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      04-17-2025, 05:23 PM   #6
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I had three sons. The oldest went to public schools and Jesuit HS, until they told him he had to attend 4 years to graduate. He transferred back to the public school and graduated in 3 years.
The youngest was told no kids can skip 1st grade although the school told us he had mastered the first grade subjects by the end of kindergarten. So we pulled him and the middle son (4 years older) out and home schooled them until high school. We found good curricula and an experimental math course at Stanford on line, and many ways for them to get social interaction.

Observations on home school: it takes a lot less time to cover the material at home than it does in school - they waste a huge amount of time between classes, between classrooms, etc. Homeschooling was typically around 2 hours a day (including Latin), never more than 3 hours. And really easy to enrich lessons with activities around the house (like using their math skills to help lay out a deck and make sure it was built square). But it does require at least one engaged parent, and while there isn’t a ton of lesson prep, there is some. More important is finding the curricula that fit the kid.

Every time we looked at private schools we found that they were essentially high-priced versions of the public schools. Basically the same curriculum and fluff, but with a uniform and attitude (I attended parochial schools myself).

For a bright or special needs kid I would strongly consider home schooling. I’d go to a private school if there was some really compelling reason that it was safer or better than the public school where we live. Otherwise public schools are great at preparing kids for a life of corporate peonage.
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