We were lucky to have this option as well in Bastrop ISD...

Best High Schools in Austin, TX

If I didn't work rotationally we may have tried homeschool, but as it is we send our kids to a private Catholic school.

My kids were in a great elementary in clear Creek isd in the Houston area, highly rated, good neighborhood, not many free lunch types and not a single apartment complex zoned to the school. We thought the school was great.

When we moved and switched to private, my younger daughter entered kindergarten and it was immediately evident that the private school was head and shoulders above the public. My kindergarten kid was learning and doing stuff that my oldest was doing in the second half of first grade. The learning timelines were vastly different. It really opened my eyes to the fact that even a great public school is a "tallest midget" scenario.

Couple that with the awesome community that the Catholic school has, the much better electives, sports opportunities, annual events and just a calendar chock full of opportunities for friends and family to be involved in the education process and it just rises that much further above public school.

I think the sense of community you can get from a tight knit Catholic school is definitely worth foregoing homeschool, especially if you like the curriculum and pace of learning. There are a ton of opportunities we get through school that wouldn't arise if we homeschooled.

I also think I should emphasize that I am not religious whatsoever, but my kids are really starting to lean that way, and I think that allowing the kids to discover what they believe in and have a lot of exposure to god is a good thing. I think that having an authority above mom and dad helps them understand the world better.

Anyways, just one man's opinion, but unless I became destitute, my kids won't go to a public school again outside of some really specific circumstances.

We have done private, charter, and homeschool. We love homeschooling because we get to pick out our curriculum (usually one that will incorporate our faith), set our own pace (we have 5 kids with all different learning styles), and we can focus on subjects they enjoy (hopefully leading to their career path). We also like during their high school years, doing a lot of dual credit classes. They get credit for high school and college credits as well that can get a lot of their requisites done for a way cheaper price. My daughter went into A&M with 26 college credits. For some of my kids, they didn't want to go to college so they focused on a trade and got experience while they went to school. They went to a coop once a week for some of their classes. Overall it's a great experience and still going on.

JDUB08AG said:

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We moved to private school 2 years ago. The primary driver wasn't woke education or anything like that, it was the overt lack of discipline and growing accommodations for other kids. As an example, my daughter (first grade at the time) would have class in the hallway every couple weeks or so because some kid in her class was prone to tantrums and outbursts. Instead of removing the kid, the entire class went to the hallway so the school could accommodate their 504 requirements. Most ridiculous thing I have ever heard.

That's when my wife and I said we're done. We have generally enjoyed private school, but there is a lot of entitlement and discipline isn't what we were hoping. It is definitely better though and the environment is much more contained and managed. We have zero regrets.

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My wife is a 2nd grade teacher. Damn good one too. Your reason for pulling your kid is the exact same reason my wife is leaving teaching. Public schools even in Texas are absolutely hamstringing kids without "issues". Every day she has an example of at least one (usually multiple) kid that was being disruptive to the point of having counselors or sped called. I feel bad for the rest of the class because they are getting used to seeing that there are little to no consequences for poor or disruptive behavior. And my wife documents everything. To the point that some parents (the "not my child" type) tell their misbehaving kids that they hate my wife. And we live in one of the best school districts in the state.

Public school is lost with little hope for revival. All this argument over vouchers and school choice with no discussion about the parenting. Yes there are kids with challenging behavior issues or learning disabilities, and they should be worked with in a separate learning environment to potentially be moved back into a general classroom.

If my wife and I had young kids now, we would never send them to public school. I'll live in a van down by the river to afford private or home school.

panhandlefarmer said:

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The bad for them is that they had to meet a lot of new kids when they moved over to the public school. They were sheltered and we had to really work at parenting the first few years as they were exposed to more bad behavior than they had experience in private school.

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It's been a long time since I was in school, but back in the day, the Catholic school kids were WAY wilder than those of us in public school.

They had money and were used to a faster lifestyle, with all that entails. And parents that often traveled a lot for work or fun and left them at home.

