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Guest Blogger Jenny: Apply To The Schools YOU Like

August 22, 2011February 20, 2012 admin 1 Comment

Private elementary school searches in Los Angeles always seem to lead to the same few schools being touted as “the best.” So, inevitably you, the proud parent of some innocent pre-schooler (usually) who’s still building faulty block architecture and trying not to pee her pants, feel pressure to apply to those “best” schools, or look like a loser.

Don’t lie about it. You sometimes hang out with parents who seem to know the scoop on the private school scene, and they have some tough and shill standards to holler at you during cocktail parties. Stuff about the best “progressive” education (I’m still unclear as to what that actually means), the most innovative classroom organization, and (the dirty little LA private school secret) the incredible business connections you could foster with other well heeled parents.

Goodness knows the schools we’re talking about are excellent. All are feeder schools to the top middle and upper schools in the city. All have high ERB scores, and scores of educational goodies. Most are a bit artsy, although underneath that cuddly, slightly 1970’s exterior lurks a ruthless competitive drive. But here’s the problem: you can apply, but the odds of getting in aren’t in your favor.

Take The Center For Early Education (CEE), for instance. CEE is probably the top of the top tier of private elementary schools. Designed by psychologists and other educational experts, CEE is the utmost in “progressive” education (as stated above: not entirely sure what that means), and it’s one cozy and cloistered environment. CEE kids go on to schools like Harvard-Westlake, Marlborough, and Brentwood.

And by all means, you should apply! Why not? But here’s a little statistic for you: your child has more likelihood of getting into Harvard for college than getting into CEE for kindergarten. It’s true.

I’m not writing this to bum you out, but to clue you in on the private school reality. If all you do is apply to the totally top tier, super competitive, ultra progressive (see my other parenthetical statements above) LA schools, you might not get into any of them. Schools like CEE, Brentwood, Oakwood, Crossroads, John Thomas Dye (not progressive, but just as impossible to gain entrance to), Carlthorp and The Willows are a total crap shoot. Your child might get in, either through exceptional performance (could happen with sufficient bladder control that day; skip that extra apple juice box), some connection you happen to have (mazel tov), or sheer amazingly good luck.

This is why it’s important to look at other schools, schools which may be excellent and perfect for your child, but aren’t in that ultra top tier. Kids from mildly religious schools like St. James and St. Brendan’s in Hancock Park still have impressive matriculation stats and offer an excellent education, often for a far lower tuition. Another example of a great school with limited buzz is our friend Virginia’s take on Children’s Community School, a slightly less well known school that sounds really wonderful. Check those schools out. And then apply to combination of the heavy hitter long shots and the so called underdog schools which might turn out to be the greatest educational experience your child ever has.

Finally, ignore those cocktail party braying donkeys. Private elementary school is not, ultimately, a status symbol. It shouldn’t be a place for the parents to get ahead in business, it’s a place for children to learn how to function in the world. Your child is the one attending the school; you’ve been done with school for a long, long time. Sip your martini, nod politely, and let all the nonsense roll right off you.

Jenny Heitz has worked as a staff writer for Coast Weekly in Carmel, freelanced in the South Bay, and then switched to advertising copywriting. Her daughter started 4th grade at Mirman School this year. She previously attended 3rd St. Elementary School. Jenny has been published recently in the Daily News and on Mamapedia, The Well Mom, Sane Moms, Hybrid Mom, The Culture Mom and A Child Grows In Brooklyn. She now writes about gift ideas and products on her blog,

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Anne Simon, "Beyond The Brochure" Co-Author Makes It Official: She’s Retired!

August 20, 2011August 20, 2011 admin 2 Comments

Anne Simon, my step-mom and Beyond The Brochure co-author steps down as head of school. She’s retired! Congratulations, Anne on more than 30 years as an educator, mom, grandmother, step-mom, foster mom, mentor and more! Now Anne will be able to spend more time in L.A. seeing my family and helping parents navigate the private elementary school admissions process.
We love you! Christina and Porcha

Apply To The Private Schools YOU Like…

August 15, 2011May 12, 2013 admin 3 Comments

Look For The Hidden Gems

Starting with private elementary school tours, parents need to be careful they’re not swept up in the enormous wave of “Top School” pressure. Even before you’ve seen one school, you’ve probably already heard about “The Best School” and “The Ivy League Feeder School” and so on. If everyone you know is buzzing about one or two schools, try to think outside the box and tour a few schools that aren’t on everyone’s speed dial.

