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EDITOR'S
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They
say your school days are the best of the lot,
because they remember or because they
forgot?" This naive verse, written by a young student, was the epigram on the back cover of "Kookaburra" -- the Presbyterian Ladies' College yearbook -- for as long as I can remember. I love my old school. I walk by it every time I take a trip home to Australia and still feel a certain kinship with those girls in black-watch tartan and Panama hats. |
| Not that I usually spend much time contemplating my school days, but our story on private schools set me reminiscing about an age of innocence. |
For six years, I enjoyed -- and sometimes endured -- the rigors of being "a PLC girl." Today, my closest friends are my oldest friends -- the ones I bonded with in Mr. Ruddle's terminally boring economics classes.
Readers who attended public school can tsk-tsk me all they like for my sentimentality, but it's nice to have a sense of belonging, of loyalty: Mine just happens to be to a private girls' school.
It means something to me that my mother went to PLC, and my brother and other kinfolk went to Scotch College, the affiliated boys' school. We were all in Stewart House and my mother and I were both tennis champs. When it comes to choosing whether to send your kids to public or private school, there's no accounting for precedent.
And speaking of accounting, when did private schools go Wall Street? Since when did tax-exempt, public bond offerings become part of the same lexicon as reading, writing and arithmetic?
This month's story was a real eye opener for me: I hadn't realized how much the business of education has changed. Private schools were once parochial -- and some might say elitist -- institutions funded almost exclusively from endowments, tuition fees and, perhaps, the church. These days, with prayers banned from classrooms, church affiliations relinquished, uniforms an apparent assault on individual expression and academic achievement held in unrealistically high regard, private schools are run more like corporations.
No longer are a few elected parents and the principal responsible for fund raising and spending: Today's private schools employ corporate financiers to find innovative and lucrative ways to raise funds in the big, scary real world.
Which begs the question: Why do private schools need all this money?
In my day (bring on the violins) we didn't have air conditioning, and it regularly topped 100 degrees in the summer. We didn't have many computers (and these classes were exclusively for the calculus uber-dorks anyway), and we certainly didn't have anyone looking out for our emotional welfare.
But in this age of rapid technological change, when there is genuine concern for the learning environment and well-being of students, the stakes -- and the costs -- are so much higher.
On a whim, I searched the Internet for PLC and, sure enough, up popped its web site. It contains all sorts of information about technology, academics and pastoral care. It even hosts home pages for all the teachers, which is way too much information for my liking.
Yes, the age of innocence is lost. But I still have those memories. Good memories. Because I remember or because I forgot?
Nicolee
L. Stevens
Associate Editor
© FEBRUARY 1999, VIRGINIA BUSINESS
MAGAZINE