<p>I have a friend who lives in Inglewood (Los Angeles area) but does not want her son to go to the local public schools there for middle school and high school. My friend listed four private schools that she was looking for her son... I've only heard of two of them (Crossroads and Chadwick), so I don't remember the other two. How are Chadwick and Crossroads? Any private middle schools and high schools in the West LA or South Bay area that'd you recommend her to check out? </p>
<p>Btw her son is stronger in math and science, and is interested in athletics.</p>
<p>We live in LA, and both our D and S attended Brentwood School. If your friend's S is very strong academically, he should also add Harvard-Westlake to the list. Other options are Windward and Loyola.<br>
1. H-W - by far the best academically and in math and science, but also the farthest to travel for your friend. The middle school (grades 7-9) is in Bel Air, and the upper school is in Studio City, about 6-8 miles away. If the student is a good athlete and would play on a JV or V team as a 9th grader, the afternoon commute to the upper campus every day for practices and games can be interesting. Athletics are strong.<br>
2. Crossroads - Probably 2nd to H-W in math and science, also known for its performing arts program. Athletics are mediocre. Located in an industrial part of Santa Monica. Very artsy and a little quirky.
3. Brentwood - probably 2nd overall academically to H-W. Athletics are good - plays in a smaller school division and except in a few sports (girls' volleyball coming to mind), a hardworking (not necessarily gifted or club player) athlete with basic skills should be able to make V in their main sport by their junior year.<br>
4. Loyola - according to some, should be tied with BWD academically. Extremely strong athletics makes for much competition for playing time. This boy's Catholic school is located near downtown but draws from all over the city.
5. Windward - similar to Crossroads but a little more traditional and balanced in approach. Don't know anything about their math program Of the schools mentioned above, the commute to Windward (in West LA) will be the shortest for your friend. Also don't know much about their athletics program, although last year or the year before, the girls' basketball team won a championship.
I also don't know anything about Chadwick (way too far away for us to consider), other than the fact that both my kids played against them during their high school sports careers.
Most important, your friend should look at the websites of these schools, and any others they might consider, to find out about their philosophy, curriculum, athletics, other student activities, and college counseling/placement information. Open houses are coming up soon, and they should definitely make appointments to visit. If athletics are important, drop in to watch a game and also observe how the other students interact. Good luck to them!</p>
<p>If your friend is an URM, then Crossroads and Windward will be very interested. Crossroads gives a lot of financial aide. The full tuition at these schools is about $25-30K a year. Loyola is significantly less. Brentwood is the least diverse. HW is diverse, but primarily with asians. I have two friends who are african american and their children go to Windward. They would have been comfortable at Crossroads as well.</p>
<p>poomix did a good job of describing the area's private schools, but one thing your friend will need to consider is the child's age as different schools have different entry levels. Crossroads has big entry levels in 6th and 7th grade, and after that it's only by attrition, some years they don't take any one. Harvard Westlake takes most of the class for 7th grade but then takes another 50 I believe for 9th grade. They also take 10 in 10th, which is the only school that takes at that grade level not by attrition. Although one poster said Crossroads was mediocre athletically, they have some strong teams (like boy's tennis which last year won the state championship in its division) and they are really starting to recruit in some sports. Good luck to your friend.</p>
<p>Actually, I'm not sure if Harvard Westlake and/or Brentwood do help a kid that much with college placement. I think the top third do incredibly well, as they would in any school, but the middle and lower thirds might even suffer from comparison to their classmates.
That said, I somewhat agree with namaste but I think it's reductive to say any school is "unhealthy." I think, just as with colleges, it's a matter of fit. There are kids who are going to thrive on all the opportunities and competition at H-W or Brentwood, and others who will only blossom at a place like Crossroads or Wildwood. Crossroads and Wildwood, incidentally, are VERY different schools. I actually think academically Crossroads is more like Brentwood than Wildwood. For what it's worth...</p>
<p>That's true, Crossroads has become far more competitive and grade oriented. All of the big private schools (HW, Brentwood, Windward, Crossroads, Marlboro, Archer, Loyola) have significant numbers going to "top" schools, but far from a majority. Wildwood is a new alternative learning school that's gotten a huge amount of buzz (supposedly downplays competition) and is reportedly sending its graduates to respectable schools as well.</p>
<p>HSN brings up a good point about college placement out of HW or BWD (or to some extent, any of the other schools named above), especially for a student intending to eventually apply to the UCs. There is a thread running on this subject here:
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=397561%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=397561</a>
starting around page 3, about the competitive advantage/disadvantage of being an average student at an independent private school on UC admissions. However, if the student is (a) a URM or first generation, (b) in the upper part of his class, or (c) aiming for a private college, any one of those factors would change the picture considerably.</p>
<p>All of the schools named above will provide a solid college prep education, and ultimately the real issue is which one is a good fit socially, financially and academically. Neither of our kids was accepted to H-W (although I'm pretty sure that S was turned down because of a sib at BWD) and after I saw how happy they were at BWD, I told friends beginning the process with their own kids who had their hearts set on H-W (or on any one school) to "be careful what you wish for".</p>
<p>"I don't think Brentwood or Harvard Westlake are very healthy schools."</p>
<p>What makes you say that? Both my kids have attended HW, my son just graduated and my daughter is in 10th grade. They are happy, healthy well adjusted kids who shop for bargain jeans and don't think Pinkberry is the second coming. They have the most supportive teachers you'd ever hope to meet and, yes, the school does pretty much guarantee that if you do well you'll go to the very top schools. Why the hate?</p>