When I was touring schools, I looked at about 10 schools. I needed to know more about schools that sounded good, but weren’t on the radar of anybody I knew. I felt certain that the schools that were uber-popular would have a lot to offer, although I didn’t end up liking all of them. But, I also wanted to see schools with solid reputations and minimal hype. They’re out there in every neighborhood, you just have to be willing to ignore the opinion of the preschool queen bee moms and seek out these schools on your own. Of course, talking to other parents is a great way to get information about private schools. But, parents are highly opinionated when it comes to this topic. So, don’t let a very small group of them be your only source of information.

One of my friends has a very bright daughter who is about to enter middle school from a public elementary school. I like my friend’s approach. Rather than become obsessed with the most popular schools, she sought schools that would be sufficiently low key for her family, yet still challenging for her daughter. I was a bit surprised, given that her daughter could probably get into any school. But, knowing my friend, she wants her daughter to have a school experience that will be about learning, growing and thriving and not about her mom’s ability to drop the name of her kid’s school.

Applying to private schools in L.A. is competitive in every way, there’s no denying it. This reality hits most parents even before they submit their first application. Prospective parents are bombarded with education terms they’ve never heard of like “feeder schools” and “developmental schools” and horror stories about families getting shut out. You’ll hear about celebrities whose kids attend one school and entertainment moguls who financed the new building at another school.

All this talk naturally makes many of us tense and worried, wondering how we’ll beat out hundreds of other families for a spot. We assume we’re not doing enough, that we can do more thing to get our application into the “accept” pile during the admissions process…one more letter of recommendation, one more call, one more tour, gifts for admissions directors, donations prior to admissions letters arriving (yes, it happens, but isn’t recommended).

But, if you include “off the radar” or “hidden gem” schools on your list, you’ll be able to see the full range of schools in the L.A. area, from those that are talked about ad nauseum at cocktail parties to the schools that aren’t on the cocktail party chatter circuit, but that just do a great job educating kids. They’re out there, you’ll see. You just have to look. Oh, and get ready for a wide-eyed stare from the preschool queen bee. She’s so busy buzzing about the “top schools” she may not know what to say.

The Paradox Of Redshirting: A View From Inside The Classroom by Anne Simon

August 12, 2011August 12, 2011 admin 11 Comments

“Redshirting” refers to the athletic practice of holding a player

back a year to give them time to grow and develop skills

I applaud the wisdom of parents (my own children included) who pay close attention to their child’s development and make the decision for when they should enter kindergarten based on an assessment of not only the academic, but the social and emotional readiness of that individual child. This is often a great gift to the long-term happiness and wellbeing of a child in school. This practice does contain, however, the potential for unintended consequences that may sabotage the sincere efforts made to help the child succeed.

I have been an educator observing and participating in the private school admissions process for almost 40 years, I am concerned about the impact of “Redshirting” (keeping a student in preschool an extra year) on the kindergarten curriculum and consequently, that of every other grade. It can go something like this: parents and school officials make individual decisions that skew the age of the kindergarten class toward 5½ to 6 years of age instead of late 4s and 5s. Ambitious teachers see and act on the ability to move this new age group along the curricular continuum more quickly that they might with a younger group. Voila! Kindergarten becomes the new 1^st grade!

Most private elementary schools, and many public school districts around the country, have added a new entry-level class to their program – Jr. K, DK, Pre-K – it goes by many names. This is the place where children are prepared to begin the process of being in school and taking on the challenges of whatever style curriculum the school offers. This is not restricted to any particular style of school. The progressive schools are as likely to do this as the more traditional academic schools. In this first year children learn to follow a routine, listen to instruction, take turns, help your friend, and work together. Hmm…sound familiar? Everything we learned in kindergarten is now what children are learning in Pre-K.