I'm a former public school teacher. My daughter was in private school K4 through 3rd grade and has been homeschooled ever since (now in high school). What would you like to know?

Knowing everything I know now, I would never put my child in a public school. Parents deserve full transparency on what is going on with their children and that is not something you can count on in a public school.

We enjoyed out time in the private school. No real complaints. We pulled her out because my husband was traveling a lot and we decided it would be nice to go with him. It allowed her to see other parts of the country and gain new experiences that a traditional school setting just didn't offer. After covid, my husband's traveling slowed down but we were so happy with homeschooling that we just stuck with it. Our daughter is definitely happier and less stressed. Everything gets to be on her level. If she grasps a concept quickly, we can move on; if she is struggling with something, we can spend as much time as necessary on it. When she was in private school, she struggled with ELA (has since been diagnosed as dyslexic) but was gifted in math. Her teacher was great and sent up supplemental material in both subject on my daughter's level but that also meant hours of homework at night as she still had to do the work her classmates were doing. That's not a concern with homeschool. She is now a freshman in high school and is in college math (and completed other college courses) through dual enrollment between her co-op and a university. I'm not saying my daughter is highly gifted or advanced, just that homeschool has allowed us to work on her level for certain subjects in a way traditional school hasn't. I think most high school students are not performing at the level of which they are capable because of how it is structured.

EclipseAg said:

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panhandlefarmer said:

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The bad for them is that they had to meet a lot of new kids when they moved over to the public school. They were sheltered and we had to really work at parenting the first few years as they were exposed to more bad behavior than they had experience in private school.

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It's been a long time since I was in school, but back in the day, the Catholic school kids were WAY wilder than those of us in public school.

They had money and were used to a faster lifestyle, with all that entails. And parents that often traveled a lot for work or fun and left them at home.

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HA!

Reminds me. The most nasty, hostile environment my high school basketball team played in every year was at the Catholic high school in our district. Man, those parents probably spent the entire next morning at confessional.

Is there a baby Fiasco on the way?

I have two grandkids ages 4 and almost 6. My daughter is the expert on this and did extensive research. We are paying for my grand kids to go to a private Montessori school. We have visited and love it.

Very low student to teacher ratio and constant interaction.

My daughter's both went to private Christian schools.

Kool Junior did multiple different forms of school, but he started out doing a Catholic "hybrid" school for K through 3rd grades. He was in school with a class of maybe 25 kids 2-3 days a week (I don't recall which it was), and at home with Mom or in different homeschooling groups the rest of the time. I would do it over in a heartbeat. The key was having other activities to fill in and enrich on the home days, even though there was a bit of homework and lesson plans assigned during that time as well. He was liking it and doing great, but it was a long drive to get him there and back and I in particular felt he needed more structure, so we moved him to a small private Catholic school.

He spent a single semester at a private school for gifted kids, but it was an absolute disaster socially. It would be hard to describe, but it was obvious that he hated the school and didn't want to have anything to do with it, so we brought him back to his previous school. That particular school went through high school, but the graduating classes were 60 or so, so we transitioned to a Catholic prep school. I just didn't think that such a small school could adequately offer all of the different courses and curricula he might want in order to be prepared for college.

I will say this about that Catholic prep school - they went in on DEI hard after the Summer of Love 2020, and it was detestable. It culminated in a particular teacher going on a rant during morning prayer/announcements, criticizing the school in general and several kids in particular (albeit not by name), and getting fired. She made a huge stink out of her termination, and got an article on her personal Mein Kampf published in the local rag. Parents made a big stink out of the direction the school was going in and the Administration finally got rid of their DEI department and started rolling back some of the stupidity.

Just an anecdote from this weekend about home schooling: over the weekend we were on a boat tour of Sarasota and there was a large group of probably 20 kids along with several parents with us. The kids weren't loud or disorderly, all of the boys were wearing nice shorts or slacks, the girls were mostly wearing dresses, nobody looked skanky. I heard a lot of "Yes sir", "please", and "thank you" from the group. I found it remarkable how well behaved all of the kids were, enough so that I went up and asked one of the parents what their group was. Yup, it was a homeschooling group on a field trip.

