Experiential Education and the Cost

Last night I had the opportunity to attend my husband's 20th high school reunion at St. Andews Sewanee here in Tennessee.  As I met with some of his high school friends and watched many other reunion groups during the evening it fueled much thought and fed into my ever dissecting of the decision each year we make to send out children to private school.

Let me set the stage.  St. Andrews is a former military school turned college prep in 1981.  My husband's class was only 11 years into the college prep program and now they are moving into their 32nd year of co-ed education.  St. Andrews is set on a huge campus of beautifully forrested land on a mountaintop in Sewanee, TN and the children attend classes in a wonderful modern building amid Spanish influenced dorms and offices.  They fill their days with inspired classes and have access to an incredible university library a few miles down the road.  Extracurricular programs include typical high school things such as football and cross-country, drama and art but due to their mountain setting they have opportunities to hike and canoe and explore nature as well.

Most of the graduates (of course there are exceptions) are thriving adults who went on to institutes of higher learning and are leading successful lives all across the country.  For the most part, there is nothing too extraordinary about the folks I met and spoke with.  They are in design, finance, education, and engineering.  They are married with children and live for the most part a fairly typical life.  As someone who is constantly reevaluating our choice in education for our children, I listed intently on the conversations these folks had about their school experience as well as what their lives look like now.

Let me clarify something about the reevaluation.  I do not reevaluate because I doubt the educational choice for my children as in questioning the validity of the method.  I do question each year if it will make a difference in their lives later on to have made what will eventually be a 6 figure investment into each of the children's primary education.  I am writing about this today because I know that so many of us who are making this investment do question.  Beyond the financial  the real question is this - what difference does it make if my children attend the private school of our choice or our neighborhood public school.  In the long term what is the difference? 

I am going to leave you with that thought and tomorrow you can see what I have over and over again come up with as well as continuing to have my feelings validated by experiences such as this weekend's reunion.