While this works well for many children, and it makes schools feel good because their students seem so accomplished in earlier grades, there are some unintended consequences of this shift. For those who are not older but are fully ready to handle the program of kindergarten, there may be as much as 18 months difference between the age of that child and the oldest child in the class. There can be huge size differences between the children in the same class. Most importantly, if the curriculum continues to accelerate, there will come a time when it does not fit the development of the students and the whole purpose is defeated.

In the last few years of my tenure as Head Of The Lower School of an independent school in Virginia, I too established a wonderful Pre-K program. We rehabbed a donated construction modular office into a colorful “Cottage” complete with deck and ramp. The younger siblings of our enrolled students flocked to the program, delighted in the options offered: ½ day, full-day, extended day. We could really pay attention to what each 4-year-old needed and even tailor that need throughout the year. Several students started the year as ½ day and graduated to full day students around January of their Pre-K year.

In the second year of the program I needed to hire a new teacher for the class. Guess what? I hired a talented veteran kindergarten teacher from a nearby public school district. She was delighted to be in an environment that allowed her to attend to the developmental needs of her students and not primarily to the concerns of state tests and benchmarks. I was happy that she understood both where the students were currently, as well as where they needed to go to be ready for our more academically focused kindergarten program.

Somewhere in all of this is a warning – be careful what you wish for! While I agree completely with the need to make sure your child is ready for the kindergarten experience, it is equally important that the schools you are applying to that are accelerating their curriculum as a result of having classes with slightly older students be mindful of the potential pitfalls of this practice over time. Schools must adjust their programs to fit the new profile of their students – larger age spans and greater differences in size and capability perhaps. This can be done well if the school and its teachers resist the temptation to simply accelerate their program and truly reframe their curriculum and methodologies to fit the needs of the students they have. If this is accomplished, students can have the best of all possible worlds.

Anne Simon is co-author of “Beyond The Brochure: An Insider’s Guide To Private Elementary Schools In Los Angeles”. She is the former Head of Wildwood Elementary School and the former Dean of the Crossroads Middle School.

Guest Blogger Jenny: How Are Private Elementary Schools Different From Public Schools? One Mom’s Opinion

August 9, 2011February 20, 2012 admin 2 Comments

Although Beyond The Brochure is a blog about Los Angeles private elementary schools (and I kind of assume that, if you’re reading this blog, it’s because private school is of interest to you), occasionally I feel the need to discuss the differences between LAUSD schools and private schools.

First off, I’m not anti-public school. On the contrary: I attended LAUSD schools from K-7, and my daughter attended public school at Third St. Elementary from 1-3^rd grades. That’s why I think I can write this comparison with confidence and relatively little bias; I’ve experienced both.

Funding

Obviously, there’s a huge difference in how your child’s education is funded at a private school vs. a public one. At private school, the funder is you, pretty pure and simple. You pay the tuition (ranging anywhere from $12K to $30K annually, depending on the school), and then you pay again in terms of annual giving, plus fundraising offers galore. Even if you get financial aid, you’ll probably still be paying something.

In public school, our tax dollars pay for education. Just how much of our tax dollars trickles down to the actual schools, however, remains a mystery. LAUSD claims anything from around $3,600 to $10,000 per pupil, depending on the school (it’s too complicated to explain here; rest assured if you live in a low income area, even if your school is overcrowded, your school is probably receiving less money per kid than the schools in more affluent areas. It’s not fair). Some sources claim that, since LAUSD doesn’t count money raised by public school funding bond measures in these figures, that the actual funding is higher. Lord knows I’m no expert on this topic, but twenty minutes of researching it online made my head spin in confusion.

What is definitely true (and I know this from our three years at Third St. Elementary), is that you’ll be fundraising all the time, perhaps just as much as at a private school. The difference is that often the parents’ hands are tied in terms of how to allocate the funds; at a private school, you know exactly where the funding is going: straight back into the little school and thus to your child.

Perhaps it’s not fair to compare private schools, which are essentially medium-sized businesses, to public schools, which are vast bureaucracies with massive infrastructure. But it is an important, if somewhat obvious, distinction.

