Powerboss
09-10-2002, 03:43 AM
My Public Spirit Stops at My Daughter
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48640-2002Sep6.html
Sunday, September 8, 2002; Page B08
My daughter began private elementary school this year. Our decision to pay for something not everyone can afford immediately raised painful questions of social and economic class.
"Are you ashamed of us?" my mother-in-law asked my husband. Perhaps her son had become too big for his family's blue-collar britches, she suggested.
But that wasn't it. Our local public elementary school ranks near the bottom of the Anne Arundel County system. Its test scores confirm the stories I have heard from discouraged neighbors: Their children, who had adored nursery school, soon came to dread kindergarten. They were bored by repeating material they had already learned. They wanted to stay home.
The test scores combined with these stories persuaded my husband and me to start looking into private schools for our daughter.
My mother-in-law didn't approve. She said it wasn't right for us to send our daughter to private school. If we kept her in public schools and worked to make the system better, everyone would benefit -- including people who don't have the option of sending their kids somewhere else.
For a card-carrying liberal, I was surprisingly unapologetic about our decision. Why should I sacrifice our daughter's future to an abstract principle? I wasn't up to battling the school system about class size, curriculum and extracurricular activities. And by the time any changes could be made, our daughter would have already missed out on a vibrant education.
But Granny's arguments did ring uncomfortably true. Education isn't just another commodity, with parents doing comparison shopping to find the best brand at the lowest price. Education is the foundation of our future as a community and as a nation.
Our public school system suffers from scarce resources: not enough teachers, too-large classes, not enough fine arts instruction or computers, and a finite number of slots for children in the schools that will challenge them. Sadly, most educational opportunities seem tied to money in one way or another: the higher mortgage payments for homes near the best public schools, or the tuition payments and waiting lists for private schools.
For family reasons, my husband and I will not move from the neighborhood where he grew up. But I am jealous of friends who live in coveted school districts. At the same time, I feel awkward around our neighbors: How can I talk about my daughter's new school when they don't all have the same chance?
Education is threatening to become just one more element of the social divide. I was struck by the starkness of this divide when I learned that students from my daughter's new school perform community service, like Lady Bountiful, teaching children to read at the impoverished public school that lies a slim boundary line away from our own. No wonder Granny questioned whether, in rejecting our local school, we also were rejecting the community.
It's this economic factor, I think, that gives pause to both Granny and me.
Education has become a zero-sum game, a reluctant competition to see who can capture the few best opportunities for their children. And, so, I'm acting like a consumer, giving up on the public system in favor of the exclusive school that I hope will offer my daughter a richer experience today and a brighter future.
Private education doesn't square so well with my liberal, communitarian ideals. But with the state of our public school, I wouldn't dream of educating our daughter any other way.
-- April Falcon Doss
© 2002 The Washington Post Company
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48640-2002Sep6.html
Sunday, September 8, 2002; Page B08
My daughter began private elementary school this year. Our decision to pay for something not everyone can afford immediately raised painful questions of social and economic class.
"Are you ashamed of us?" my mother-in-law asked my husband. Perhaps her son had become too big for his family's blue-collar britches, she suggested.
But that wasn't it. Our local public elementary school ranks near the bottom of the Anne Arundel County system. Its test scores confirm the stories I have heard from discouraged neighbors: Their children, who had adored nursery school, soon came to dread kindergarten. They were bored by repeating material they had already learned. They wanted to stay home.
The test scores combined with these stories persuaded my husband and me to start looking into private schools for our daughter.
My mother-in-law didn't approve. She said it wasn't right for us to send our daughter to private school. If we kept her in public schools and worked to make the system better, everyone would benefit -- including people who don't have the option of sending their kids somewhere else.
For a card-carrying liberal, I was surprisingly unapologetic about our decision. Why should I sacrifice our daughter's future to an abstract principle? I wasn't up to battling the school system about class size, curriculum and extracurricular activities. And by the time any changes could be made, our daughter would have already missed out on a vibrant education.
But Granny's arguments did ring uncomfortably true. Education isn't just another commodity, with parents doing comparison shopping to find the best brand at the lowest price. Education is the foundation of our future as a community and as a nation.
Our public school system suffers from scarce resources: not enough teachers, too-large classes, not enough fine arts instruction or computers, and a finite number of slots for children in the schools that will challenge them. Sadly, most educational opportunities seem tied to money in one way or another: the higher mortgage payments for homes near the best public schools, or the tuition payments and waiting lists for private schools.
For family reasons, my husband and I will not move from the neighborhood where he grew up. But I am jealous of friends who live in coveted school districts. At the same time, I feel awkward around our neighbors: How can I talk about my daughter's new school when they don't all have the same chance?
Education is threatening to become just one more element of the social divide. I was struck by the starkness of this divide when I learned that students from my daughter's new school perform community service, like Lady Bountiful, teaching children to read at the impoverished public school that lies a slim boundary line away from our own. No wonder Granny questioned whether, in rejecting our local school, we also were rejecting the community.
It's this economic factor, I think, that gives pause to both Granny and me.
Education has become a zero-sum game, a reluctant competition to see who can capture the few best opportunities for their children. And, so, I'm acting like a consumer, giving up on the public system in favor of the exclusive school that I hope will offer my daughter a richer experience today and a brighter future.
Private education doesn't square so well with my liberal, communitarian ideals. But with the state of our public school, I wouldn't dream of educating our daughter any other way.
-- April Falcon Doss
© 2002 The Washington Post Company