| User | Comment |
|---|
romkey  | | posted 6-Aug-1998 11:33pm |
I think most public schools close to stink at this point. Home Schooling is tempting but I think that would really cost my kids in terms of them learning to play well with others. I think I could teach at home what I felt was lacking from the Private, non-religious school I'd send them to. Of course, I'm not planning on being responsible for any kids, so it's a moot point. |
| Mimi | | posted 7-Aug-1998 12:06am |
This is a hard call. As much as I would like to have my children at home with me all the time, they would need to be actively involved with other children & I like to think a good parochial school would be the thing. |
| jonas | | posted 7-Aug-1998 10:43am |
Public schools are only good for survival training. It would take some serious commitment towards improving public education (not from the NEA) for me to change my opinion. |
| Jody | | posted 7-Aug-1998 11:37am |
Public school. But I'd make sure to live in a community with a really GOOD and innovative public school. In fact, I think that people who go only to private schools come out socially and culturally crippled because it's NOTHING like the real world in there. |
| lisashea |
Private school. Public schools have many flaws which I've been seeing first hand as my 9 year old goes through them. Home schooling is a great theory, but children need to learn how to deal with sharing and group education and all *before* they get to college. The whole "competition" thing only gets worse at work :) So private, non-religious. Jody: I think there are flavours of private school - the awful stuck-in-a-forest ones, and the normal "charter" kinds of schools that just have tons more resources ... Dab: I have home schooling friends - I know they have play clubs and socialize deliberately at parks. That equates in my mind to getting together with people for drinks after work - "fun socializing". What they miss, and the parents acknowledge this - is the "competition" aspects of school, in some ways good, in some ways bad. They don't have to worry about how they do compared to the class, or "keeping up with the class". On the other hand, they have no sense of ... "politics", of "working through problems with others", how to ask the teacher for information, how to deal with someone else getting praise for his work that you feel you deserved for yours. The child is "shielded" from these aspects of working, essentially. Which is good for child morale, but bad for the child when he/she gets into college and of course work. The parents feel the morale is worth the other setbacks. I don't know that I agree, but to each his or her own. |
bill  |
Home schooling would be best, but that's time not money, you didn't say I had unlimited time. * Kirst, I hope you didn't say "public school" - The Framinghan public school system was the pits!  ** Eris/Jody, I'm pretty certain that I was damaged socially by public school. The effect they had on me was highly negative (socially), and did not help me at all later in life to socialize (more likely crippled me). Other social settings like extra-school activities, and college are where I picked up how to socialize. My impression is that socialization at public schools is nothing like the real world (thank God!) |
| hunter |
Home schooling, if at all possible. I'm not really interested in having my children be socialized by other children, I'd vastly prefer for them to be socialized by adults. That's the company I always preferred and found most useful. |
| steve |
It depends on the school district, but probably a combination of public school and supplemental home education. |
| RatQueen |
I said public school, but technically, it's OTHER. See, I'd listen to my kids. I'm still a kid, and I get ignored TOO MUCH. My life, right? Well, it'll be theirs. I wanted to be homeschooled for years, but my parents refused to oblidge. So I was stuck in public school. This was all a cause of me being a sociopath for the same number of years. I had approximately 1 friend at a time, give or take .5 friends. I think I would STILL be happy being homeschooled, if I had been. However, it'd take some serious consideration if my mom suddenly offered to home school me these days...but what I was saying. If the kid wants to try home school, or private, and has a darn good reason, I'd give him/her a year of it and see if he likes it. If he doesn't, he can go back to public school. If he does, maybe he could stay that way. (Also, when I say 'public school', I mean an academic magnet program if he was eligible. If he wasn't...well, the neighborhood schools would be fine.) |
| kirst |
*Bill, I said private school (non-religious), but I would also send my child to a private school affiliated with a religion (depends on the school in question). I wasn't a big fan of Walsh or North. I was psyched to escape to Brown. I've taught at both public (Hartford, CT and Tampa, FL) school and currently teach at an international private school run by the Lutheran Church. Our school is excellent and about half of our students are not Christian. I guess what I've decided is that a school is only as good as the teacher that your child has! I don't know how much consolation that is. I guess the better schools strive for excellent teachers. |
