<p>Princess'Dad: I missed something in your post. Can you explain? I don't understand why the "what to look for in a school" post was of concern to you. I think at least some of those are rational places from which to start. </p>
<p>I am happy that D will be at a BS where students score well on SAT's: I want her to be with peers for whom achievement mattters. Advanced degrees demonstrates depth of understanding of subject matter, and implies more maturity since it takes more years to get that advanced degree. ]Endowment is a big one for me; I prefer to send D somewhere that I won't feel guilty paying only tuition and not making charitable contributions on top! </p>
<p>I am SO glad that D chose (and was accepted at) a school that CC considers to be outside the "elite tier." Reading CC makes me realize that many (not all! Don't flame me!) who aspire to the "elite tier" do so because their first priority is an Ivy League admission. I SO don't want D surrounded by such people. I do not want her at BS to credential herself for admission to a particular college or class of college. I want her surrounded by educators who want to develop her as a person, and by peers who want to develop themselves. S understands exactly what he wants already, and he shaped his HS experience to get it. D is still clay waiting to be molded, and I no more wanted her at a BS where success is measured by Ivy League admission than I wanted her to remain at a PS where success often isn't measured at all.</p>
<p>I absolutely agree with laxtaxi on being surrounded by people whose "good" in the simplest terms. The friends that you hang out with have most effect on who you are going to be. As I have noticed transition from elementary to middle school (PS)(I am a little parenty even though I'm in 8th), people around you do mold you as a person.
BTW, can anyone tell me why CC prep school admission is so obssesed with ivy league schools? just a thought</p>
<p>lax.
The matriculation list is my first concern. Schools like Exeter/Andover/SPS push the Ivy's (per the schools and their students). I graduated from Stanford and think it is the best college in the country. But, am I better prepared then someone from a top small liberal arts college? I would argue that some of my surgeon friends are so narrowly educated, that a LA college would be better.</p>
<p>The SATS. Several College admission deans that I have dealty with (I am on a med school admission committee) have said that the top students at all of the top 50ish boarding schools are equal. The lower halfs may differ. </p>
<p>I started my approach to schools with the same that scroks posted. Now I think that you should start with what you like: if you like lacrosse or dance or.. and pick those schools and then visit to see which you are most comfortable in.</p>
<p>As to APs. They are still being pushed by many of the admission staffs of Universities. The academica staff is different. Stanford and Harvard recently had a discussion about not accepting them at all as a freshman English class at S or H is different from a HS class AP.</p>
<p>Finally, look at Deerfield's English dept. I don't believe they offer AP English, but they offer a HUGH variety of English classes which as an educator I think is much better. So just looking at the number of AP classes may be a cop out on the schools part. It is easier for them to offer AP English then a variety of intense English courses.</p>
<p>BUT you hit it on the head. I want my daughter surrounded by educators that develop her as a person and by peers who don't call her a nerd for studying and have late discussions about abc. I don't want her at a school where they get 5 hours of sleep because they are pressured to getting high marks to get into harvard or yale.</p>
<p>I will be flamed too, as I think the vast majority of posters here are looking at ivy league matriculation as the end that must be obtained instead of a great education that may not be obtained at most public hs due to "no kid left behind'.</p>
<p>I was pleasantly surprised at the lack of pressure we got to donate from S's MAPL school. They send out the stuff, but NO pressure at all. Plus, you got to donate in the name of a specific teacher or staff member if you wanted.</p>
<p>Princess'Dad, I support NCLB as a concept. I love the idea of motivating kids with no family support or role modeling for education. Too often, though, I have seen NCPA - No Child Pushed Ahead. </p>
<p>I have heard that many (most?) schools won't accept AP as a means of jumping ahead of the freshman survey or intro courses. I have assumed that getting high scores on the AP is more about scoring high for admissions purposes than it is for advanced placement once in college. </p>
<p>D's BS emphasizes that they sent their graduates to over 125 different colleges and universities last year (or maybe over last 3 years or something like that). Some were ivies; some were top LA's; the list was quite diverse.</p>
<p>lax,
I think more and more schools are going the way of only using them as "scores".<br>
