patrick.net

@corntrollio You clearly haven't read my other comments so before you have please don't make asumptions about me, because when it comes to me I respectfully say to you that you are wrong.

@leoj707 Amen!

corntrollio,
We are technically a "brown" family, and the private school that I transferred my sons to has plnty of "brown" families. I never even mentioned a color in any of my posts. Jumping to conclusions?

We pulled our sons when they were in 3rd, 5th and 7th from the schools and yes, my oldest son actually saw (as did many other students) other boys smoking pot AT Hillview. During school hours. The kids were caught, and served a small detention.

Spoke with my friend whose son stayed at Hillview and the same bunch of kids were caught twice again this year. They all graduated in June.

thomas.wong1986 says

SJSU churned out tons of professionals before Silicon Valley was spotlighted on the national conscience. Not even Ivey League schools have cranked out so many in recent years.

This is true of many local schools. If you're in LA, Pepperdine and Loyola grads do better there than they would in NY or DC. Santa Clara grads do quite well locally, but would likely do less well as a general group outside of the Bay Area (except perhaps the ones who are soccer players).

At the end of the day, it's about job skills primarily, but the favored university can help get your foot in the door, whether local or elite.

commonsense says

You clearly haven't read my other comments

You clearly didn't read my comments. I actually *agreed* with you that parenting makes a huge difference. I also took a quick look at your other almost 50 comments that aren't in this thread, and none of the were particularly instructive on this issue.

Saying "I know as a fact" when empirically it's not true, however, is silly.

I see that you modified your comment above with parentheticals:

(with all these overpaid board members and millions in endowments they have to get that money where they can after all) again…. not what they were 30 years ago. Options are out there, and my point is that today private does not mean success or necessarily quality (there are plenty of liberal wacked out theories flying around the Ivy League these days in my view.)

Those board members were always paid well. The endowments were always high (and are in the billions in some cases). You seem much more concerned about ideology than making a substantive comment here about whether the Ivy League has undesirables. The comment just seems uninformed and has nothing to do with whether the Ivy League schools produce good scholars and good workers.

avpmenlo says

We pulled our sons when they were in 3rd, 5th and 7th from the schools and yes, my oldest son actually saw (as did many other students) other boys smoking pot AT Hillview. During school hours. The kids were caught, and served a small detention.

So you didn't see actual drug dealers, like I thought. As I mentioned, private schools are not devoid of pot, and people often have the ability to buy more expensive things. They just do it in their expensive homes instead.

As I mentioned, at 7th grade, you're sort of past some of the stronger influences parenting can have. It doesn't appear that your kid was the one smoking, and it's likely that will transfer to the new school. It's the Bay Area after all, it's probably likely that some of your new school's parents' smoke pot -- they certainly have the time and can afford it.

corntrollio says

Careful -- Freakonomics has NOTHING to do with experiments. Freakonomics is simply a backwards look at data and has more to do with chance and random discovery, than having good smarts and doing good thinking. I'd much rather have a clever thinker than someone who can pore through mounds of data just to find a random correlation.

I think you need to re-read Freakonomics. It has nothing to do with random correlations or chance. It is the scientific method. Testing a theory based on the data. It is the opposite of random correlation.

The authors are clearly clever thinkers. Why do you think otherwise?

corntrollio says

You seem much more concerned about ideology than making a substantive comment here about whether the Ivy League has undesirables.

Precisely, that is what I am focusing on ...ideology. This is all ideology, and frankly lunacy to a great degree.

I really should not be on this thread. I don't give a damn what school does what or which produces a failure or a success to be honest. I don't have children in school, nor am I here to discuss parenting or educational issues so before the future of society issues start up that's the end of my comments on this topic.

Corntrollio: Many people KNOW when their children are quite young that the children are headed for a state university, NOT THE IVY LEAGUE. There is no need to build a resume of extracurricular excellence, they just need the appropriate SAT score, or to be in the top 10% of their class. Under this set of circumstances, the child is free to choose whatever activities he likes, and most boys would like to be on a football team or basketball team at a small school rather than to be one of the kids on the chess team or in the Madrigal Society at Gargantuan High School. Similarly, a lot of girls would like to be cheerleaders at a small school than to be on some kind of third-string pep squad at a bigger school. It shouldn't matter so much, but 14-year-olds can be so immature! heh

Corntrollio said:
You're jumping to the other end of the spectrum without sufficient justification. If your kid was a slacker in elementary and middle school, chances are that your kid will be a slacker in high school. At some point, kids get beyond your parenting, and high school is generally beyond parenting. If you haven't put a good head on your kids' shoulders by then, sending them to an exclusive private school probably where they can't hack it won't do it.