Particularly when they are young, the smaller and more controlled the environment is, the better. I love the idea of a school being able to dictate a uniform, dictate acceptable versus unacceptable behavior and get rid of kids or parents who don't comply. Just one opinion. I don't think doing a hybrid school early on stunted Kool Junior in any way, socially or academically.

TheEternalOptimist said:

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Our son's math skills started to outstretch our ability to teach more to him - so we made the decision to pursue Christian education.

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From what I've been told and have seen with my cousin's kids, math is one of the weakest things about home schooling.

An old friend of mine from A&M has done some math tutoring for home school kids for that reason.

panhandlefarmer said:

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TLDR: The answer isn't private, public or homeschooling. The answer is parents prioritizing their children's education, being involved to know when their child isn't reaching their potential, and advocating for their needs.

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I wish I could blue star this so many times that it would be the all-time Texags leader in the clubhouse. It seems most parents are looking for the best solution to have someone educate their kids. The most proven way to do that is to be a present parent and work diligently with them regardless of their educational environment. There are good lessons learned in the public system that have nothing to do with books. There are great advancements that can be made in books that can't be made in public system. None of it gets learned without a present parent though.

dermdoc said:

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I have two grandkids ages 4 and almost 6. My daughter is the expert on this and did extensive research. We are paying for my grand kids to go to a private Montessori school. We have visited and love it.

Very low student to teacher ratio and constant interaction.

My daughter's both went to private Christian schools.

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Monsignor Kelly?

dermdoc said:

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I have two grandkids ages 4 and almost 6. My daughter is the expert on this and did extensive research. We are paying for my grand kids to go to a private Montessori school. We have visited and love it.

Very low student to teacher ratio and constant interaction.

My daughter's both went to private Christian schools.

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Getting our daughter through calif public school in the 80's and 90's was as easy as moving to where the good public schools are. It's not that way anymore. Our granddaughter is being home schooled here in Calif - it's the only option outside prohibitively expensive private schools.
She is testing above her grade level in all areas of study while avoiding the state's factory of failure and misery. All good

If you choose private school, note that there are plenty of fairly woke private christian schools, so do your research well.

Kids did public school, in retrospect we would have done private. Post 2016, public school in austin, tx went absolutely mental. We were fortunate that all our kids came out stronger because of it, but it's pretty sad.

Quote:

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If you choose private school, note that there are plenty of fairly woke private christian schools, so do your research well.

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This is very true.

We're already looking at high schools for our kiddo, and the closest catholic high school might as well have been just another Marxist indoctrination factory. We noped that one before we even started the car to leave.

Jesuit school?

MasonB said:

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Homeschool dad here.

What do you want to know?

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Understatement of all understatements. This guy is the pinnacle of homeschool parent. I subscribe to his kid's YouTube channel and the Donut Media car channel. That's it.

Keep up the good work.

Two sons sent to private Catholic school in Tulsa (6 - 12). The difference in their maturity, intelligence and faith when they are around their cousins, all who attend public schools in Texas, is frankly unbelievable. Expensive sacrifice for our family, yes, but worth every penny.

No idea.

I agree with several posters. As a professor, the home-schooled I later taught tended to be in the top as opposed to middle or lower of their class.

I taught at TAG HS (Dallas) many years ago and thought it was a very good experience. But not nearly as good as the best private high schools - for example St. Mark's (Dallas). St. Mark's is perennially one of the top 2 or 3 high schools in the nation with facilites that rival many universities.

But St. Mark's and its ilk are not a good fit for many students - the academic competition can be very challenging. If a university is blindly looking at class ranking, then moderately talented students may get better acceptances from less top-heavy schools. And getting into a school like St. Marks can be very difficult.

