Why is it that Private schools are all Religious?

[Born_a_Democrat]

Where does it say that a Private school can't be SECULAR? and why aren't there more of these if "private" schools are all the rage now?

Any thoughts?

[JVS]

1. they are not

but the cheapest ones are religious

[jiacinto]

2. There are secular schools

Just look at the multitude of boarding schools that exist.

[vi5]

3. That's the rub....there are secular ones but they are $$$$$$

I went to a secular private school. At the time it was the early-mid 80's and it cost $8K a year. So I can only imagine what it costs now. But my parents paid it and never once moaned or complained about their tax dollars going to a school that their kid didn't attend. Because they recognized that it was our choice for me to go there.

Now the problem is that the religious schools are much, much cheaper. So what will happen is that the wealthy will get their vouchers and be able to use it as a supplement to a much nicer, secular school while the poor will at best be able to use the voucher only for religious education.

[oneighty]

4. Secular private school

I can speak directly about one secular school. It is located in a small village in South Carolina. Its reason for existing is to keep the precious white children away from those good for nothing blacks. The secular school is white and will remain so. And as soon as school vouchers become reality those monies will be taken from the public (Black) school and sent to the private (White )school. Just as God intended.

180

[AP]

13. These kinds of schools can only exists if there is some kind of subsidy

and the irrational subsidy of racism is the one that keeps this school going.

Otherwise, without some subsidy (whether it's taxes, tithes, or private school loyalty) these schools wouldn't exist.

Like I say in more detail below, it's impossible to deliver education for any kind of short term profit which would satisfy any rational commercial entity. Education delivers its benefits broadly over a long period of time. All of society benefits always fom having smart, educated citizens taking society to the next level, wethers it scietnifically, artistically, or whatever.

[skeptic9]

25. AP: Great posts--Here are some data that bear out what you're saying

Every other year, the US Education Dept surveys non-public schools. The most recent data have not been processed yet, but the 1999-2000 survey showed little change from the prior survey. A total of about 27,000 private schools account for about 10 percent of schoolchildren, some 5 million youngsters.

Only about 22 percent of private schools were nonsectarian. Thirty percent were Catholic, and 18 percent were "Conservative Christian". Reflecting the use of "religious" schools to dodge public-school integration, thirty percent of "private" schools were located in the South.

There's a lot more worth noting, along with references and tables, at http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2002/quarterly/fall/q3-4.asp

[OldSoldier]

5. If you have $15,000 you can send your kid to a secular school

Welcome to part of Jim's Aperiodic Rant Against Vouchers.

When Republicans start talking about private schooling, they always trot out how "affordable" it is. How a private school (and here they never admit that secular schools can exist) can educate far more cheaply than a public school.

Well...yes and no. In Fayetteville we have many private schools, and all but one are owned by churches. They use church property--no facilities costs. The water, sewer, electric, Internet, etc., bills come to the church, not the school. Parents purchase their children's books. You start weeding through all the things that are picked up by the church, the parents or the parishioners, and you discover that all tuition is paying for is teachers' salaries. (You can't even track the janitor to the school because he cleans the sanctuary too.) They can afford to keep salaries low because being a parochial school teacher is often called a ministry. And compared to doing the Lord's Work, what's money?

If a public school could do the same thing, public education would be the deal of the century.

As I said, there are secular private schools. The SAS Institute in Cary, NC, built one. It's called the Cary Academy and is very tech-heavy--as you would expect when a computer-software company opens a school. SAS is not running it as a ministry. They're running it as a profit center, and doing well. It costs $18,000 a year to send your kid there, and it's a day school. It costs about that much to send him to UNC--and that includes room and board! The Fayetteville Academy, which boasts a 100-percent college acceptance rate (and we're not talking shit schools either; at least three kids in every FA graduating class wind up in a service academy and Harvard has a few FA kids) costs $8500 and it offers a "classical" (read: no electron microscope, which the Cary Academy has) education.

Why aren't there more of these secular private schools? Would you pay ten grand or more to send your kid to a school with no track record?

[ElsewheresDaughter]

6. lots of secular private schools

[jburton]

7. not all are

especially Montessori schools

[swinney]

8. Great question

why?

[radwriter0555]

9. Not the one we go to. VERY private, VERY non-religious. Not a

yamulka or rosary in sight. No gods, no teaching, no prayer, no nuthin. REAL liberal, though.

[swinney]

10. RACISM RACISM RACISM

I can speak only for local North Carolina schools.

We do not want our kids going to a school with inferior blacks
I have heard it and observed it.

[AP]

11. Education is so expensive and it reaps its benefits so broadly and over...

...such a long time that there are only a few economic models which allow it to be done profitably.

