The Magnet School System: or, my kindergarten-driven ulcer

Advice for all you parents considering a move to the suburbs.  If the town you're considering features a magnet school system, run.

Don't know what a magnet system is?  Oh, you're in for a treat. The Cliffs Notes version... There are six elementary schools in the district.  But rather than sending your kid to whichever school is closest, you choose your school. Each school is just a bit different.  So you find the school that is the best fit for your offspring.  Sounds fun, right? That ensures that the different socioeconomic and demographics of the town blend, and the folks who would otherwise be saddled with schools in the more disadvantaged areas get to be on an even keel with those in the more upscale neighborhoods. Yay!

Enough of that Fantasyland crap.  Here's how it really works.  

There are six schools.  Each has something a bit different. Some have deeply desirable "concentrations". Others have hooks that are... esoteric, or inexplicable and bizarre.  To protect the innocent, I'll list the schools in the order I visited them:

• School A, "the University Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  They have a partnership with the local State U that's a few blocks away, and have exchange programs where they crib teachers and resources from the university. The principal seems top-shelf. Test scores rock.
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  It's close enough we likely don't get school bussing. Oh, and it's firmly ensconced in the tony part of town, i.e. its student body is lily white.

• School B, "the Environmental Sciences Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  It's a new building.   It has that new school smell. 
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  Their testing scores are iffy to awful. It's in "the bad part of town", as in, they've made heroin busts on that block repeatedly (admittedly, after school hours).  And environmental sciences as a hook is, well, strange.  You get to help raise trout.  You know, just like every kid dreams about.

• School C, "the Global Studies Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  It's a nice school, near enough to the university to snag some additional resources.  The principal seems quite dynamic. Test scores? Solid. And with global studies the kids get exposure to different cultures (so say in 3rd grade, when the kids study Australia all year, they use the didgeridoo in music class, and they have math problems like "If England deports a thousand convicts a year to Australia for 100 years, how many gold medals will the Aussies win in the next Olympic games?")
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  Global studies does not, in fact, mean any language studies.  Explain that to me. Oh, and like school A, it's got a homogeneous student body that will fight over the same color crayon to use for skin tone coloring.

• School D, "the Montessori Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  They offer more experiential, learn-it-fully-before-you-move-on-to-the-next-topic instruction. It's near my son's favorite playground.  Yes, I'm stretching for positives here.
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  My son would abuse the Montessori system like a pathological liar catching someone on a trust fall. He'd dog it then sprint through assignments. Or he'd go at a fast enough pace to finish the academic year in October.  And the school is crazy small - two classes a grade means you better get along or it'll be an awkward six years.

• School E, "the Gifted & Talented Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  They offer 90 minutes a week of Mandarin instruction.  Impressive.  They have "electives" to study things that interest them in 1st and 2nd grade, like cartooning or poetry. Their music teaching includes violin and other instruments that aren't just the recorder. Oh, and their gym teacher's won awards for being superb - a not-insignificant factor for parents of a hyperactive party animal (i.e. us).
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  Their test results seem to be on the poor side. It's only K through 2nd grade.  After that, kids transition to another school.  After Superstorm Sandy, someone stole all their computers... and there months later, there's still inadequate replacements. And did we mention that "gifted & talented" is read as "everyone's talented"? So yeah, the title's a big fat lie. 

• School F, "the Science and Technology Magnet".  
• The "hey, I want that!" factor:  They have science labs, greenhouses, beakers. Test scores are through the roof. They've won a bunch of awards.  You know, it's that kind of school.
• The "who signed up for that crap?" factor:  Turnover for the role of "principal" is on par with that of "Spinal Tap Drummer" (they've been through 4 in the past 6 years).  It seems the toughest of all the schools to get in. It's oversubscribed, so for an attention-starved kid like our son, he'll have to be even more of a disruptive nuisance to get attention.