So think about where your kids are and what interests them, let them have some voice in the process, and don't be afraid to change if they are not succeeding (not everyone thrives at this time of thier lives). For most kids I would look at home schooling as the first option, particularly if you are in a large urban district. I taught for a couple of years at a "project" high school, terrible, and I believe it would be much worse now.

eric76 said:

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TheEternalOptimist said:

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Our son's math skills started to outstretch our ability to teach more to him - so we made the decision to pursue Christian education.

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From what I've been told and have seen with my cousin's kids, math is one of the weakest things about home schooling.

An old friend of mine from A&M has done some math tutoring for home school kids for that reason.

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I can definitely believe that kids who are exceptional in math could easily outpace their parents' ability. Finding a curriculum that not only supports the child but the parent is paramount. We use Math-U-See and just in the last few weeks I've hit that point where I've definitely had to sit down and study to refresh my memory on some things, but the curriculum is excellent and so is their customer support.

Our children go to a small Catholic school, and we really enjoy that it feels like we live in a small town (because of the school size) while living in a large town. The school is big enough to have all the extracurricular activities like band, football, basketball, baseball, etc., but small enough that these activities need any student who wants to participate. The education is fine, and, like any school, it is is what you put into it. Our oldest is a National Merit Scholar and probably would have been one wherever he went to school, BUT he would not have graduated 1st in his class and played all the sports if he'd been at a public school. Sending the children to private school is a sacrifice monetarily, but it is one we gladly make.

It's interesting how no one says their kids are behind in homeschool; none have issues, and all are excelling.

Don't mean to be a downer on homeschools. I have several grandkids that are doing homeschool, and of course my daughter did "all the research," and those kids are the "best." However, my other grandkids are in public schools, and all are excelling as well. I hope the homeschool systems find a way to provide extracurricular programs that develop our young kids.

Time will tell how homeschooling works out, but not all public schools are a problem. I encourage my adult kids to buy homes in areas with top public schools where parents are involved.

BenFiasco14 said:

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BadMoonRisin said:

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preorder nintendo switch 2

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Will do

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im glad you're good, dude. I thought you might have accidentally turned into the TWO WEEKS lady disguise from TOTAL RECALL.

We did a home school/Classical school. Partial home and partial in class through 6th grade. 7th through graduation, was a Classical education, but the school was a Biblically based education/foundation.

Our school was much more concerned with the ability for our kids to leave the school with the ability to discuss what they believe and to stand up for what they believe and defend it.

I have a Junior currently at A&M, doing very well; a second year student at the Naval Academy who is about to finish that second year with a 4.0….

My baby girl is graduating in 2 weeks and will be a freshman at A&M.

The big difference we have seen between the education our kids have received and the public system is parental involvement. It's work…. And hard at times, but it is so worth it.

My daughter has had an outstanding experience attending a K-5 charter school. She's going into 6th grade next year, so we just went through the private school admission process at 5 different schools. Her entrance exam scores, interviews and evaluations were all stellar, so we have no complaints about the academic or social education she's received at the charter school. I know they're not all created equally, but this one is truly special and she's absolutely flourished there over the last 6 years.

She was accepted to all 5 places we applied, and we've chosen one that follows a classical model because we believe that's the best fit for her. Our hope is to keep her there through high school, but of course we'll pivot if it seems like there is a better fit elsewhere. Homeschool is not an option for us. I am not a good teacher, and she is substantially more intelligent than I am, truly. It would be a disservice for her education to be in my hands.

aglaohfour said:

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Homeschool is not an option for us. I am not a good teacher, and she is substantially more intelligent than I am, truly. It would be a disservice for her education to be in my hands.

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You're making the assumption that the majority of public school teachers are all wizards in their own respective fields.

Over_ed said:

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I taught at TAG HS (Dallas) many years ago and thought it was a very good experience. But not nearly as good as the best private high schools - for example St. Mark's (Dallas). St. Mark's is perennially one of the top 2 or 3 high schools in the nation with facilites that rival many universities.

But St. Mark's and its ilk are not a good fit for many students - the academic competition can be very challenging. If a university is blindly looking at class ranking, then moderately talented students may get better acceptances from less top-heavy schools. And getting into a school like St. Marks can be very difficult.