Bullying and Behavioral Issues

There are bullies and nasty girl terror everywhere. That is simply a given. And I’m not sure there’s much difference between public and private schools in how they deal with these entities. I’ve heard unbelievable horror stories circulating about texting harassment at private L.A. schools. Sometimes more money and entitlement absolutely leads to awful behavior. And it’s up to the school and its overall culture to deal with it.

On a personal note, my daughter had trouble on the playground at Third St. with mean girls and aggressive boys. She handled it fine, but she pretty much had to handle it on her own. Then again, it wasn’t anything extreme. But she’s experienced nothing like that at Mirman. The school seems to have a zero tolerance policy for that kind of nonsense.

If you’re concerned, ask the administration about things like honor codes and discipline. And if the school doesn’t have a real code of conduct, I would ask some current parents about their experiences regarding student behavior.

Quality of Teachers

There are dedicated and wonderful teachers everywhere. Anna’s second grade teacher at Third St. was one of the best teachers she has ever had; he was an example of how years of experience (I believe he had 17 years) can add up to true excellence.

The difference in public and private school teachers doesn’t really come into play unless you’re talking about bad or ineffective teachers. In public school, teachers earn tenure after only a couple of years of teaching, and after that it’s almost impossible for LAUSD to rid itself of a bad teacher. The best you can do in public school, if your child gets a lousy teacher, is to transfer your child to a different classroom. Forget about getting the teacher fired. It isn’t going to happen.

Private schools, however, pretty much hire and fire at will. If a teacher isn’t cutting it, he or she won’t last long. Private schools don’t need to tolerate substandard teaching, or attitude problems, or laziness. On the other hand, private schools don’t have to hire terribly qualified teachers, either. Some twenty-something with a history M.A. and no teaching credential could end up teaching your child, and the results could be less than stellar. I got more than a couple of these types of teachers when I attended Crossroads for middle and upper school; Crossroads did get rid of the lousy newbies, but there was some chaos along the way.

Another comparison is the quality of teaching, but that’s hard to gauge. These days, LAUSD teachers are so bound by testing requirements that it’s difficult for them to fit in anything creative or different. It’s a system that doesn’t necessarily reward initiative, but does reward quantitative test results, so many teachers have to teach to the tests (this isn’t true of charter schools, which have different criteria for funding than regular LAUSD campuses).

On the other hand, teaching quality at private schools is more qualitative and far fuzzier. Sure, the kids do get tested every year at private school, but there wasn’t much attention paid to it. One could argue that a successful private school teacher is willing to compete in a popularity contest, whereas in public school popularity plays no part in job security.

Diversity

Public school wins this one, hands down. Private schools, however they wish to sugar coat it, will never be as diverse as public schools. And I’m not just talking about ethnicity, I’m talking about class as well. If you send your child to private school, she will be with mostly upper middle class to outright rich kids. This does vary from school to school, as some private schools are truly enclaves for the rich and famous.

So there it is, some of the pluses and minuses regarding private and public schools. I’ve tried to be as fair to both sides as I can. At the same time, though, if I’ve inadvertently offended any of you, you might want to keep in mind that Beyond The Brochure is a blog about private schools. If you’re a huge public school- at-all -costs-and-in -all-circumstances-advocate (and all power to you), you might want to ask yourself: why are you reading this???!

Editor’s note: Among our readers we are pleased to include public school parents. Yes, we have public school moms who email us and say they read this blog for a few reasons: 1. They are considering transferring their child to private elementary school at some point in the future. 2. They want a glimpse into what life is really like at private schools.

A few months ago, Beyond The Brochure was mocked by another mom v-blogger (as Jenny says, if you can’t write, you video yourself) who called us “private schools snobs” and a bunch of other nasty names. We don’t think we’re snobs, and we try hard to be fair and inclusive on this blog, but if we have strong opinions, we write them. If we’ve struggled with a parenting issue at our school, we’ll talk about it. We answer every email and read (and welcome!) your comments. I have never attended a private school in my life! I matriculated through the LAUSD, SMUSD and UC systems from elementary school through graduate school. Oh, and last but not least, we aim for keeping our sense of humor present at all times. If that makes us snobs, so be it.

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