<p>I thought that was what you were saying? Do you have the link handy? I’m curious.</p>
<p>Is it this? [43</a> Percent of 2011 College-Bound Seniors Met SAT College and Career Readiness Benchmark](<a href=“News and Press Releases - Newsroom | College Board”>News and Press Releases - Newsroom | College Board)</p>
<p>“I think this is IN PART due to the fact that many wealthier parents DO take their kids out of public schools. It becomes a self perpetuating thing, the more people choose private, the fewer people with money and influence left to make the publics better. And kids who are likely to score higher on those tests have been removed from the system.”</p>
<p>That’s not exactly true. There are many good public high schools at the top that have kids with good scores. The problem is poverty. There’s a lot of it here. A bloated and unwieldy system. A large number of kids in special Ed who were never educated to the best of their abilities, and a huge influx of immigrants, kids coming into high school without Knowing English. And I think most kids take the PSAT. It’s given free in high school. There’s no other classes at that time.</p>
<p>[College-Bound</a> Juniors 2011 - PSAT/NMSQT](<a href=“http://professionals.collegeboard.com/data-reports-research/psat/cb-jr-soph/juniors]College-Bound”>SAT Suite of Assessments – Reports | College Board)</p>
<p>PSAT–not SAT. YOu have to look at each state. There is a pie chart one page 2 of each state report showing the stat–28%, not 23–typo but still ouch.</p>
<p>red–how many of those kids in poverty/special ed are taking the PSAT though? Really, the only reason to take the PSAT is for the National Merit potential and to get your name on the mailing lists for 100’s of schools so they can clutter up your mail box each day. This isn’t measuring ALL students, just ALL kids that took the PSAT.</p>
<p>Ohio: “That said, I imagine there certainly are many parents who are appalled at the idea of their kids being educated alongside a bunch of non-white poor kids, and choose private school to avoid exactly that, even if the teaching at the public is great and the classes not overcrowded.”</p>
<p>Hmmm. Can you think of anywhere else this applies to besides NY? I don’t think NYers are more racist or classist than anywhere else in the country, and probably less so than in many parts of the country, as we are used to such a mix here.</p>
<p>Another thing: you all are imagining all NYC private schools are white. They are absolutely not. Id guess my one child’s school has about 40% children of color.</p>
<p>Mn: I honestly don’t know. At my daughter’s school everyone took the PSAT. It wasn’t a choice. It wasn’t something you had to sign up for. It was like any other standardized test. They did it on a regular school day. The private school where my kid has friends did it on the same day. I don’t think they just did this at the “good” schools. Imagine how horrible that would be.</p>
<p>I’m sure that is ONE reason parents in any urban area choose private schools so no, not just NY.</p>
<p>My private had maybe 20% not-white kids. Had I gone to my local public HS there wouldn’t have been even 20% white kids though, and I do think that is a factor for some parents.</p>
<p>Thanks MN, interesting.</p>
<p>Kids at my kids’ HS DO have to sign up for the PSAT and there is a fee for it. It is given before the school day begins, so you also have to drive that day, can’t take the bus.</p>
<p>Interesting. The PSAT was free here.</p>
<p>Maybe that’s Why our scores are so low, and others high. Everyone takes it here.</p>
<p>Red–the PSAT wasn’t free, you just didn’t have to pay for it, your school picked up the cost-or if you have a fee you pay at the beginning of the year it’s rolled into that. Here the school pays for sophomores that want to take the test for practice, juniors have to pay ($27 or something like that). The test is taken in school in the morning so the kids miss the morning classes.</p>
<p>I was talking about the sophomore PSAT, sorry. I do not know then. $27 is a lot of money for some. I’m sure some parents wouldn’t pay it. I’ll have to look into it.</p>
<p>I know our school has “scholarships” for kids that can’t afford the fee for PSAT or ACT/SAT, etc. Back when I was in school, a lot of colleges would base acceptances off of PSAT scores and you didn’t have to take the ACT/SAT (state schools mostly). Now, no one does that so I can see where people that didn’t think they had a chance at Merit money would just not take the test. I don’t know that I would have had our kids take the test again as juniors if they hadn’t scored close to cut off at sophomores.</p>
<p>Ok, I looked up my kid’s private school’s ethnicity breakdown. 63% white. Probably much more diverse than most suburban public schools in this country. Yes, it doesn’t represent a real breakdown of NYC students, but it’s hardly an all-white, and other-race avoidant. My other kid’s public is 20% white.</p>
<p>If the 40 grand is a small part of the parent’s salary/assets wouldn’t this be similar to celebrating a sweet sixteen with 6 figures or some other such luxury? If the parent didn’t spend the money on school maybe there’s nothing else that he could have used it on that he was holding back for lack of money.</p>