If you read what I posted carefully, you will find that my chief recommendation was shelling out for private/parochial school from 5th to 8th, and using the public system for K-4 and 9-12. IMO, kids who "go sour" usually do so by becoming bored/alienated during the middle school years. People with dysfunctional kids often will try to tell themselves and others that everything was OK up until the child turned 15 and fell in with the wrong crowd, but in the situations that I have seen up close there were clear warning signs by 7th grade. Also, middle schools and junior highs that do not separate the kids by ability tend to run "everybody can be successful" classes that have little academic content. You, Corntrollio, should be adamantly opposed to this sort of mollycoddling. After several years of cut-and-paste activities, many bright children will REFUSE to take difficult classes at the high school level, because they know that they can coast through on a lower track cutting and pasting. In addition, when they get to the high school, they may be put into higher-performing classes based on IQ, and find that they are out-gunned by the kids who went to private or parochial schools through the 8th grade, and who actually know the different parts of speech, know how to write a five-paragraph essay, etc. They feel that they are behind and can never catch up, so they just give up.

I don't know whether you have children or not, but many people deeply regret having sent their child to the "wrong" school, regardless of why the school turned out to be "wrong." I have NOT suggested some rigid one-size-fits-all strategy for choosing a school. My suggestion is to choose carefully and get the best education you can with the resources you have.

thomas.wong1986 says

SJSU churned out tons of professionals before Silicon Valley was spotlighted on the national conscience. Not even Ivy League schools have cranked out so many in recent years.

OK, so most of the worker bees in SV come SJSU. Where did all the money people, and founders of SV tech go to school?

corntrollio says

So you didn't see actual drug dealers, like I thought. As I mentioned, private schools are not devoid of pot, and people often have the ability to buy more expensive things. They just do it in their expensive homes instead.

If there are drugs in a school there are drug dealers in the school.

In general people are kidding themselves if they think private or "rich" area schools will insulate their kids from drugs and violence. Those things can happen anywhere.

And, yes... richer kids means more disposable income for more expensive drugs.

tatupu70 says

I think you need to re-read Freakonomics. It has nothing to do with random correlations or chance. It is the scientific method. Testing a theory based on the data. It is the opposite of random correlation.

The authors are clearly clever thinkers. Why do you think otherwise?

Just to be clear, the prototypical examples of Freakonomics -- e.g. a drop in crime is correlated to an increase in abortions -- are not experiments and do not involve the scientific method. They are just as well known for their statistical errors in academic circles (e.g. the police/crime/election thing).

Are you saying there are examples in the book that strictly involve scientific method -- e.g. making a hypothesis, setting control groups, randomly assigning subjects (preferably double-blind if possible) and using statistical analysis to determine whether you can statistically reject the null hypothesis? I don't think that's the case, but you should be able to tell me quite quickly.

My impression of Freakonomics and Freakonomics-type research is that it basically does post-hoc analyses of vast mounds of data to find a correlative discovery. That is pretty rote.

AnotherLaura says

Many people KNOW when their children are quite young that the children are headed for a state university, NOT THE IVY LEAGUE.

But if you read carefully above, I said it's not about the Ivy League. It's about having the kid that is motivated and curious such that he/she may apply to the Ivy League. "State university" is quite broad -- do you mean the Berkeleys, Michigans, North Carolinas, UCLAs, and Virginias of the world? Those state schools accept fewer than 50% of the applicants. Or do you mean Sacramento State (no offense intended), which accepts the vast majority of applicants?

AnotherLaura says

Under this set of circumstances, the child is free to choose whatever activities he likes, and most boys would like to be on a football team or basketball team at a small school rather than to be one of the kids on the chess team or in the Madrigal Society at Gargantuan High School.

That seems to be conventional stereotyping. I'm not sure why that is necessarily the case. They could just as easily be confused as to why their tiny high school has no chess team or why their tiny high school doesn't take chess seriously. By no means are sports the only thing that can make someone well-rounded, even if we are to go with that theory. Similarly, I don't know why coaching people to be mediocre helps either.

AnotherLaura says

After several years of cut-and-paste activities, many bright children will REFUSE to take difficult classes at the high school level, because they know that they can coast through on a lower track cutting and pasting.\
...
In addition, when they get to the high school, they may be put into higher-performing classes based on IQ, and find that they are out-gunned by the kids who went to private or parochial schools through the 8th grade, and who actually know the different parts of speech, know how to write a five-paragraph essay, etc. They feel that they are behind and can never catch up, so they just give up.

