Middle schools

As I have said in this space before, I worry about middle school. In particular I am not hopeful that our neighborhood public middle school will serve our older child well. So we are looking around. There are two other public schools we have our eye on, one a science-and-nature themed K-8, and one a new middle school just north of us. Both of these places seem to have visionary principles and happy teachers, and they both a lot smaller than our neighborhood middle school. However, they will still have large class sizes, and still be part of a system that doesn't have much time to spare for a bright, socially adept, non-disruptive kid who has not fallen far below his grade level. We are seeing wonderful benefits of being at a school whose teacher:student ratio is 1:10 instead of 1:25, and where teachers provide Jordan with the kind of cuing and feedback that enables him to get things done. Thus, we plan to apply for private middle school. We have to decide where to apply now-ish; we are well into tour season already, and applications are due in January.

There are a lot of private middle schools in Seattle. Only two are grades 6-8 (one near us and one in West Seattle). Some are K-8, and some are 6-12 or even mysteriously 5-12. Geography is important to us so we made a list of all the reasonably nearby ones, plus one that is very close to my work. This gave us a list of six independent schools to visit. We have toured three so far. The first was way too Catholic for our family (I don't know how I missed that). The second we loved; it seems like a wonderful education, great student body, and a great location; but spots at this school are so coveted that the chances of our getting in are extremely small, and the grapevine says they push students very hard academically, which is not something we want. The third seemed like a good, solid, ordinary school, like what public school should be but isn't; we will apply there too, even though the sports emphasis is not our style, and we hear that they don't offer much tuition assistance. Three more to go.

Even after we decide where to apply, there is the question of getting in. A K-8 or 5-12 school doesn't admit very many sixth graders, and even the places with major 6th grade entry points are small, admitting a total of 35-75 kids. The application itself is extensive, requiring essays by parents and students, multiple teacher recommendations, and scores on a standardized test called the Independent School Entrance Examination. And then on top of that, we would certainly be needing significant tuition assistance to go to any of these places. So who knows. But for now, we are plugging through this part of the process and trying to make the best decision we can with the information we have.