Private schools don’t earn their price tags

When Obama came to DC in January 2009, one of the biggest questions for Washingtonians was where Malia and Natasha were going to attend school. The entire town was awash in rumours and gossip, everyone smugly sure that it would be their child’s school that would be chosen. I remember a dinner party when I was fifteen where a parent was convinced that the Obamas would choose Holton Arms because they could easily land a helicopter on the lawn. Some said they would choose the boarding school Madeira for security and because they had an equestrian program, while still others argued for Maret because the campus is built on the President Eisenhower’s estate.  In summary, it gave Washington parents the perfect excuse to extoll the virtues of the private schools they paid so dearly for their children to attend.

It was nauseating.

The Presidential couple finally decided on Sidwell Friends School, a Quaker school on Wisconsin Avenue that boasts Vice President Biden’s grand-spawn and several well manicured tennis courts and sports fields. Sidwell comes with a $35,288 price tag per year, which doesn’t include textbooks, transportation or the Parent Association fee.

The fact that the President invested in private school for his children is very understandable. But the fact that the entire town was so wrapped up in the choice of which school tells us a lot, and indicates a strange trend in middle class American culture. Instead of bragging about the fact you own a Mercedes or a BMW, the new signpost for wealth is where you send your child to private school.

So is this healthy? It is undeniable that private schools give kids a leg up in many areas: more attention, better chances at college (in some cases), more emphasis on what my private school described as “personal growth”. But what the hell is personal growth anyway, and is there any way to measure it? Why should parents have to pay 30,000 plus a year to get it (and who’s to say you can’t get it from public school?)

A lot of things need to change in America before the public v private issue can be resolved, beginning with the fact that where you live and how much you pay in property taxes defines how good your local public school is. But the snobbery about private schools can be suffocating. The haughtiness surrounding college is bad enough without it beginning in the secondary school years. One can get an excellent education at a variety of institutions, and using one’s high school as a bragging point is juvenile, for both parents and children.  Pride is one thing. Elitism is quite another.

I went to private school my entire life. My school had greek murals, marble staircases, and a breathtaking view of the Washington Monument. But the beautiful setting and more attention didn’t (and doesn’t) make me any more prepared for the world than my public school contemporaries.

Image courtesy of:  http://calumhenderson.com/education/public-vs-private-main-page/