And So It Begins

If you’re looking for a good time in the trainwreck vein, go to UrbanBaby between fall and March, having selected the “NY Schools” setting. There you will see the hysteria that is private school admissions play out, and in addition to providing quality entertainment, it serves to prove true most of the plot of “The Nanny Diaries.” (The yearly kindergarten application process has already climaxed and the Manhattan moms are now either gloating about acceptances or telling everyone how, in the end, they “decided” their local public really is the best of all the publics, but there are still some bitter tales about the outrage at being waitlisted everywhere to be savored.) Good stuff. Be sure to tune in next fall.

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Before I moved to South Carolina, I was heavily influenced by the standard Northeast attitude that everything in the South was subpar, particularly its food and schools. You could hold a room spellbound by describing the watery tomato sauce you had at an Italian restaurant while on vacation in Myrtle Beach or the revelation that your son at Camp Lejeune got ranch instead of blue cheese when he ordered wings. Plus, they used to have slaves there. Slaves.

There persists an urban legend that a New York teaching certificate is universally accepted in any Southern state, that to be from the North is so prized that they will hand you a teaching job, no questions asked. And when someone moved back after a brief stint in the South, they invariably cite the bad schools as the reason. (Buffalo is full of people who believe that, despite their blue-collar existence in the 716 area code, they can move to Charlotte or Orlando, cities of milk and honey, and strike it rich. Live the good life in a mansion. Vegas, too. Lots of disappointed Western New Yorkers find their way back from Vegas far less smug than they were at their going-away party. In a mood more “suck up to former boss and co-workers” and less “Anyone who stays here’s an idiot.”)

Despite knowing better, I still absorbed some of these attitudes by osmosis. I was prepared to find the schools here lacking but have been a little chastened. Instead of an educational backwater, there are far more options in terms of teaching methods and missions, and the overall quality is as good and in many cases better. (I’m not talking about that latest survey that puts SC 50th in the nation in high school graduation rates. That’s a sad truth but not at all the case here in the non-rural upstate area.)

It’s hard to get the lay of the educational landscape when you aren’t a product of local schools, but I set to work. Shortly after we got Tink home, I found out that an elementary school with a partial-immersion language magnet program would be adding Mandarin to its offerings of Spanish and French. The Mandarin program ended up permanently tabled, sadly, but getting involved with the push to make it happen taught me more about the schools.

There are public, private and charter schools aplenty here. The magnet programs are impressive; there are single-sex charter schools capitalizing on the studies that show kids learn better in gender-exclusive environments at certain ages (amen); there are Baptist schools that boast test scores better than the best public schools (uh, thanks anyway). In addition to the language magnet program (which extends through middle and high school, by the way) where English is only spoken half of the school day, there’s a private French-speaking school. There’s a Montessori school that has expanded into the middle school years and will add a high school eventually. There are progressive homeschooling coops that make good use of independent art and music schools as well as the classes offered by the local children’s theater. It’s not at all what I’m used to.

There’s even a statewide online charter high school developed by some educators from the University of Pennsylvania. I would love this to be an option for Tink. It would work out well if she shows proficiency in some sport, or dance, and needs a more flexible school schedule. I mean, what if she becomes a semi-professional ballerina or competitive figure skater? It could happen. I would be more than happy to have her take a pass at school shootings and trading bulimia tips in homeroom. I do acknowledge skipping traditional high school means she’ll end up with a prom-shaped hole in her soul that will never heal and she’ll blame me for, but I’ll take on that burden if it spares her being a sex trophy because you know you get more points for banging an Asian.

In New York, there’s public and parochial (Catholic). And there isn’t a whole lot of difference between the public and parochial since Buffalo’s a pretty homogeneous town, made up of people who grew up there, so the culture, the values, the vibe is the same. My Latin teacher had my mom in class years before, a totally common occurence. Once New York allowed charter schools, they cropped up like mushrooms, but they grew too fast, devoted themselves to narrow, wackadoodle areas of study (the Western New York Maritime Charter School?) and many found themselves de-chartered. There’s not a single Montessori preschool. There is one Waldorf school, but people think those families are freaks, as are the very few families who homeschool. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lowest homeschooling numbers in the nation were found in New York State. Innovation just isn’t done there.

I should be smacked for sniggering at the Manhattan moms dithering over the optimal educational and developmental options for their extra-speshul snowflakes because that’s exactly what I did, too. I went to the open houses, asked too many questions and called the parents who offered to give me the inside dope. I was evaluating for the best fit for Tink but also for us. I believe school has to be right for the parents, too, or else parental involvement becomes parental intrusion.

For anything other than the nearest public elementary, there’s a process – applications, lotteries and/or admissions tests. I kept things lighthearted, telling Tink that we were going to see a school she might like and while we’re there the teacher might ask her if she can write her name, etc. NO PRESSURE.

This week I eagerly checked the mail until Thursday, when a fat envelope came. Inside was the acceptance sheet to be signed by me, some other informational stuff and the official letter, “We are pleased to offer your daughter a space in our full-day five-day kindergarten for the 2010-2011 school year.” Blah, blah, blah, asset to our school, blah, blah, orientation day to be held, blah blah, and there it was at the bottom:

Test scores: 91 percent.

I did not expect my reaction, but I’m sure it won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s read this far: My daughter was robbed.

What did she get wrong? What didn’t she know? What could you possibly have deducted points for on a test designed for kids who have had no preschool? She can identify and make the sound of all the letters, can count to 100 as long as you remind her that it’s in fact “30″ and not “20-10,” mastered shapes back before she was potty trained and is a champion colorer-inside-the-lines. For land’s sake, the kid uses the word “appropriate.” And she uses it appropriately! (”SpongeBob is not appropriate for me, right, Mommy?”)

I instantly wanted to call and reassure them that Tink did know the 9 percent of the test she got “wrong,” that there probably was some performance anxiety at work or she was unsure of her setting and was being given instruction by a teacher she met only minutes earlier. I wanted to point out she has a late birthday for rising kindergartners and that there was a mom there at the test day who told me her daughter will be turning 6 next month. Six! I wanted to tell them all the amazing things she says every day, how she’s got the vocabulary of a third-grader. Well, no, I don’t know that for a fact, but listen to her!

I wanted them to find her as extraordinary as I do.

She doesn’t know anything about grades yet but she will soon. Will they crush her like they do me? Will she find herself shamed and paralyzed by bad grades? Will they inhibit her natural curiosity, will she become so focused on the grade that she misses the point of great literature, of the satisfaction of learning for learning’s sake?

Or will she become a dirty little grade grubber like her mother?

I can see this is going to be hard. But not for her. She’s going to be just fine.

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Tagged as: education, schooling, schools