That's actually the opposite of what I've found typical, which is that the bright and motivated children will seek out more intellectual stimulation. They'll read more and try to learn more and do more academic things. I think this says more about motivation to start out with than anything else.

I'm not sure you gave great examples there -- grammar and writing "five-paragraph essays" are very rote and not always indicative of critical thinking or intelligence.

AnotherLaura says

Also, middle schools and junior highs that do not separate the kids by ability tend to run "everybody can be successful" classes that have little academic content. You, Corntrollio, should be adamantly opposed to this sort of mollycoddling.

Which middle schools are these? Any old middle school in the area I grew up in (okay city school district, neither great nor horrible) realized, for example, that some kids would be more advanced or less advanced in math, and bumped the advanced ones up to pre-algebra, algebra, etc. before the less advanced ones who wouldn't tackle those until high school. Many states have an "academically gifted"-type program that they use for this.

AnotherLaura says

I have NOT suggested some rigid one-size-fits-all strategy for choosing a school.

It seems like most of the regret you're talking about is mostly about hyper-optimization in one way or another. I don't think I'm suggesting a one-size-fits-all solution either -- I think you have to be able to respond to your kid. You might raise a slacker too and need to respond adequately to that.

Maybe our sole disagreement is the time period during which things go bad. I think it's earlier than you, but we can agree to disagree. A lot of studies I've read suggest that the foundations start early. The high school level is typically far too late, and it seems like we agree on that.

This topic seems to have jumped the track. Its simply about a subject that in my opinion has become perhaps a bit too obsessive: Parents putting too much emphasis on schools and sometimes paying way too much for a house in specific neighborhoods strictly because of a belief in faith that living in such and such place near such and such school will guarantee their kids will turn out to be geniuses and succeed in life.

Its luck of the draw no matter what and spending tons of money in an attempt to buy success won't necessarily have the desired outcome. As is life.

corntrollio says

My impression of Freakonomics and Freakonomics-type research is that it basically does post-hoc analyses of vast mounds of data to find a correlative discovery. That is pretty rote.

This is a good criticism of Freakonomics and Freakonomics-type "research" that I ran across before:

http://www.tnr.com/print/article/freaks-and-geeks-how-freakonomics-ruining-the-dismal-science

Spend $200, once, for all children, on the Robinson Curriculum. It's self-teaching: little intervention by parents above grade 3. www.RobinsonCurriculum.com.

Use Salman Khan's free videos (1+1 = 2 through calculus): www.KhanAcademy.org. Bill Gates uses it for his kids.

That's all you need. Robinson's six kids all used AP exams to quiz out of the first two years of college.

chip_designer says

Any public school in USA is still 100 times better than the public school system in 3rd world countries.

It depends on what you call a 3rd world country. I don't know much about African schools but, I can assure you that any public school in India, Russia or Argentina is 10 times better than any public school in the US. At least all these countries have a world map in their classrooms, unlike the US schools which only have a map of the state and teach students about local Indian tribes, before teaching them about WWII or the Persian Empire.

dunnross says

I can assure you that any public school in India, Russia or Argentina is 10 times better than any public school in the US. At least all these countries have a world map in their classrooms, unlike the US schools which only have a map of the state and teach students about local Indian tribes, before teaching them about WWII or the Persian Empire.

Nice strawmen all around. I'm not sure what backwater school you're talking about, but I don't think I've ever been in a US classroom of the appropriate type (e.g. history/geography or elementary school) that didn't have a world map, and that's in multiple states. Many curricula I've seen tend to include local history/geography/culture in some year of elementary school, sure, but that's not to the exclusion of more advanced topics as time goes on. I don't see anything wrong with learning local, national, and international history.

This is what I was talking about when I described getting into ideological critiques rather than substantive ones.

That's not to say that certain things could be more advanced here. I believe many foreign schools get deeper into things like multiplication and division at a younger age than is typical here.

Gary North says

Robinson Curriculum

Robinson seems kind of like a crackpot.

Gary North says

Robinson's six kids all used AP exams to quiz out of the first two years of college.

...and... 3 got expelled from college... why? Robinson says because he is being "persecuted", but the college does not comment. My guess is that they were trying to push some of their fathers ridiculous beliefs, but who knows.

Gary North says

Use Salman Khan's free videos (1+1 = 2 through calculus): www.KhanAcademy.org. Bill Gates uses it for his kids.

This actually looks like a pretty good resource. I would use it for my kids. Not a replacement for "traditional" schooling though.

Gary North says

Robinson's six kids all used AP exams to quiz out of the first two years of college.

That's nothing impressive in itself. You can do this at most any school with AP classes.

Gary North says

Use Salman Khan's free videos (1+1 = 2 through calculus): www.KhanAcademy.org. Bill Gates uses it for his kids.