<p>We had a lot of good options for public schools where we lived, but I still think it was worth it for us to send our kids to a private school. We all make the decision that’s right for our kids and what we could afford. Redpoint, you seem kind of apologetic and defensive of sending your kid to a private school. I don’t think it is necessary. You, as parent, based on your economic ability is doing what’s best for your kid. I am sure there are a lot of other parents who wish they could do the same.</p>
<p>I don’t think redpoint is being all that defensive, particularly given the unfair and data-free things that are being implied about her. Simply put, if you haven’t spent time trying to navigate the NYC school system, then you really don’t know 1) what people are facing or 2) what the range of people and motivations might be. A New Yorker might not be equipped to judge your choices either. Further, it is not a good idea to use state level data to talk about NYC. It is a big, diverse state with rural and urban areas.</p>
<p>The $40,000/year price tag is for elite private prep schools; read the article. It’s not as if there’s an absolute choice between “free” public school and super-expensive private school - there are more choices in between for families. These very expensive schools cater to “1%” upper-income families, not the dual-income two school teacher household, nor the white-collar middle-management household. Saying the choice is limited to $40,000/year elementary school reminds me of a an executive who once told a group of clerical workers discussing handbags “my wife won’t even consider a handbag that costs less than $1,000”. Reminds me of Mitt’s $10,000 bet, when a $20 bet would have sufficed; price is no object to obtaining the object of desire. If you’re making $4 million/year, that tuition is just another household expense, but it’s not a reflection of how the other 99% of households are addressing school needs.</p>
<p>It’s NOT defensible, but it is our reality, and a reflection of current income disparity. That same NYC quality private prep education existed decades ago, without the extremely high price-to-attend. (And scholarships are extended to create the artificial “diversity” those high-flyer parents still expect.)</p>
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<p>The NYC DOE pays the fee for all sophomores and juniors to take the PSAT. Every student in school that day, whether at the top NYC magnet or the lowest performing HS in the city takes the test.</p>
<p>I am a product of the NYC public school system; GATE K-5, SP 6-8 and NYC specialized HS. Even back then my education was vastly different from that of my siblings and my friends who attended the neighborhood/zoned schools.</p>
<p>My D has also had a K-12 education at the NYC public school, even though in the beginning I was very ambivalent about her attending public school. </p>
<p>I think that the price of pre-school has risen with inflation and is all relative. I remember when my D was accepted to a private kindergarten in Bklyn Heights the cost to attend was 8k (1991 $$s), which was more than my younger sister, who was a grad student at the time was paying to attend Columbia. Today that same school cost over 30k/year with a price increase at grade 4. We did opt to go to our local public elementary school. It was in Tribeca and the PTA at that time was raising about 300k/year for enrichment programs (a full K-5 music, art and computer program). Today there would be a waitlist for her to attend kindergarten there.</p>
<p>She ended up attending a magnet (admission test) 6-12 school. Again, PTA raised close to a half million a year for enrichment the enrichment program. Students only left to attend Laguardia, Bx Science and Stuyvesant (D accepted but wanted to stay with her friends). Her experience there was nothing like the title I public high schools where I have worked.</p>
<p>Higgins. Actually it is true, there are few choices between $0 and $35,000 for private schools. I am not including preschools. There are some choices there, definitely, but after that you have expensive privates or religious schools, which are less expensive. Sadly, the Catholic schools are being shut down left and right. Perhaps one might find a few outliers, but those would be neighborhood-based and not generally known. There are certainly none anywhere near me.</p>
<p>Higgins wrote "These very expensive schools cater to “1%” upper-income families, not the dual-income two school teacher household, nor the white-collar middle-management household. " and this is a well-known NY school. </p>
<p>One of my kids is at one of these schools, perhaps the same school sybbie wrote of regarding kindergarten. I personally know, exactly, dual-income two teacher household families and middle-management people there. I also know kids of single mothers scraping by, whose kids are there on scholarship. It IS a mix. Sorry, but it is not all extremely rich people. We have those, too, but they don’t define our school. There are probably schools as you describe, but not all private prep schools are filled with insanely rich people. Also, many parents are not just bankers and lawyers, many many are in media and the arts, so it’s a different crowd than you seem to be imagining.</p>