One way is the prep school model...you charge a tuition that is more expensive than most colleges, you promise social connections that will reap financial rewards, and you play on emotions and school loyalty to a degree that people continue to donate money long after they leave school (oh, and it helps that your customers are already rich, and, thanks to social class, probably run little risk of becoming poor).

The second model is the public school. Since it's all society that reaps the rewards of educated Americans, and since those benefits are experienced over such a long time, you (logically) ask all Americans to pay a litle through (ideally) progressively collected taxes, and everything is beautiful. The fact is, we don't collect the taxes progressively. We collect them regressively out of property taxes which many large corporations don't pay. And that's where the public school model starts to fall apart, as it is now.

The third model is the religous school. These schools don't make a profit on teaching end of things. They are subsidized by the church end of the financial equation. What they're hoping to produce is church goers who will continue to give on sunday, so that they can indoctrinate the kids monday through friday to grow up to be life-long sunday givers. It's similar to the private school model and public school model in that, to make sense, they have to create life-long giving, and it's similar to the public school model in that it's (1) designed to fruitfully recreate the whole system (the church in one case, democratic society in the other) generation on generation and (2) it tries to socialize the costs as much as possible among its "citizens". Notice, however, that old and childless church goers never complain that their donations are going to schools. While they might not understand why, as citizens, they need to have their neighbor's kids educated, they seem to undersand why they have to pay to help the little kid kicking the backs of their pews get an education. They don't care if American falls apart, but let's keep this church going!!

The fourth model is the non-sectarian private school which tries to create a "liberal" learning environment. They just want bright kids, small classes, and academic success. They reject the classism of the private school model and the indoctrination of the religious school model. Because it is impossible to educate a student for a short term economic gain (because, as I said, the benefits of education are so broad and manifest themselves over time) these schools usually go out of business after about 15 years, and after producing a couple kids who go off to form an alt rock band after graduating from Harvard or Reid College, and maybe a poet and filmmaker.

[AP]

15. hey, this might be one of the best things I've written at DU, and this

all came off the top of my head.

I'd love to hear a few comments.

Is this bunk?

Am I right?

[AP]

16. no comments?

Oh well. I guess my amateur interest in and enthusiasm about political economics isn't shared.

[AP]

20. one last chance for comments...

[ComerPerro]

37. A little self-indulgant

But you are right, this was well written. And you made some very good points.
Is it all bunk? I don't think so

[Fescue4u]

33. Actually most of that post makes alot of sense

Except I don't understand why it supposedly so bad for a Church for subsidize the education of its members.

We do this on a national level now, and I fail to see what is wrong for a group of people who choose to do on a smaller scale.

Its not like anyone is twisting their arms for Church donations.

[AP]

39. It's great for Churches to subsidize education (somebody has to do it).But

my point, sort of, is the fact that Churches subsidize education sort of proves that privitization of education is bunk. You just cannot take the annula cost of educating a child and charge the parent of that child the full cost. The cost will either be so low that the education will be terrible, or so high that only the already wealthy could afford it.

It's got to be subsidized somehow, whether by taxpayers, by the church, or whatever.

[Cassandra]

36. I can only speak from my own experience

I went to a private/prep school, K-12. The school was founded in 1915 and is still going strong. It was liberal, even in the 60's and 70's, although rather sexist and insensitive to Jews and Catholics, but it was the best school in the area at the time. By the time I graduated in the early 70's, tuition was $5,000, nearly as much as college. Now the tuition is around $22,000.

Edit: spelling (what was I saying about an expensive education?)

[supernova]

12. Not true

There is a very good private, secular school here in Durham that has existed since, I believe the 40s. But it is mucho expensive. That's the problem.

Most private schools that are affordable (maybe more so for some parents with vouchers), are religious. That's the problem.

But I bet you could pull out the yellow pages where you live and find a secular private school.

[Tinoire]

14. Ton of secular private shools

Trouble is only the religious institutions are willing to take the financial loss on this one.

My secular prep school, rated number 2 in the country, is priced so heavily that only the children of the gatekeepers can afford that kind of an education

Grades: K-12
Enrollment: 790
Waiting list: No
Tuition: $16,530-$17,490

Get a load of the difference in price between secular and religious Private schools here: http://www.mddailyrecord.com/pdfs/PSbaltcity03.pdf

And by the way, my school, The Bryn Mawr School for Girls, is a bastion of liberalism- like our other brother and sister schools on the East Coast.

I give big time kudos to the Church for making this type of rigorous and rewarding education more affordable to normal people.

[DrGonzoLives]

17. ?

There are plenty of non-religious private schools. It's just that most of them are up in wealthy areas of the northeast, and a few on the west coast.

[nemo137]

18. two of my good friends go to a secular private school.

very, very cool program. the integrate all areas of study, so if you're doing the renaissance in history, you're reading the prince in government class and the inferno in english, and studying renaissance music in music history and theory.

that said, i love my public school, and wish my government and schoolboard would give as much of a damn as i do.

