Is your teenager going to be a high school student in the fall? Are you worried that they may not be ready for the transition, or that the high school in your area may not meet all of your child’s needs? If so, you should really consider sending them to a private high school. Here are the reasons why:
Transition to Public vs. Private
Did you go to public school? Your teen will go through the same challenges; however, with the added difficulties technology and social media presents, these issues are magnified. Your child will be navigating a new environment, while trying to make new friends and learning from new teachers with a higher expectation for independence. Not to mention the peer pressure to drink, have sex and to do drugs. Some teens can find this overwhelming and stressful, leaving them distracted and anxious in class. If you feel your child can benefit from a smaller classroom, and a tight knit school community of less than 200, consider a private school when weighing in on your high school choices.
This transition is much easier in a private school, which is much less overwhelming. Private high schools have a smaller student base, which makes for a safe, clique-free community that is closely supervised. Your teen will benefit from close personal relationships with their teachers, and individual attention in their academics. This also means that the peer pressure to perform illegal activities is practically non-existent. Private high school is a supportive and nurturing environment where students, teachers, administrators, and parents share a common goal – to put students on the best path for success. Such an attentive support network is rarely available for public school students.
Student Performance and Future Success
In March 2015, Statistics Canada released the study “Academic Outcomes of Public and Private High School Students: What Lies Behind the Differences?” According to the research, private school students were shown to outperform their public school counterparts across the board. In reading, mathematics and science scores, private school students performed close to 9% better. The graduation rate for private high school students was shown to be 99%.
Private school students continued their advantage during their post-secondary education. 17.8% more private school students attended university, while 13.9% more graduated from university and 8.1% more went on to graduate or professional studies.
According to the study, “students who attended private high schools were more likely to have socio-economic characteristics positively associated with academic success and to have school peers with university-educated parents.”
Personalized Learning
The typical public school has a much larger student base than a private school. A sampling of nearby public high schools in Ottawa like Rideau, Gloucester, and Colonel By have enrollments between 500 and 1,200 students. With such large student bases, public high school teachers simply don’t have time to assess the individual needs of all of their students. Each student is unique and should be properly motivated and taught based on their personality type, individual learning style, and cognitive profile.
Private schools offer differentiated instruction and assessment, so that your child is seen as a person and not a number. At St-Laurent Academy High School, the Multiple Intelligences Theory (MI Theory) guides the instruction process, and lessons and projects are differentiated to allow each student’s learning style taken into account. At public schools, instruction is geared toward students who excel at linguistic and logical intelligence, but St-Lauren Academy teachers also value kinesthetic, spatial, musical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal learning.
If your child has special needs and have an individual education plan (IEP), they will be supported to the letter based on that plan. The same goes for students with attention deficit disorder and any other learning impairments.
Put your child on the best path to success by enrolling them in private high school for the 2016-2017 academic year. Contact the St-Laurent Academy Director of Admissions to start the process.