I ran for school board on NCLB, but No Child Pulled Back either (close lost). </p>
<p>As for SAT score, your kids score can pretty much be gauged now: the ssat and even your income level correlates very strongly with SAT scores. Your kids will score what they will score, whether you go to PS, DS or BS. When you look at an average SAT score, what you are looking at is what peers your child will have, not the educational results. I do want my D to be with a group of kids who are interested and motivated and not disruptive. </p>
<p>I believe matriculation is similar. Your kid can go where ever they want regardless of what school they attend, but maybe none of their friends will be following them. I think if we went the PS route, it would have been a base from which we would have had to pursue additional activities like outside ECs, distance learning from JHU/CTY, extra foreign language work etc. But D would get to college regardless.</p>
<p>Another reason in favor of BS for our family over PS and DS is that my daughter does one ton of EC's now and I drive her all over creation every day of the week. She thinks this will continue forever, but I have had it! Not to mention that DD2 and DD3 who also have their ECs and as they get older want more of Mom's taxi time. I don't know what the situation with you other parents is like, but for me the idea of D getting to her activities under her own steam is priceless.</p>
<p>We did look at endowment, because it is critical for getting FA which we needed. The BS ended up having more FA than the local DS. The facilities were less of a concern because our scrappy little public school does amazing things with their lack of facilities. The fancy campuses of the BSs have evolved over time. I remember reading the histories of some of the big BS mentioned on this site and many started as one room places with no athletic fields. Impressive, but not necessary.</p>
<p>I have given up on looking for AP classes. I think it used to be a marker of a difficult class, but a better indication of the schools strongest classes is a thorough reading of the course descriptions.</p>
<p>Sunday afternoon, S went golf practice with dad. I'm here feel alone and upset. </p>
<p>I've been studying the facts & figures about the BS and our local public whole day. A thought came in, very dark side:<br>
What will happen if S doesn't like the BS or doesn't fit in ?<br>
What will happen if he switch back to local high? That will be junior year then, too late for everything?<br>
He is doing fine here, top student, excellent athlete (coach said he's very potential to be recruited by college), will he at the same level when he goes to BS?</p>
<p>This is really kind of Sunday-afternoon-mommy-blue</p>
<p>Speaking of the Ivy schools...I'm not about to say that they don't matter because I think they do in terms of satisfaction with one's own education and also with the greater possibility of open doors in the workplace due to more/better recruiting there. However, so much of this is regional; I have lived in many states, and my observation is the Ivy schools will always get attention, but in some areas, the best of the large nearby provate universities and stats universities are held in higher regard. This is often due to familiarity of the hiring manager, or bias on his part. I think what I am trying to say is that once you get below the Ivy League schools, most of the rest of the high priced schools are excellent schools but as far as carrer opportunities, won't give you much of an advantage. I'm trferring to high priced schools like Univ. of The South, Davidson, Rhodes in Memphis. IMO, this teor of schools offers agreat education, but from a recreuiting standpoint, not as much bang for the buck. Now Emory, Duke, Vanderbilt are sort of in a special 'local Ivy' league in the south. For example, in Atlanta, of course Harvard would be very impressive to a hiring manager or recruiter, but Vassar, Bates, etc. wouldn't mean much even though they provide a great education. The hiring manager would probably be more impressed with Emory, Ga Tech or UGA. In Charlotte, UNC-Chapel Hill or Duke will be at the top of the chart.
All my babbling just to say that I for one think the Ivy reach is worthwhile to our kids who are truly interested in learning and want to excel. Certainly in the NE US, that is the trophy prize and maybe even a sign of success as a parent or student. In much of the rest of the country, I just don;t think it's necessary to be successful. Some of the people I know who are the most successful, and I am measuring that by social standing. civic leaders, corp leaders and execs as well as entrepeneurs and small business owners, many were educated in mass at the large state universities. Heck, some of them didnt even finish college. I'm certainly not advocating that path for our kids, but rather pointing out that in my 20+ years in the business and prof. world, success there has been more as the result of an intense hunger to do well, and enthusiasm for their chosen field, doing whatever it took every day to 'get the job done right'.
