The private schools smell blood in the water… and they are turning the screws.

In an interesting case of “let’s shore up our finances while the time is ripe to do so”, the Saddle River Day School has taken out ads extolling the virtues of their [private] school while implying that the public schools in the area inferior/slipping.

“Skimping on science isn’t smart” says the ad.

And really, who would disagree that skimping on anything, when it comes to education, is smart?

BTW, who can argue that in public education these days, it’s not just skimping. Sheesh, we only wish that “skimping” was the term folks were using to describe what we are doing in our/to our schools.

Words like “draconian cuts/unprecedented devastation” are more likely to be heard from those in the know… not tepid words like skimping.

In Detroit, they are closing/bulldozing schools.
In California, they have pink slipped more than 20,000 of the state’s teachers.
In Arizona, Texas, Illinois… so I need to go on?

All across the country, public schools are being foundationally eviscerated and private schools – places that cost up to $30,000 a year – are seeing a chance to tout their own institutions by basically saying, “Public school can’t match us, they can’t keep up and if you are a parent that loves your kid and cares about your child’s education, you really ought to consider ponying up the big bucks to send your little angels to us.”

Talk about piling on… WOW!

But the thing is, they have a case to make. The schools of even decade ago are not the schools of today. From NCLB and the insane focus on bubble testing to the economic crisis and the insane amount of “cuts, cuts, cuts,” these private schools are making a very shrewd play.

And a hard case to argue with.

They see the blood in the water and they are doing what they feel they need to do to survive/ prosper.

Smaller class sizes. A culture of achievement. Diversity of curriculum. Enviable graduation rates. No, it’s not apples to apples at all, but that’s not the case they are making. They are making the case that if you can send you kid to a private school, you really ought to consider it because “we do it better than they do it”.

And less and less public schools in this day and age are able to stand up and say, “No you don’t.”