Maggie's Farm

I spent lots of money over the years sending my children to four private Christian schools, which are usually semi-prep schools in this area. I have mixed feelings about them now. One was a terrible choice; one was a terrible choice for that particular child but would probably have been okay for his brothers; the elementary school was magnificent for the one who went there; the last was mixed, but was very emotionally supportive for my Romanian adoptees when they arrived. I would certainly do less private schooling if I had to do over, though not none, because of individual circumstances.

When you pay for something, you have a strong inclination to believe it was worth it and become less objective.

The apples-to-apples numbers do not give evidence independent schools provide a better education. They select, which makes their testing and college placement look better, but the children who were of similar ability do just as well in public school. I wouldn't send a child to a school where they were in danger, but otherwise, the rigorous studies point to schools being equal. It is an area where our impressions color what we believe more than the data. Outcomes are much more dependent on inheritance, after all.

Charles Murray talks about entering Harvard from small-town Iowa when it had an even higher percentage of students from top prep schools. Comparing notes, the consensus was that the public students started an average of six months behind because of lack of AP courses, but everyone finished in the same place four years later. He knows the data than I and does not recommend preparatory schools, even for gifted children.

I love Thomas Sowell, but he is simply wrong here. He does not factor in the differences in selection. Of course a school will do better on testing scores, graduation rates, sending kids to prestigious colleges, etc, if it does not admit the most difficult students (or can get rid of them). When admission is decided by lottery you can just follow the kids who were otherwise equal at the time of selection but went to different schools and compare how they did 2 years, or five years, or ten years later. The results are identical, except when the public school is truly horrible and dangerous. Even then, it's only a few points difference.

That is even true of prestigious colleges, where the kids who almost made it versus those who barely made it in turn out about the same.

Mostly, schools don't matter.