| ron2112 |
Ship the little bastards off to a boarding school. ***emily: Wow, your son sounds like an amazingly brilliant person. I'm sure he's grown into an enormous intellect and an overall great guy, loved and respected by both peers and underlings. Am I close? |
| Lorax |
***lisashea - in New Hampshire home schooling is very popular and I think they achieve a very good amount of socialization - they get together with other kids for band practices and team sports, both of which teach them how to compete, coordinate etc. Also, many parents get together to trade off teaching of subjects they aren't as proficient in, so home schooled kids even get a good deal of intellectual competition, but in much smaller groups. I used to have socialization issues with home schooling, but having been exposed to so many excellent home schoolers here, that I think that would be the way I would go. Also, home schooled kids as a group are doing much better in colleges and universities than non-home schooled kids - although I'm not sure the numbers are high enough to form any concrete conclusions. Plus I would say the socialization I got in public schools was a more negative than positive experience for me. |
dab  |
It's not money that's an object to home schooling, it's time and ability. Still, that's what I'd want to do. I'm surprised at how often "socialization" is raised as an objection to home schooling. There seems to be this assumption that the only contact kids have with other people is at school and if they stay home they'll never interact with another human. I don't buy it. Emily - Did they really do that to your son? The Harry Chapin song in real life. How appalling. |
| emily | | posted 8-Aug-1998 10:03pm |
Definitely Boarding School from the age of 2!! (only kidding) If money were no object I wouldn't have to work. I'd opt for home schooling. As soon as I was called in for a conference at my son's preschool because he refused to color things in traditional colors I knew he was in for a long haul in keeping his creativity in tact. ***ron2112...uh....yeah...that's it |
| jjg |
Private school with no religious affiliation. Currentyl if the wife and I stay in Massachusetts our daughter will go to public primary schools and go to the Worcester Academy for high school. |
| Grneyz02 | | posted 10-Aug-1998 1:57am |
I believe sheltering children from the real world by sending them to private schools is wrong. It takes them longer to grasp the reality of the world whereas a public educated student already knows. Though, private schools are better academic-learning wise..But.I still do believe that life smarts is more important than book smarts which are what public students have. |
| jzp | | posted 10-Aug-1998 7:11am |
public school in an area where it was done right. you have to learn first hand *why* being outside society is a good thing, and why most people suck. otherwise a 'modern school'.
dab: well, my wife used to work at higgins armoury and i learned wuickly that the homeschoolers were, well, freaks. I mean i and many of my friend are freaks, but these are snotty, obnoxious freaks, not friendly freaks. |
jettles  | | posted 10-Aug-1998 8:20am |
i would go with public school as long as the schools in my area were considered "good" schools............. if not then private-not affiliated with a religion |
| gilly | | posted 10-Aug-1998 10:53am |
Assuming there were a private Jewish school that didn't suck, I'd send them there at least for a while. The one I went to was horrible, and a very painful experience, but I'm *still* glad of much of the Judaica I learned there. |
| reality | | posted 10-Aug-1998 1:19pm |
private school, then again, I'd want to attend classes there at random to make sure things were going well, and also have available time for self-education (or non-directed home education). |
| Mark | | posted 10-Aug-1998 2:16pm |
They are in (non-religious) private school, and I try to work with them at home, too. Just last night, my eldest (5.75yrs) was begging me to work with him on his cash register workbook. We also do "word cards" nightly (the kids complain if we don't). I would have chosen both options, if I could have. I will probably send them to public school in a few years, but only after we've moved to a community with a really good school system; if money weren't an issue, I probably would continue to send them to private school instead. *** dab - I just read the lyrics to the Harry Chapin song, and it sent chills down my spine! Thanks for reminding me why I send my kids to private school! Also, one of my nephews had a similar experience at a very young age. My sister (his mom) was quite unhappy about it! |
| lizzie | | posted 10-Aug-1998 3:05pm |
