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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
 
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Personally, I wish both students success, but I know from teaching in Catholic schools, Catholic students score higher on language tests partially due to the study of religion. Many root words have Latin or Greek origins which is the basis for many English words. Years ago, I had a friend who taught in PS#3, she complained Academic, now McNair took a higher portion of 8th graders from Catholic grammar schools. PS#3 then rarely had a student attend Academic while small St. Peter's Grammar School, student body of 200, usually send 3 or 4 students each year. There are less children graduating from Catholic grammar schools, but it would be interesting to know how many have attended and are attending now.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 23:16
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Anecdotally, friends who have had children at both schools say McNair is tougher. It certainly offers more advanced placement courses. Whether that is significant is open to debate.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 18:06
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
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Read what I said. I said academics, I claimed nothing of careers outcomes. It was made clear by the school and alum that the Prep Network takes care of it's own throughout their careers. But basing your opinion on who's spotlighted in their publications is a little sketchy as data.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 17:40
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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You don't get that in a high school with 5000 students. True. And McNair has fewer than 700.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 17:20
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
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Yes, about 60 of the 90 members of my class went to Rutgers. Many of them got substantial scholarships and chose Rutgers over more "prestigious" schools. I have worked for two Ivies and now at Rutgers and there are smart and dumb people at both. It's mostly what you make of it. I supervised Ivy undergrads who were unemployable due to lack of skills other than book smarts (like hygiene, for one). I've had state school kids way outperform Ivy kids in the workplace. I do think the networking/foot in the door is probably better at some Ivy schools. But if you go to a solid public school and do things like internships or individual studies with professors you get almost the same kind of boost. And having 200K in loans vs. maybe 100K max for Rutgers is a big difference in cost for just networking and having more famous professors.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 16:39
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Where are your facts Brewster? When Prep mails out their magazine on former graduates based on years, they list their professions. I see heads of corporations, lawyers, doctors, engineers. That doesn't mean is disapprove of McNair, but to say "McNair is superior," is just hot air.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 16:38
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Rutgers really does predominate because of tuition, and then scholarships on top of the lower tuition. They know McNair. Yvonne is correct that St. Peter's involves the parents much more than McNair. But after two good going through LCCS, I was really ready for a school where they didn't want ANYTHING of me except my occasional signature!
Posted on: 2013/10/10 16:29
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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I graduated from private high school. Private schools keep track of their alumni because they rely heavily on donations. I personally do not donate money but I have donated my time to my school for several of their events. It's mainly because due to the small class size, I got to know several of my teachers and guidance counselors very well, and I have kept in touch with them over the years. Whenever I go back and visit I would say 60% of the staff remembers me. You don't get that in a high school with 5000 students.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 16:28
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Of that we had no doubt, they do a great job of selling themselves. But we concluded that academically, and in terms of students going to selective colleges, McNair was superior. JCnewmom, most hard data about McNair is difficult to get, but in addition to anecdotes about the Ivies (like half a dozen one year to Harvard) we were told 1/4 of the class typically goes to Rutgers, as the economics are compelling.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 15:59
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Newbie
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Can anyone shed light on what colleges the majority of the graduating seniors end up attending for McNair?
Thanks!
Posted on: 2013/10/10 15:29
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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There is a lot of social activities for parents at SPP, and the graduating students are connected to the high school for life. All kinds of social activities. When you join Prep, you join a family.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 13:25
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Robin, you answer your own question. I don't doubt half of what helps these kids succeed is the peer group. So what difference does it make if the school does or doesn't do any more than offer the AP classes that get it into most of the rankings. Any decent teacher should be able to pour knowledge into these kids. If they're great, as some there are, so much the better.
But you're not going to get an answer, there's just too many variables. Are the great Manhattan private schools that good, or do the kids from extreme privilege and good preparation just do well anywhere? We concluded McNair was the best school for our son in Hudson County, at any price. What more do you want?
Posted on: 2013/10/10 1:06
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Robin, my younger son is a McNair senior and my older is a graduate. I don't know how you construct a control group to answer your question. I can say that some teachers are ordinary and some are phenomenal and both my boys love(d) it. The other more interesting comment was made to me by a mother whose son is not doing so well at McNair and she asked him if he wanted to go to his "home" school. He said absolutely not, because at McNair no one gets bullied. When the nerds rule the school, they're too busy running science projects or student council to bother bullying anyone. No one gets shoved into a locker unless it's an experiment to see how it's done or how many actually fit. My son's friends are gay, Indian, bi racial, Latino....and that's one of the great things you get at McNair.
And of course St. Peter's also takes top kids.
Posted on: 2013/10/10 0:59
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
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(Re-posting form other thread as this one seems more appropriate)
Mcnair is a selective intake school, so of course it will get great test scores, and be high on all the top school lists. Given it takes the cream of Jersey City's kids, how can we objectively measure if it is really doing a good job or not? If the Three Stooges taught those children in my back-yard they'd still get great test scores! Are any of these top school rankings statistically normalized to control for the performance of the kids *entering* the school? Robin.
Posted on: 2013/10/9 22:45
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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McNair has sports teams -- track & field, cross county, basketball, swimming, volleyball, softball. soccer, bowling (not football but a boy can play on his home high school team) -- and a LOT of extracurricular activites. Language clubs, school paper, glee club, science research, chess, rotc, come to mind right of the top of my head.
As to the SPP stats for Jersey City, do you mean that 20% of the kids are from Jersey City (half of the 40% for Hudson country)? And yes, the cone of silence over McNair can be frustrating.
