Choices
February 15, 2011
We live in a small town. I mean, really small. When we moved in, we bumped the number from 84 to 91 people in town. It’s small enough to not have a school. Taxes pay tuition for local children to attend any school in the district. So that’s kind of cool – we can pick any of the 7 schools to send our children to. It was easy enough to narrow the choice down to two schools and now we’re stuck. School #1 is in the bigger, regional town. By high school all of the children in the surrounding town are fed into this regional high school. It is also the town that both Zach and I work in. It is the town where the boys’ doctors are located as well as their day care. School #2 is also an excellent school. It’s closer to home, they have a contract signed with our town so even if class sizes are big, they can’t turn our kids away, which is a small risk at the 1st school. We’ve talked to parents with children in both schools, and everyone has had positive experiences at both schools. My next step is to contact the schools and set up some observation time.
Ultimately though, it’s a choice between a smaller school that gets fed into a larger high school or starting out in the larger school system. I went to kindergarten with the kids that I graduated high school with. My high school years were pretty comfortable (aside from all that teenage angst and drama). When I got to college I realized that I could no longer make friends by playing tag or kicking a kid in the shins. I spent exactly 1 semester at UVM before going home, completely friendless.
Zach on the other hand started in a smaller school. He had wonderful experiences with his K-8 classes and then attended the same high school as me (a year behind me). For him it was awful. He never completely fit in, and although he was a pretty good athlete, since he wasn’t part of the “in crowd” he never really got much of a chance to play. High school was much more tumultuous for Zach. He graduated 3rd in his class and when he arrived at college, he had no trouble settling in and making friends.
Now Zach and I are trying to figure out which experience to give our kids. Where do we choose their struggle? High school? College? Which fits better with their personality and learning style? They have such different personalities, how do we choose one school that will work best for both of them? This feels like the biggest, most important decision that we will make for our children for years to come. We are both worried about the decision. I have calls in to both schools to visit the classrooms, meet some of the teachers and ask some questions. We’re going to visit school #1 this week. I still need to set up a time with school #2 (the assistant principal has been challenging to get on the phone…) Like it or not, we’re going to have to make the decision sooner or later – and hopefully either way we choose it’ll be a positive experience for our kids.
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