<p>“And most importantly, it ALL depends on the priorities you have for your child’s educational experience. You will find at most of those schools, the competitiveness of the students is implicitly indicative of the competitiveness of the parents. So you have to decide how much stress you want your child to be under to succeed, and be around people whose parents are spending every penny possible to assure their child’s success (by the way, I know teachers/administrators in all four districts I mentioned, so I hear this from them).”</p>
<p>This is a very big point. While New Trier and Hinsdale are excellent, the pressure is very intense, and one could argue that someone could be better served by being, say, the star at Downers Grove rather than one of many stars at Hinsdale.</p>