Posted on: 2013/1/28 1:34
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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We were at the SPP open house today, and they handed out brochures saying 40% of the student body was from Hudson County. We were told verbally half of them were from JC. Where did you get your info? Can anyone comment on the extracurriculars at McNair like sports and clubs? It's so bizarre getting the dog and pony show and hard sell from SPP, and McNair just shrugs with the attitude: "If you don't come someone else just as smart will, why should we try to sell you on our school?"
Posted on: 2013/1/28 1:10
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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I think the response was "you can't play the game if you don't know the rules." I don't batting averages or stolen bases has come up on any test, but they do have tests and papers and projects in gym. Yup.
Posted on: 2013/1/23 22:13
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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What the hell? How does that have anything to do with Phys Ed? Do they have to memeorize batting averages or who wone the World Cup? Phys Ed should be learning how to build and support a healthy active lifestyle, not learning st00pid ball game rules.
Posted on: 2013/1/23 21:55
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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I asked that same question when we were at Prep open house -- not so much social, but group projects. Everyone said they worked at school. I don't think they consider it was a problem. I also got the impression that Prep has a lot more social events with St Dominics. McNair has a prom and that's it.
Posted on: 2013/1/23 18:06
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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I dunno, corralling raging hormones has been a top task of civilization for thousands of years. I think half the wars ever fought were getting the boys out of the village to go make trouble elsewhere. As far as main topic, I keep coming back to the mostly commuter population of Prep and how it affects the boys friendships. Can anyone comment? My son had a somewhat disappointing after school social life in middle school in part because the class was so small there were very few kids he was on the same wavelength with. McNair would be terrific for him in that way. How do the kids at Prep socialize if they all live in different communities? Do they all stay on campus with clubs and sports every day till they go home to bed?
Posted on: 2013/1/23 3:05
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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I agree - having gone to an all Girls Catholic school myself, being in a unisex school do not make a difference at all. In some cases, it can make one more "desperate" as you do not get your daily dose of interaction with the opposite sex.
You cannot fight against raging hormones.
Posted on: 2013/1/22 23:26
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Home away from home
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Quote:
Unless you are gay..
Posted on: 2013/1/22 22:01
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
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Quote:
gets rid of a huge distraction.
Posted on: 2013/1/22 21:51
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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...adding that McNair has a graduation requirement of 50 hours of community service. In addition, the required curriculum is so rigorous (6 years of English, four years of math and four years of science, etc.) that there is less room for electives. And Phys Ed is a letter grade, not just pass fail. You can actually fail PE if you can't identify the line of scrimmage or the 3 point rule.
Again, just full disclosure.
Posted on: 2013/1/22 14:21
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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+1
But I wouldn't call it pressure to perform so much as academic performance is celebrated. No one is looked down on for being a brain.
Posted on: 2013/1/22 12:00
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Boy, after reading here and some other places it sounds like Prep is great if you and your kid agree that their "ideal young man" is what you want want him to be molded into. McNair sounds like the only pressure to conform is to perform academically, but naturally there's less school cohesion.
Prep must really be something though, I don't think I've known anyone who goes back and visits their high school. But maybe that's more of a private school thing?
Posted on: 2013/1/22 5:13
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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My daughter is a sophomore at McNair. I can't speak too much to Saint Peter's, but my general take is that McNair has a good group of academically motivated students who also have a lot of other interests. McNair has a junior ROTC program, if your child wants to do the regimental thing. They also have sports, a glee club, anime club, band, academic clubs, and so on.
If your child has a lot of individual interests, McNair has a lot to offer. The student body is also very, very diverse. All of my daughter's friends are intelligent, motivated, and interesting individuals. My daughter applied to public schools and Catholic schools, and she got into all of them. She bristled a bit at the parochial aspect when she did the tours. If it is the first time going to a Catholic school, I think it can be a bit of a shock.
Posted on: 2013/1/21 20:41
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"Someday a book will be written on how this city can be broke in the midst of all this development." ---Brewster
Oh, wait, there is one: The Jersey Sting. |
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Home away from home
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Both my boys got into both schools, both spent a day with a freshman mentor at SPP, and one son did the HAP summer program between 7th and 8th grade at SPP. In the end, both chose McNair. Girls were one factor and dollar value was too (if both offer quality education, why not go to the free school and save the $$$ for college?).
One thing my boys say about McNair is that everyone "fits in" and finds his/her group of friends. There is no jock culture whatsoever - no one gets bullied (I am not suggesting anything about SPP, just telling you what my guys like about McNair.) It seems to me that SPP inspires more school spirit, more cohesion around school identity and that is really important to some boys. It was not important to mine. If you take an AP course at McNair, you HAVE to take the test (school pays for it). Son #1 says it's an excellent policy because it makes you work harder as you can't blow off the test if you think you won't do well. He started college with 26 college credits, making it easy to double major and to chose his courses ahead of most of his class. I think your son will succeed regardless of which school he chooses. I posted merely to suggest some factors that my sons considered in making their choice.
Posted on: 2013/1/21 20:26
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Re: Comparisons of Mcnair vs St Peter's Prep?
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Obviously I'm still learning about the schools themselves, but in the circle of strong students, Prep is considered far easier to get into, for some being the "safe school" if you don't get into McNair or Hitech. The main distinction is whether they gave you a scholarship and how much. This difference leads to being baffled by the comparable SAT scores. Is it an artifact of better test prep at Prep? McNair's scores brought down by lesser students there due to the racial admission policy? Both? Anyone have current Prep SAT stats? This is not available the way it is for public schools.
Posted on: 2013/1/21 17:25
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Just can't stay away
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As a Jesuit school, theology classes are required for all four years.
Posted on: 2013/1/21 13:37
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