So that's the playing field.  But it gets better.  See, now you have to visit each of these places.  And they pull out the whole dog and pony show to show you why you need to send your kid there.  So now you have new criteria to cloud your judgment... Which school sprang for Starbucks coffee, and which served swill in an urn? Who had generic muffins versus cookies from the niftiest neighborhood cafe versus homemade biscuits in the shape of the school's initials? Which ones had the cutest kids doing the AV pitch and which had principals who seem  Power Point deficient?

The tours dripped with irony.  Showing "schools in action", but spending most of a tour's time in empty classrooms (I think the one subject I saw in action more than any other was phys ed). PTA parents talking about how "education comes first", while leading their tenth disruptive cattle call trip through a first grade classroom.  Breaking into fifteen smaller tour groups, then bottlenecking in the same rare classroom in which students were actually being taught something.

Then there are the tour guides, wide-eyed PTA zombies ready to chomp on the brains of any who have not yet made their school decision.  Each one spoke of their school with the slavish, unquestioning perspective of a realtor at Jonestown.  Seriously, I was expecting they all shared a common tattoo, or had identical purple tracksuits and Nikes at home, or maybe they were all hoping to hitch a ride in the tail of a comet after their kids graduated. They encouraged us to ask questions - one even prodded me to ask a kindergarten teacher about what kind of homework she gave her students. As for any criticisms or concerns about their school? Answered with a degree of spin seldom seen his side of a White House Press Secretary. And this passion was interesting, as each one seemed to refer to a wad of notes to do their walk-through as if they'd never been to the school before.  Which made me think perhaps the principals hired professionals, which would have added a new, surreal level to the proceedings.

But the worst part? The fellow parents. And as you might expect, there were archetypes at play:

• The Researchers: They've done some prep, but they have some questions.  Some awful, inane questions.  Mostly about homework, because it's disturbing just how much people are concerned about the volume of take-home the kindergarteners should expect.  But questions about the age of the school, length of the school bus ride in the mornings, typical school lunches, and "how will this school help my kid get ready for life's challenges?" abounded. 
• The Decisives: the ones who already made up their minds, and felt the need to keep discussing why this school had "everything they wanted". They did their research and wanted you to know it.  Some were so set, not only should you question why they were wasting the morning on a tour, you might suspect that the PTA put ringers on the tour to make things seem even better.
• The Worrywarts: the ones who  were preoccupied not with their choice, but what to do if their choice didn't work out. "If I don't get my choice, can I appeal?" "What if I don;t like it?" "After second grade, can I send my kid to school B?" "Once  they're here, am I stuck with a track through middle school with no chance to change anything?"
• The Consensus-Needers: the ones who were curious what you think.  "Did you go to school A Do you think it's better thank this one?"  "Which school are you leaning towards?"  "My kid likes arts - do you think this school would be a good fit?"  Not that they asked about what my kid was like or what his interests were - all that maters is tat they;re not making their decisions alone.  Validation matters, man.
• The Wide-Eyed Naifs: the ones who said nothing  They just shuffled through their tours, saying nothing, with blank stares, overwhelmed by the whole affair.

And all this type A behavior is over NOTHING. I mean, per the state, everyone's saddled with having to teach the same damn subjects.  They still on get two sessions of PE a week, or a music class a week, or 30 minutes of math a day.  They all have to pass the same damn tests.  All this showmanship, wasted visitation sessions, and agonizing over which school is going to impact whether my kids will go to Oxford or Apex Tech is over the 5% of variance between any of these goddamn programs, a gradation so minimal it'll have no bearing that my kids or I will likely ever notice.  

Well,  no difference that I'll notice assuming I get my top pick.  Because much as I like to pretend I'm above it, I'm just another over competitive parent who wants to say he's looking out for his kids' best interests, when the reality is I just want to make sure I get my preference no matter how trivial it may be. So if you'll excuse me, I have to pore through more demographic data to make sure I don't make a poor choice that precludes my kid from an Ivy League education.  Because we all know School F is the feeder kindergarten for Harvard.