To sum this long mesage up, I can understand the heave emphasis on the Ivy League schools and go for it if you can reach them, but there are many ways to reach success in life and there are many high school paths also. I cannot afford to send him to DS for status alone, although I would like him surrounded by people all eager to learn and succeed. If he stays at the PS where he is, we will design some summer activities to give him more breadth. He will be ok either way I think.....</p>
<p>Princess' Dad -
You would have liked (I think) the talk given by the head of school at St Andrew's when we were there for revisit day. He talked about the mission of the school and how High Schools now have largely abandoned their missions. That is not so surprising. He also said that most colleges and universities (including the big boys) today have lost their way - what are colleges for? I have been thinking about that ever since. </p>
<p>The whole name-brand college thing is dispiriting, but I am not totally immune from its charms, either. I am going to think about this for a while more - What is college for? Well?</p>
<p>My wife and I have this discussion all the time. I went to Stanford and she the U of Calif, SD. I still think Stanford gave a great education. I had Linus Pauling teach chemistry and explain how he gave his daughter who was dating Watson the "wrong ideas" which turned out to be the correct one and the Nobel. Stanford Overseas was fantastic.
But 35 years later does it matter. No.</p>
<p>I don't know if it matters in terms of establishing a pedigree...but the choice does matter. I have been in conversation with some college classmates -- some that I knew well, others that I have only come to know recently -- and there are some common themes to our professional lives, and even family lives, that we believe are the byproduct of our undergraduate education. Decisions that we make in life are still shaped and guided by values and thinking that we gained in college. Some of those ideas were molded in college; others had their seeds planted there. But I would hardly say it doesn't matter over the long run. I think it has made a profound difference in who I am.</p>
<p>Alas, I cannot go back in time, create a control group of "me," and determine whether my theory can be established by the scientific method. It's just something I'm quite sure of...and am conscious of after comparing notes with classmates.</p>
<p>Considering the stakes that I believe are in play when it comes to a college choice, I think the decision is very important. I agree, however, that one need not attend an Ivy to get that. And, as satisfied as I am that my undergraduate school was the best choice for me, I wouldn't begin to suggest that it is the universally correct choice. But it sure does help to have as many doors open as possible. I would hate for someone to enter their senior year in HS thinking that Cornell or Dartmouth are the best places for them to become the best kind of person, thinker, leader, etc. and being completely shut out from those possibilities.</p>
<p>The reality -- even in my case -- is that colleges are rarely chosen on the basis of these long-term impacts. It's hard for a 17-18 year-old to imagine what their college experience will continue to offer them in 35 years' time.</p>
<p>I do think the university that we choose has a hand in shaping us and our kids as people. I just no longer think it has a major role in our professional success. Going to Harvard, Yale, etc. is certainly interesting and would give us many good tales and memories because of the tremendously talented people around us, and if one can do, it go for it! I have just been around long enough to know that it may not lead to professional success and shoudl nto be viewed as a ticket to the corner office on the top floor as so many think it will...Now, Harvard Business School or Wharton, I can almost assure you that will open some doors that the local MBA program will not open. The Wall Street firms, top consulting firms, etc. recruit at the Ivy MBA programs, but most corp recruiters will also tell you most of those students have an inflated sense of worth in the market and an attitude second to none....</p>
<p>Hopeful,
I agree with you. My wife is in fortune 500 and she will look at an Ivyish MBA, but usually they do not work as hard as some of the state ones.
D'yer,
I believe that my college education made me and that nowhere else would I have had the experiances I had. However, my wife feels she had the same (although Revelle College at UCSD is probably the equivalent to some Ivys).
I definately would have had a different experiance if I had gone to a school with heavy beer drinking and partying frats - i think.
But, again. The small liberal arts schools probably provide as good an education as the ivys. (then there is the old question of which is a better teacher - a guy who is a good teacher or the guy that won the Nobel prize in the work?</p>
<p>I graduated from an outstanding New England liberal arts college, one of the most selective and exclusive (no way they would have accepted me today!). I attended a public high school where good enuff was good enuff. I had no idea how to study and no idea what it was like to be surrounded by motivated peers. As a result, I had no idea what opportunities were available to me when I was in college. I didn't know who I was, and didn't know what I could be. I was and remain envious of my classmates who arrived at my college better prepared, more driven and more focused than I. </p>
<p>In the decision to send D to boarding school, among the predominant factors in favor was my own PS experience. I am hoping that the BS experience will give my daughter the chance to do a lot of growing up and self-realization in high school, so she can experience, appreciate and benefit from her college. Ironically, it may be the boarding school experience makes her better able to benefit from college, even if going to BS and doing "worse" gradewise means that college may be less "prestigious" than where she ends up after 3 years of BS.</p>
<p>lax, I agree,
However. I worry when I read the students at Exeter and elsewhere bragging that they only get 5 hours of sleep and live on caffeine.</p>