[MISSDem]

19. racism, racism racism - did I say racism

My niece had their two daughters in an "academy" in Mississippi which, of course, was private. She had to take them out and put them in public school because she said that going to the "academy" was like going to a Ku Klux Klan meeting must be like.

[Yupster]

21. If you're a racist, you

wouldn't go near my son's private school.

A quarter of the kids in the class are from Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi backgrounds. The school attracts the kids of doctors.

Ironically, it is a Christian school, but 1/4 of the students in the class are Muslim or Hindi. They all have to go to chapel every morning.

I had a long talk with the dad of one of the Muslim kids, a heart surgeon, at a minor league baseball game where my kid held his birthday party. He said he sends his kid there because it's the best education available. What choice do you have? he asked. He was still critical of the school's science department though.

[SahaleArm]

22. Relics of the British rule.

Not surprising. Their parents probably went to private schools in India, many of which are Catholic/Religious; but not in the US-fundie sort of way.

[dreissig]

38. British Public Schools

British public schools are actually private schools.

[Cheswick2.0]

23. they aren't, where did you get that idea?

?

[arwalden]

24. You'r Right Cheswick... 99.9% Isn't *TECHNICALLY* All Of Them...

... so the thread-starter post might have been more technically accurate if it has said "most" instead of "all".

What if we pretend that he said "most" (instead of "all") because that's clearly the basis for his follow-up question.

-- Allen

[Dob Bole]

26. Churches used to run all the schools

before public education. So some still do. There's just never been much of an incentive for private public schools.

[ieoeja]

27. Rightwing Talking Point

Not you. I just saw the subject and figured your message would be. But I see it wasn't.

Rightwingers like to quote, "all schools used to be run by churches," then toss in something about "how much better everything used to be". Given that public education began before the United States was even founded, I wonder on what they base this opinion.

[bicentennial_baby]

28. Falsehood

I went to 2 secular private schools, including an international prep school which had students from 80+ nations.

[trof]

29. Our daughter went to a private secular high school.

Oddly enough, it was started by a group of Jewish parents many years ago. They weren't satisfied with the quality of education available in the local public school system.
Although there were several Jewish kids there by the time she attended, they were not in the majority and the school was totally secular.
BTW, she got an excellent education. Such that she says now that she learned more there than she did in college.

[Taxi Driver]

30. Private schools are mostly for racists and snobs down here

I went to a public high school with a high rate of minorities. I never hung out with the guys from private schools because they were all jerks who were extremely socially unaware and cared for nothing in the world other than their pretty clothes and their own little world. I've always said that kids who go to private schools are not part of our reality. It is their own little world.

The parents usually send their kids to private schools because it is the chic thing to do.

However, the public school I attended had more class options and better-qualified teachers than the private schools around here.

My kids will be going to the public.

[Brian Sweat]

31. They are not al Religious.

It just depends on what part of the country you are in. There are many prep schools that are not Religious.

[noonwitch]

32. 3 in Michigan, off hand-Interlochen Arts Academy, Cranbrook and Detroit

Country Day. Cranbrook originally was run by the Quakers, but is secular now. IAA is affiliated with U of M these days, and I don't know all the details about DCC, except that their most prominent recent alumnus is Chris Webber, which is not exactly an endorsement.

[Character Assassin]

34. They're not. I went to a secular one in Pebble Beach, CA.

Robert Louis Stevenson (RLS), now known simply as The Stevenson School.

Best education of my entire life, including grad (barf) school.

[Silverhair]

35. Why most private schools are religious

The conservative Christians have seen prayer taken out of the schools, ten commandements taken down, etc. They feel that the textbooks are trying to make atheists out of the students, and that the textbooks teach immoral lifestyles. They are passionate about this, and from that passion they are highly motivated. They want their children to be educated well and "properly". So they start their own schools.

Racism? Some yes, but most of the private schools I know of are intergrated, and have students of several racial/ethnic groups.

Please note that I am not agreeing or disagreeing with the stance they take.. I am explaining what is happening.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

40. Why Catholic schools got started

Back in the nineteenth century, the Americans who were descended from immigrants from the British Isles felt threatened by the Catholic and Jewish immigrants in the same way that many people nowadays feel threatened by Muslim immigrants.

The laws on school prayer and required Bible reading in school, the laws that the Supreme Court struck down in 1962, date from this era. School officials saw prayer and Bible reading as a way of reinforcing Protestant values and hopefully converting a few Jews and Catholics.

The Catholics felt that the atmosphere in the public schools was hostile to them, and they feared that their children would be seduced away from Catholicism by the majority Protestant culture, so they started their own school system.