Charter v. Private School “Prepsters”: Manufacturing College-Ready Kindergartners
“College Prep Begins in Kindergarten” is the motto for Cornerstone Preparatory School (a charter) in Memphis. HERE. A lot of charter schools advertise themselves as college preparatory schools, and they begin marketing college at the earliest of all levels—kindergarten. How does this compare to honest-to-goodness private schools?
Secretary Arne Duncan visited Cornerstone the other day. There was a lot of hoopla, kind of like rolling out next year’s new cars, and if you watch the school video carefully, where they convince the public they are a great school, every child has their hand raised. They are all smiling and chanting and loving every minute of it. They want you to see order. They succeed at that. These 5-year-olds know how to strictly behave. And most of them eerily do it with smiles on their faces.
The trouble is should they be that structured? Should college prep really start at kindergarten? Is such order right for 5-year-olds?
This isn’t just an agenda found in charter schools. Many reformers have succeeded at forcing this message into traditional public schools too. “Rigor” is the new buzzword for kindergarten, even preschool! Children must now learn earlier than ever before. Kindergarten is the new first grade…maybe second…possibly third!
I decided to look deeper at this hard driving message to push kindergartners to achieve faster, by comparing Cornerstone Preparatory Charter School with Trinity School, the prominent New York City prep school, where parents have a harder time getting their child into the school than getting them accepted to Harvard. HERE. Trinity has a Charter v. Private School “Prepsters”: Manufacturing College-Ready Kindergartners: