Me: “ Being a parent of three kids, who have all attended private schools, 2 in DC, what would be your advice to a parent entering into the world of private school?”
Rand: “ Tuition actually doesn’t pay for the tuition of the child, somethinhg like fourteen percent of the education that is not covered by the tuition, so you have to realize that you will be asked to give to annual giving, potentially capital campaign, but You will be asked to contribute.”
Me: “ Knowing what You know about all the different private high schools in DC and after sending hundreds of kids to these schools, if You were an eighth grader where would You want to go, and if You had a child about to go into high school where would You want them to?
Rand: “ GDS for both.”
Me: “ Tell me about the curriculum at Sheridan.”
Rand: “ Well there are three parts to it, A- I decided mainly because I was a parent there needed to be symmetry between the whole nine years, some kind of connection, I had two ideas for the faculty, the one aforementioned, and You wanted eighth grade to be based on current events and global issues- In the book Guns, Germs, Steel by Jared Diamond we found this symmetry, basic premise being where you live influences how you live and people started branching off and trading with each other which led to conflict and war, so we divided up the K-8 social studies curriculum based on the book. An example being, kindergarten studies the six biomes, and first grade studies how you adapt to where You live. At the same time, we decided to go a concept-based curriculum, which basically meant that there were basic concepts that ran through the whole curriculum, such as the idea of power. The third thing we did was to look at the state national standards and we developed a skills matrix based on these standards, that what’s important and unique for Sheridan because a lot of private schools only look internally, whereas we looked to the outside world.”
Me: “ What is something you don’t like about the private schools in DC?”
Rand: “ They can be elitist and too power and money focused, and take themselves VERY seriously.”
Me: “ How do you handle diversity?”
You: “ the easiest answer for me to say is at Sheridan we have established a “responsive classroom model”, which means basically that there be a community rule that governs the classroom, it’s a non-punitive covenant based agreement between the members of the class and the community that helps everyone be treated the same and with respect.”
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