**kirst: did you know a Joan Zawacky (sp?) when you taught in Hartford, CT? She's a friend of my mother's. |
| lelle | | posted 10-Aug-1998 3:23pm |
Combination of home schooling and public school. I've never been a fan of private schools (I went to one my last year of high school). I guess I would simply make sure the public school was good where I lived (which probably means I'd have to live in Europe somewhere). |
| eris | | posted 10-Aug-1998 3:47pm |
I'd go for public school, with plenty of supplemental nurturing & activities of the appropriate type. It's my perception that there's a really bad attitude associated with non-religious private schools, and I have other problems with the religious ones. Home schooling sucks for socialization, which is really the whole point of school if you ask me. The knowledge I gained in school is infinitely less important in my life than the skills (social included). ***bill: point taken - I carry quite a few scars myself from some phases of public school, though I think I have pretty much reversed the damage at this point. After reading all the comments here, I would probably still lean towards public school, but I would vet it a lot more thoroughly before putting my kids there. |
| doom | | posted 10-Aug-1998 4:07pm |
I liked public school..... I would look for a good community but I don't think that private has an advantage over public, you just hear more about how public schools suck. |
| phi | | posted 10-Aug-1998 7:22pm |
Yet another area in which I think my parents made basically the right choice. |
| dpolicar | | posted 11-Aug-1998 10:38am |
Home schooling, with the assumption that I'll be hiring tutors and making other arrangements as appropriate (that is, not that I'll be personally/exclusively educating my child). |
| Artemis | | posted 12-Aug-1998 1:39pm |
Public school's more fun. You get to meet more people and there's more diversity in the kind of people you meet. Different personalities and all that. |
| Resy | | posted 12-Aug-1998 3:39pm |
eventually, we all have to deal with the PUBLIC ... start young and learn how! I have know so many people who went to private school or religion-based school, so hopelessly screwed up I didn't want to be around them. I think their parents sent them to these schools so they could absolve themselves from the responsibility of raising a 'decent human being' ... that takes TIME and attention. I think it is most important that a child feel his/her worth. I can ensure that better than any teacher in any school. GOD! I'm getting off my soapbox now ... reaching for the 'chill pills' .... grip, damn, where's my grip? |
| checkerboard | | posted 12-Aug-1998 8:20pm |
alternative schooling |
| seth | | posted 17-Aug-1998 10:54pm |
If money was *really* no object, I'd create my own private school, staff it with administrators and teachers whose methods and philosophies I agreed with, and allow other children to attend in addition to my own. Otherwise, I'd use a mix of private school and home schooling.
*** The only necessary difference between public and private schools is that public schools are funded entirely through taxes and have more restrictions on how they operate. Private schools typically charge tuition to cover costs, because that's the simplest way to do it, and therefore exclude a lot of people, but they don't have to operate that way.
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| elijahblue | | posted 19-Aug-1998 1:36am |
A good private school, non-religiously affiliated. Although, if the child/teenager had a strong desire to attend another type of school I would consider it. *RatQueen: I sympathize with your frustration, but the "it's my life" argument ignores that asking your parents to homeschool is quite an imposition on them. Parents have lives too. |
| Atzilut | | posted 21-Aug-1998 2:43pm |
I do not have children, I will never have children, and I choose to use that to say "I cannot will not answer this question" |
| seanhuxter | | posted 1-Sep-1998 11:27am |
My wife is a teacher by profession (though not working now) but I don't think either of us would have the energy for home schooling, and though I support public schools, (where I'm from there were no private schools) I think that shallow though it may seem, a private school is a good thing to have on a resume. |
| nbarone |
ok. if money was no object, really no object, i would have them attend public school. once they had chosen classes, i would hire the best teachers in those fields i could find, and loan them to the school to teach those classes (i may have bribe a few other teachers and public officials to pull this off, but hey, it's only money). if money was a little bit more of an object, i would probably start them in public school, but be prepared to do some home schooling if there was a subject that the school wasn't doing a good job with. maybe do home schooling one semester out of four. more or less depending on the child. of course, all this depends on one very big, not-happening, if. |
