School Applications

We, my husband and I, are in the process of applying for Kindergarten for our 4, almost five year old. Since he has a late fall birthday, we are of the belief that a boy needs a wee bit, try years, more time to mature compared to their female counterparts. It is still amazing to me most of our world is run by men when I see my son and his cohorts in action. We are, in essence, holding him back a year by having him repeat kindergarten at a new school. Yes, we're part of the annoying trend of parents, who do all they can to insure our child will succeed in a life, something increasingly difficult given the early age at which competition starts. The stigma of being held back is no longer such a big deal as parents, even with kids whose birthdays aren't in fall months, are holding their little ones back--to insure they will succeed, of course.

This application process has been illuminating in the monumental differences of quality and quantity of educational opportunities between New York and Los Angeles. The two cities mirrors one another in certain neuroses of the upwardly mobile class. Everyone is out to insure their progeny can get as many advantages in education and enrichment--to churn out the future titans of business. In our present culture, there is a serious disengagement of upwardly parents from the much thwarted public school system. Los Angeles was, by far, the worst I'd seen of parents having completely abandoned a school system so entirely. Most middle class parents, those not wealthy enough to afford the escalating costs of private schools, found themselves truly in the lurch as the idea of a neighborhood school became another casualty of urban life.

True, Los Angeles suffers from the devastating affects of Prop 13, and the unforeseen surge of the immigration population, whether legal or not. This has created whole swaths of public schools in dire need of so much that the middle class citizenry has decided is not worth putting the effort into changing. With the grim situation of public schools, you would think the private institutions would be competitive with their counterparts throughout the country.

Let's just say that when we were going through the application process for Pre-K programs, there were so few schools that were options. In fact, the one truly noted school--noted as in it is ranked nationally, although not in the top ten or anything--was a school started by psychologists. How this institution became the most prestigious place to send a child still baffles me. This school, overrun with celebrities and the Hollywood elite, is the place that everyone in the city tries to get their little one into. The rest of the schools are supposedly second tier compared to this one school. Whether a child is better off because he or she attends this uber-privileged school is still to be determined. What's ironic is this 'prestigious' school in Los Angeles is not recognized one iota here in New York. If you were to tell people your child had attended this school X, most people look at you with not the faintest glimmer of recognition. It's not as if you had told them your kid had gone to Exeter, Andover, or even Hotchkiss. Even Harvard Westlake, the most difficult school in Los Angeles, is not recognized here. This may have something to do with the East Coast snobbishness about all educational institutions not within their borders, or it may truly be indicative of the gulf in quality between LA and the East Coast.

So, here we go again in New York, a city so vastly different in tone and anxiety in this arena of determining our child's future--as if such a thing was possible. We have applied to ten schools, most with stellar reputations. This large number is what amazes us, that we would have so many options, whittled down from an even larger list. What's also vastly different is the number of good, decent public schools available in the city, if we decided that was the way we should go with our son.

But for an island so small, it is astounding to see so many schools, elementary to colleges and universities here, period. It feels like every other block has another school or university, its banner blowing in the wind. All of the emphasis on schools makes me think there is something real and tangible in how and why Los Angeles differs so greatly from its East Coast counterpart. What is in that Los Angeles water, actually derived from Colorado, that makes education such an afterthought? It makes sense that Villaraigosa is the mayor of Los Angeles, a man who barely finished high school, attended a community college before finally making it to UCLA. His law degree came from an uncredited law school, perhaps explaining why he never passed the bar exam, and is therefore not licensed to practice law. His counterpart in New York, Mayor Bloomberg, has an educational resume far different: Johns Hopkins, Harvard Business School. This isn't to dissect their backgrounds, but really to dissect the citizenry that voted these two people into office. The question, one that begs to be answered, is would either candidate stand a chance if they were to switch cities?

Would the staid, geeky demeanor of Bloomberg be enticing enough for the people of LA to vote him into office? And would the flashy, quick grinning Villaraigosa be enough to get New Yorkers to vote for him as their mayor? An interesting thought, if you think about it.

This hyper-focus on education can be a bit overwhelming. I say this as I head off to my first interview for a potential school for my son. This bit of the process is stressful, making the hours we agonized over our essay for the applications, seem innocuous in comparison.