Thank You Thank You - Westwood Elementary School: Fill & Download for Free

My husband and I both attended private school. When it was time for our children to start pre-school I researched a wonderful Montessori school where my son excelled and my daughter struggled. She had had some problems since birth and had been in PT, OT and one other therapy on the third day. By two she was able to go to Montessori two days a week and progressed to three days when she turned three. She was not my son, but Montessori worked with her in every way possible. Since there weren’t any private schools where we lived, we moved into the best school district to enroll our children there for elementary school.I was on the PTA. worked every fund raiser and volunteered for every field trip or carnival that they had. This helped tremendously when requesting the next grade’s teacher. Everyone knew who this was for each class and we always received our request.By Mid-school it went down hill and I knew I had to transfer my son to w great Jesuit Boys school with practically all AP courses. This meant moving to Santa Monica (nice place to live) and enrolling my son at Loyola. He did was, was the Valedictorian and matriculated to Dartmouth (2 undergrad degrees) then to Carnegie Mellon for his Masters and finally to the U of Chicago for his law degree and a PhD. He is now employable….YEAHMy daughter transferred to an all girls private school in Westwood (near UCLA). She just never was able to focus and become serious about school The nuns helped her one-on-one, I helped her at home…………….all to no avail. When she graduated from middle-school, NO private school in LA would accept her. Thankfully were in the Santa Monica school district………………thankfully only because there was LESS crime. My daughter was not a partier, drinker and never used drugs……usually home by 10:00 on the weekends.We were in Italy for the summer of 2002 and when we returned I found out that she did not have enough credits to graduate!!!!! She could repeat another year at SAMO (Santa Monica High) or get her GED, which meant attending at a school in an are town that I would never approve. So, after checking around we packed up and moved to Scottsdale. My son was already at Dartmouth, thank God, so my daughter and I moved. She had to attend a private school in Tempe, held in an office building. Funny how she was able to “graduate” with a diploma in 6 months or over $6,000! I enabled her by leaving Santa Monica. I should have just allowed her to figure it out for herself.Today my son is a very successful Manhattan and my daughter is a stay-at-home for 3 girls. I would be very proud of her if they could afford it, but SNAP, food stamps, is not a great way to raise three daughter. She is the only one so far from our family fold and it truly breaks my heart.Back to your question, I think private schools benefited both of my children. My son completely took advantage of everything, where my daughter tried to slid by and she did.But in both schools I never had to worry about bullies, gang members or any set of bad influence. Those kids were weened out immediately. The benefits of not being run by the State.