This guy has become somewhat of a sensation, and he provides a good resource. This can be used to supplement teaching for sure.

Harker was amazing for our kids. They DO have scholarships available.

Loved Harker, so challenging.

Would not want most, if any, govt schools!

We had the same debate/discussion when we lived in Sunnyvale.
Fortunately our children went to a public 'alternative' school for elementary school. For high school, Fremont HS was just not a consideration. We debated whether to move to Palo Alto - for the 'schools' but learned that there were 35-40 students in those classes. Fortunately they were accepted to Menlo School which is a very rigorous college prep school. And initial tuition was $11K - back in the day. I don't know how we could rationalize the expense today but they got an incredible education in extremely small classes. Do a calculation taking into every conceivable item - there are huge costs to moving not to mention the disruption. And check out the schools you'd be moving for in order to determine whether you'd be getting the bang for the buck that you were hoping for. I'm a supporter of public schools but forty students in a class is not a win to me.

do the math, 15K per year, so, 13 years of school at 15K per year.

that's 195K....

if you have 2 kids, it's almost 400K.

now, you have to do a NPV of that

-150K minus the interest on 150K
plus 15K per year, plus 150K out when you sell the house to pay
for the kids tuition.

it's basically 9K per year on interest on the better house or 15K per year
on tuition, but you can sell the hosue.

Home school is an inexpensive option.

There is a homeschool co-op called Pioneer Family Academy. Kids go two days a week, full day, tues and thurs all day. Given enough homework to do at home M, W, F.

Most of them at 16 go to West Valley or other Jr College.
Have AA at 18 years, BA at 20 years from SJSU

All very inexpensive.

Great kids to be around!

http://gothardsisters.weebly.com/

homeschoolers!

See also garynorth.com

He has a ton of info on home school and on many other aspects of education on a budget.

The house will maintain its value through most real estate cycles. People psychologically find it easier to pay for a house rather than having to write a check to private schools.

Check out these schools for example:
http://www.movoto.com/schools.aspx

patb says

do the math, 15K per year, so, 13 years of school at 15K per year.
that's 195K....

St Francis / Bell are only 4 years (HS) so your out 60K. You can transfer from public as many did in the past. You may well have over 15 years to save so start planning now. Save and contribute around 3K a year for 15 years earning 5% return and you get to 60-65K by the time kids get in.

Two kids ? .. should have tied the tubes after the first one!

Well, we've got 3 kids and another on the way and the house we bought when our oldest was 2 is in a pretty mediocre school district. (We live in a part of Richmond that has El Cerrito schools - the one near us has average test scores but will be under construction for the next 2-3 years and the students will be in portable classrooms.) Our oldest is starting kindergarten this fall, and we've decided to go with a private co-op K-5 school for $10k per year + substantial parent participation. The school has great teachers and offers music, Spanish, and other extracurricular activities. The parents do all of the administration, driving on field trips, supervision of lunch and before/after care, maintain and clean the buildings (leased from a church).
We're happy with this option for the upcoming year, but it isn't going to be such a great option in a few more years when our twins start elementary school. I'm not sure what we're going to do at that point, but even with parent participation and sibling discounts, private school costs will get out of hand with 3+ kids. We're considering moving into a better school district or homeschooling supplemented with extracurricular activities or lessons.

dunnross says

I can assure you that any public school in India, Russia or Argentina

you are an indian, who did graduate school in russia (kind odd, I thought all hindu comes to usa), and became a missionary in argentina. :D

if you ever lived in those countries, you would know for sure what kind of public school system they have.

I'm wondering about the parochial schools - what's the churches' interest in subsiding them?

This is of course a rhetorical question.

corntrollio says

corntrollio says

My impression of Freakonomics and Freakonomics-type research is that it basically does post-hoc analyses of vast mounds of data to find a correlative discovery. That is pretty rote.

This is a good criticism of Freakonomics and Freakonomics-type "research" that I ran across before:

http://www.tnr.com/print/article/freaks-and-geeks-how-freakonomics-ruining-the-dismal-science

That criticism is much different than yours. That article seems to be saying that Levitt is giving economics a bad name because he doesn't study the "traditional" economic topics. Sumo Wrestling and Weakest Link are not worthy of study in the old guards' mind.

I didn't see much criticism of his methods, however. Your definition of the scientific method is a little too specific. Here's from wiki.

