhaps less educated - I think the reason this anecdote has stuck in my head is because it's contrary to the usual assumptions here about state vs private school pupils :-)