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The DISD TAG program is very good. Granted they are not as rigorous as the private schools but they try to keep the smart kids loaded down with the work and out of trouble. My children survived and excelled in the inner-city public schools. The top 10% rule is achieved easily. Also, children in TAG and AP classes do not have to contend with as many troublemakers. My experience with the private schools is the 'rich' kids have $ and will use those resources to get into and stay in trouble. Many of those 'rich' kids underperform and do not gain acceptance into the top notch schools or excel later in life.

Private school here. Chapel every day, smaller class sizes. My wife was a public school teacher for the first 5 years of our marriage. I would only send my kid to a small town school, but never to a school where they don't have the personnel to pay attention to each student.

mslags97 said:

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We did a home school/Classical school. Partial home and partial in class through 6th grade. 7th through graduation, was a Classical education, but the school was a Biblically based education/foundation.

Our school was much more concerned with the ability for our kids to leave the school with the ability to discuss what they believe and to stand up for what they believe and defend it.

I have a Junior currently at A&M, doing very well; a second year student at the Naval Academy who is about to finish that second year with a 4.0….

My baby girl is graduating in 2 weeks and will be a freshman at A&M.

The big difference we have seen between the education our kids have received and the public system is parental involvement. It's work…. And hard at times, but it is so worth it.

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What is "classical" school?

I spent approximately 100K more on a house in a good school district than I could have paid less than 1 mile away for a similar house in a poor ISD

The 100K will appreciate over
time. So far I'm up 47%

I don't personally buy the difference in schools, home school, or private school as much as I believe schools with kids from bad parents do poorly. Any human can learn K - 12 given a little effort. I paid the 100K extra on a house so my daughter did it have to deal with poor parenting impacting the school in our previous home

So far so good. My daughter ranks 92 percentile in reading and 73 percentile in math. We do zero extra, no private tutoring or any of that. Learning is during school time and she's a kid otherwise

agAngeldad said:

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mslags97 said:

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We did a home school/Classical school. Partial home and partial in class through 6th grade. 7th through graduation, was a Classical education, but the school was a Biblically based education/foundation.

Our school was much more concerned with the ability for our kids to leave the school with the ability to discuss what they believe and to stand up for what they believe and defend it.

I have a Junior currently at A&M, doing very well; a second year student at the Naval Academy who is about to finish that second year with a 4.0….

My baby girl is graduating in 2 weeks and will be a freshman at A&M.

The big difference we have seen between the education our kids have received and the public system is parental involvement. It's work…. And hard at times, but it is so worth it.

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What is "classical" school?

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They teach through the "Classics". Literature. Great Books instead of normal English classes.

Includes rhetoric and logic.

And then they use the Socratic method of teaching. Basically 10-14 students with a tutor, and they have discussions. And ask questions to push that discussion along.

The education they have received makes me jealous of what I had in a public school. They were so crazy prepared for college.

I very much agree with this to a degree. Parental involvement and parents that care is the biggest factor in the education.

My reasoning for the private for us is:

1. We wanted a Christian-based education. That was the most important thing for us.

2. We live in west texas, where there aren't good public schools. Period.

agAngeldad said:

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It's interesting how no one says their kids are behind in homeschool; none have issues, and all are excelling.

Don't mean to be a downer on homeschools. I have several grandkids that are doing homeschool, and of course my daughter did "all the research," and those kids are the "best." However, my other grandkids are in public schools, and all are excelling as well. I hope the homeschool systems find a way to provide extracurricular programs that develop our young kids.

Time will tell how homeschooling works out, but not all public schools are a problem. I encourage my adult kids to buy homes in areas with top public schools where parents are involved.

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We do homeschool athletics and compete with public, private, and homeschool teams. My kids have done 4-H, youth rodeo activities, and even have homecoming and prom dances. There are tons of clubs like robotics, and debate etc for extracurricular activities. If you look you can find it most of time especially to fuel the kids passions.