1.Define a question
2.Gather information and resources (observe)
3.Form an explanatory hypothesis
4.Perform an experiment and collect data, testing the hypothesis
5.Analyze the data
6.Interpret the data and draw conclusions that serve as a starting point for new hypothesis
7.Publish results
8.Retest (frequently done by other scientists)

Now, you're right that the data is historical rather than newly collected. So they have to be careful in their analyses, but they usually are. Their statistical techniques are usually spot on.

The best of Freakonomics work is questioning the status quo and letting data answer the question rather than conventional wisdom. Like women getting mammograms, for instance.

If "Bay Area" breaks off into the sea, then will Oakland become the new fortress?

The arguments about getting the money back from buying a house in an expensive school district vs. not getting it back when paying private school fees wouldn't work if people are economically rational. If they are rational then the extra price of housing in the good school districts should take that into account so that the net present value of the two paths is equal. Remember, that you pay a bunch of interest to buy that more expensive house that you don't get back. The total capital costs would add up to the costs of private school fees. Of course, the market might not be in this rational equilibrium, but the story is a bit more complicated than people are making out.

tatupu70 says

That criticism is much different than yours.

Yeah, that was my take away from the article. Not quite sure why corn cited that article as a support for his/her criticism.

tatupu70 says

Your definition of the scientific method is a little too specific....

...Now, you're right that the data is historical rather than newly collected.

Yes! Archival data can be analyzed in much the same way that data collected just for the study.

I actually find archival studies to be some of the more interesting ones. That is because they often are:
tatupu70 says

questioning the status quo and letting data answer the question rather than conventional wisdom. Like women getting mammograms, for instance.

The advantage of the "good" school district is it buys the peer group. For the extra money you spend to live there, you get a majority of families who value education, read to their children, and provide plenty of enrichment. Your kids are surrounded by others who know their parents will react immediately if they don't do their homework. College is assumed, and the goal is to qualify for a very selective one.

Consider the not-so-joking term "Asian fail": a B. And yes, most parents would prefer their kids be stressed about homework rather than getting jumped in the restroom.

"The best of Freakonomics work is questioning the status quo and letting data answer the question rather than conventional wisdom. Like women getting mammograms, for instance."

I found some data that might be classified under freakonomics.

Recently some government information came out that said that suv's were half as likely as sedans (passenger cars) to have an accident. But what the media did not report on this is according to NTSB the death rate is actually twice as high. So combining the two if suv's get into half as many accidents as passenger cars and the death rate is twice then actually accident per accident there are four times as many deaths. Interestingly enough vans have the best safety record but the media failed to report on that as well. But that also brings up is it the car or the driver being more at fault? SUV's are more likely to be used in commercial application while vans are more likely to be used as buses. So hauling stone for masonry job where time is money vs. kids to soccer practice will certainly have people drive safer.

Although schooling is a financial decision for a family, I think the most important consideration is whether the school reflects your family's values and ideas of education, at least as much as possible. This includes the students, teachers, school district, church, whatever. Kids spend a huge amount of time at school and are greatly influenced by their peers and teachers, and the general attitude of the school. If you are willing to get involved in improving a struggling school, it can be a great experience for parents and children. Most private schools do have some sort of financial aid programs and if that is a good fit, there are ways to make that work, even on a lower income. Charter schools come with their own sets of problems, but are a great fit for some families. Magnets and homeschooling are other options. It is about the priorities for the individual family, and for parents it is really important to feel that your kids are safe and in an environment that is conducive to learning and growing. Balancing all of these priorities including housing is the challenge of the modern family. It really needs to be about what is good for the family in a holistic sense, including financial considerations.

For the investor, established "good public schools" do mean a premium on housing in the district and probably will continue to do so.

moom says

The arguments about getting the money back from buying a house in an expensive school district vs. not getting it back when paying private school fees wouldn't work if people are economically rational. If they are rational then the extra price of housing in the good school districts should take that into account so that the net present value of the two paths is equal. Remember, that you pay a bunch of interest to buy that more expensive house that you don't get back. The total capital costs would add up to the costs of private school fees. Of course, the market might not be in this rational equilibrium, but the story is a bit more complicated than people are making out.

Interesting theory, but impractical. What should you assume for # of kids in a family? How do you adjust this for families with no kids. Also, neighborhoods with good schools often have other attractive features besides the school district. How do you adjust for that?

Another consideration is that you can drop out of the private school or apply for financial aid in the form or reduced tuition if things get tight. An expensive home in a good school district doesn't give you that option.

Another option which I've used is District of Choice. Some top rated districts give you a permanet spot and the sending district cannot contest it unless too many students have left.

And there's the old standby of using someone else's address to get into a better district. Just sayin'....

At least the Private Schools do provide actual dollar costs you can factor the premium you are paying and alternatives to buying into a high scored area. Good Luck