<p>HSN,
Not true. About a third go to HYP and the like (other Ivys plus Stanford, MIT and CalTech). Some go to the top LACs (Amherst, Williams, Wesleyan). The next largest group goes to Wash U, St. L, Michigan, NYU, Carnegie Melon, BC, Tufts and USC. And many go to one of the UCs. There technically is no bottom, though by looking at last year's list, I note about three kids went to state schools outside of California that might not impress anyone. Since we don't rank, I don't know who was at the bottom GPA-wise, but no one that I know was disappointed with where they ended up.</p>
<p>Burnthis: I went to one of the elite private schools of west LA and none of them are healthy environments. Us students who go thru the pressure know that. Parents get a rosier picture from well-funded marketing and development. But the end result is, yes, placement into a top school.</p>
<p>KFC, I can relate to your friend. We actually moved from the Inglewood area to a suburb outside the city which boasted a "wonderful" public school system. After three years of my kids' educational needs being ignored, we decided to bite the financial bullet and switched to a private school. Best decision we ever made. As to which school is best, obviously it's a "your mileage may vary" issue. Obviously, there may be some pitfalls in going to a private school in the LA area (you don't have a Prada bag? you shop at the Gap? Your mom wasn't Princess L-- I mean, someone famous, ahem?) But you're going to get a version of that wherever girls congregate. But at the top schools, you will get a top education. The teachers are there because they enjoy teaching (not for the money) and the teachers who shouldn't be teaching can be fired. My kids' unhealthiest school experiences were with the public school adminstrators and tenured teachers who didn't care about teaching smart kids. Once we switched to the private schools that stressed academics, they were in heaven (and pretty much ignored the tiny who's shoes cost the most and who can score the most drugs contingent).</p>
<p>thanks for all your helpful replies! it was a very interesting read and i will definitely forward a lot of the information to my friend. </p>
<p>by the way, is going to private school the only option if one is unsatisfied with their local public school? i remember North Torrance H/S being briefly mentioned in my last convo w/ my friend, but this is a public school in another district.</p>
<p>You know, depending on where you go and what grade level you are, I believe there are good public school options in L.A. For instance, a lot of H-W ninth graders come in from Walter-Reed, which I think is a gifted magnet. THere are a lot of options in terms of charters and magnets, but LA Unified as a whole has a pretty miserable reputation. Your friend would have to do research about this.</p>
<p>There are options. Certain public schools in LA Unified have highly gifted programs (not labelled magnet programs) which require a 99% IQ score on LA Unified test. These are great programs. There is one at Paul Revere in West LA.</p>
<p>There is also the Walter Reed program for grades 6-8 which also requires a 99% IQ and an additional qualifying test. Walter Reed is in North Hollywood area and there is no transportation provided. However, I think parents have chartered a bus at their own expense from the west side which you could participate in.</p>
<p>Walter Reed feeds into a high school program in the valley as well. Walter Reed has a huge homework volume, more than even a Harvard Westlake middle school experience. It's not for everyone by any means. The high school pressure is more like a Harvard Westlake experience in terms of workload and pressure.</p>
<p>Walter Reed is not a magnet program. The program is called IHP -- Individualized Honors Program, I believe. A student applies into it. They have a criteria by which they select students. There is no transportation. At one point, parents did chip in for transportation from the West Side, but I'm not sure they had that option when we took a tour three years ago. Depending on the crop of kids, they do sometimes take kids who do not meet the highly gifted criteria. But, again, they are selective. Many of the kids matriculate the highly gifted magnet at North Hollywood which is a work-intensive place. A number of LAUSD schools offer SAS programs -- Schools for Advanced Studies. I hear the one at Taft High School (in Tarzana) is quite challenging. I'm far more familiar with the Valley than the West Side but the SAS programs are district-wide. There are magnet programs that seem to attract mostly gifted students due to the nature of the program and such. One way to check on a program is to look at the AP pass rate -- not how many tests are given but how the kids are actually doing. They should also be able to produce a list of colleges that students are going to.</p>
<p>i just wanted to put in my two cents about harvard-westlake since i graduated from there in spring of this year. i am very happy my parents chose to send me there and will probably be sending my children there too. however, i was also extremely happy to get out of that place. the pressure and competition are unimaginable to those who have never experienced anything like it. it is a pretty cut-throat environment. average workloads are extremely tough, and that on top of the ec's you'll most likely pile up in order to get into a top college can be very overwhelming. all that being said, now that it is all done and over with, all of my friends who wanted to got in and are attending top colleges across the us. i feel well prepared for college, as far as time management and study habits go. i had amazing help and advice from my dean and as much attention as i wanted from my teachers. hw may not be the healthiest environment in the world, but it's up to the student how much they decide to take on. as i said before, if i had to do it all over again, i would probably endure my 6 years at hw again.</p>
<p>One public alternative might be the Center for Enriched Studies in central LA- a magnet program for high school.
As far as middle school goes, for the kid who isn't yet ready for a huge 7-12 campus, or who wants to make a move to another school for 6th grade, I'd suggest looking at Turningpoint and Willows in Culver City. These schools go through grade 8 and have made great strides in diversifying their student bodies. Their academics are solid and for the child who needs a few more years of a more hand-on experience, or who is just not yet ready for the shark tank of middle school in a larger setting, they are good alternatives.</p>