So What College is Your Infant Going to Go to?
Nov 1st, 2007 by Nola
I got into a conversation yesterday about having christened Sun over the weekend with another attorney in my office. The parish (church parish as opposed to what the rest of the country refers to as “counties”) where we baptized Sun is the one where my grandfather and uncle live. The church is the one I’d walk to with my sister and cousin when we were children visiting my grandparents. It is close to where we live now, but it isn’t our parish. It IS the parish of the attorney I was talking to.
One thing led to another and we progressed to grammar school. That parish has a grammar school and also a day-care equivalent. I hate to admit that I’ve even begun this issue of where to put Sun for grammar school. But this is how it goes:
- Since most schools these days have day-care and the cost is the same as “regular” day care, why not get the most out of your money and send the kid to a school day-care?
- If you are going to select said day care, why not have it be at the school where the child will go to grammar school? She can maybe make friends earlier and otherwise transition easier to “big girl school.”
- Where you put your kid for grammar school certainly impacts where she’ll go to high school. Most graduates of any particular grammar school tend to go to one or two high schools. That’s just the way it is.
- Similarly, most graduates of any particular high school tend to go to one or two colleges (or, alas! no college).
So it you want your kid, say, to want to think college is something you do without having it be an option and you want that college to be, say, LSU, then by a bit of reverse engineering, you can see where it certainly matters where you put the kid for day-care.
Okaaaay. But Sun ISN’T in day-care. My husband and I made a conscious decision that, for us, it wasn’t what we wanted. The hubs and I are both working less (and thus currently earning less) to keep her out of day-care. But yesterday I was told that I’d better re-think that decision when she gets to be the ripe old age of two. Because, I am told, if I don’t put her in a school day-care, she will be behind in kindergarten when she is five. How can I live in a world where NOT putting a child in day-care is BAD?
Slippery slope being what it is, this issue rages on. I live in the New Orleans area. The mere thought of public school gives me the shivers. Ain’t. Gonna. Happen. So, it’s private schooling. Private schools here take two paths: parochial (primarily catholic) and non-religious. The better non-religious grammar schools start at about $6,000 a year and go upwards to $15,000. A year. Yeah. Parochial are cheaper–$2,500 to $4,000 a year.
Take the dollars out of it, and I want Sun to go where she’ll get the best education and not be around kids who don’t want to go to college nor snobs ala Veruca Salt. Fact is, neither my husband nor my parents graduated from college. My grandparents did not go to college, nor did two of my siblings. I KNOW you can be successful and happy without college. But I also know that less doors are open to you without college and your success can require a lot more work.
In the end, I want her to go where she’ll be challenged academically but where she’ll make friends that will span the course of her life. What I really want is what I had–a solid foundation amongst kids that came from families that had similar values as my family had. Many of the friends I made in grammar school are still close friends to me today.
But what educational system will be the best for Sun? What kind of student will she be? Will she have a learning disability that may warrant putting her in a less competitive environment? And most importantly, how am I supposed to know the answers to all these questions by the time Sun is two?
Stumble it!
One thing to consider, that I didn’t mention before, is that when looking at Catholic and private you need to total everything when comparing prices. It would cost us the same to send Amber to the Catholic school as it does to send her to her school, now. All the money we spend is up front. The Catholic school had a lot of extras, like, uniforms (not required at her school), contributions to the church and then some other goobly gook that I can’t remember. We sat there over breakfast and totalled it all up. IT WAS THE SAME, so we went with the school we like.
If you ever find a school that meets all of your expectations, let me know. I will sign my kids up without even a walk through.
[...] Original post by NOLA Notes [...]
Why the shivers at the thought of public schools? There are very good public schools in the city. To name two off the top of my head: Ben Franklin. Lusher.
maggsfriend–you are right. There are a very few good public schools in the NOLA area, but I don’t live in the districts that would permit Sun to attend the good ones. And the ones that are available to me are not places I would want Sun to be educated. It is a sad but true fact that NOLA’s public school system is deplorable and the public schools overall in our state are lacking.
[...] nolanotes added an interesting post on So What College is Your Infant Going to Go To?.Here’s a small excerpt:But yesterday I was told that I’d better re-think that decision when she gets to be the ripe old age of two. Because, I am told, if I don’t put her in a school day-care, she will be behind in kindergarten when she is five. … [...]
I don’t know if it is the same, but when I was in high school you had to test into Ben Franklin. And it was a high pressure school for academics. So if your child can get in, great, and if not then you go put them in the same academic situation at one of the many private and Catholic schools.
The reality is that NOLA has a deep resentment toward public education that started when we became part of America. We have and always will believe that the best education comes from private or Catholic teachings and that is where the effort goes. You can’t change the fact that our public schools rank at the bottom in the nation and Katrina has not helped that fact. Many things would have to change before our public school system could compete with the rest of the nation.
I hear ya. I wanted Owl to go to public school, which was a big reason for leaving New Orleans. I love the school he’s in now, but have realized that if he turns out to be slow, or exceptionally bright, I may need to look for an alternative. All the experts I talk to, and the research (oh, yes, the research) I’ve done indicate that kids who do not get the “leg up” of learning in preschool will “catch up” with their peers relatively quickly. So, she might not have reading down when she’s in kindergarten, but she’ll learn it then, and by the time they are “reading to learn” (as opposed to “learning to read”), she’ll be on equal footing. I have found kindergarten to be a little repetitive of what Owl learned in daycare, but he’s not bored. His cousin, in the same school system, only had preschool part time last year, and he’s not doing any worse with the same curriculum. It’s all about social expectations of OUR peers. There is no chance Sun is going to get anything less than the best, whether that is at home with mom and dad, or in a classroom.
But yes, in NYC, if you don’t get you kid into the right daycare/preschool, she’ll never get into Yale/Harvard/insert college of your choice. At least that’s what I hear. How can I possibly know what college will be best for him at 18 by looking at him today?
[...] So What College is Your Infant Going to Go To? [...]