Anyone has or had experience with their kids at a magnet school?How did you and your kids like it?How was it different from a public school?Pros & cons?For younger kids,who for sure cannot decide what specific theme of a magnet school they want to pursue,what were the deciding factors for the parents to choose a particular magnet school?
I have been looking into them and am thinking of applying to a few for my daughter starting KG next year,iA.I have been to a few open-houses but I would be interested in knowing any personal experiences too.
which city are you in?
I know someone who's kid went to magnet school for a year or two may be. She said it was a lot of work even for Kindergarten. Not sure if she found it more because of her other commitments and younger kids at home or if it was really lot of work and projects. Her kid was also attending Islamic school on weekend so there was Islamic school homework in addition to school projects.
They moved so now her kids are not in magnet school anymore.
Pros are definitely more emphasis on academics.
Not sure about any cons.
The parents I know looked at the ratings of the schools, I think they also looked at the languages and extra curricular of each school.
They applied to I think 3 schools and got in their second choice. They were put in the waiting list for the first choice but for some reasons, I think the timing it was not going to work out so they went with the one they got in.
I went to a magnet HS. I live in the USA.
I thought it was very helpful; there taught me skills and set up a business environment so that when I went out into the financial field I had the upper hand on many of my competitors.
KG maybe young tho - and I'm 34 now so this was a while ago.
AA I think Magnet schools are public schools with a focus on a certain vocation for advanced students.
You have to apply to get it - these don't go by district.
what im wondering is if magnet schools pigeonhole a child in any way? do most kids show a clear aptitude for arts vs science/math early on enough for this to be useful?
No pigeon holing - especially not at such a young age.
The expectations are just allot higher.
For example - I went a business magnet HS and we had to wear office attire all the time.
We had classes that weren't available to others like Accounting 101 ... now if I didnt like it in HS I'd already done the expiermenting that folks do in college. I knew where I was headed.
Muniya is right.My understanding is the same that they are public schools and all schools focus on a certain subject area,right from PreK upto high school.
I am not sure of that is the case everywhere,but the county I live in this is how it is.There is one very mediocre/poor school district in the county while others are really good.For some reason this one district is given most prefernace in regards to being admitted to any magnet school.The kids from this school district get 50% of the seats through lottery in every magnet school of the entire county.The rest of the 50% seats go to students from all other school districts in the county,also through lottery.The few open houses I have attended,they have made clear that on an average they have 60-65% students coming from the one mediocre/poor district,though they want to close it at a 50:50.
This is a concern for me.I do not want to sound bad or arrogant saying this,but I also know the demographics of the population living in the poorly doing school district,which eventually make up for more than 50% of any magnet school population.So this does make me wonder how the whole magnet school experience can be vs. in a regular public school of a good school district where we already live.
Another thing that Ehl e Chamman pointed out,is another thing I have thought about.It is not possible for me to tell about my 4 year old at this point if she is interested in science,maths,music,literature,medical sciences etc etc...so how can I decide.What if I decide on a science based school for her when she is more interested in something else,down the road.
That is why when Muniya said she attended a magnet school at HS level,makes a lot more sense vs. for someone entering KG.
So,I am still not too sure how I feel about a magnet school at this point.
Kids who wanted to be in the medical field went to one and kids who wanted to be in business another and etc.
You actually were accepted not based on demographics rather your grades. We were a small population within the highschool.
We were kinda the nerds of the school.
^^Hmmm,interesting.
I wonder if it changed over time or it is something which varies state to state.
In the last few weeks I have learned that due to the lottery system in place and the way they have to have a certain %age from certain counties,plus the fact that the preK4 kids are given preference to enter into KG,there are only 4-6 openings for KG seats and they get applications in hundreds!So that minimizes the chances of getting into one,a lot.
