<p>connections, your posts tonight have been really insightful and wise.</p>
<p>I can imagine a situation where a PA HS would be a dream come true. But it is correct that only a very few kids have access to them, and also to summer intensives. The vast majority manage to have a career (and a life) without them. </p>
<p>My D2 was so “artsy” that even her elementary teachers told me they wished there was a n arts grade school she could go to (in some big cities they have them even that young). There were times I wished she could have done that. But I think in the long run she learned a lot by having to make harder choices and learning to get what she needed on her own. She also learned invaluable things by experiencing all of the non-arts classes and activities that she had in our very regular public school system. </p>
<p>At one point she had the opportunity to go to an alternative middle school. After a lot of thought she decided to stick it out in public school - she felt she could get the arts and other activities she needed, and also that she gained more from dealing with the “real” world than in being somewhere more protected and precious. At one point in HS she did again yearn for a private PA school, but in the end she was glad she stuck it out where she did.</p>
<p>This post connects with one on the “BA school” thread that’s been active today. I think that having dealt with the frustrations and experiences in public school also prepared her for the stresses and issues she faces at her university. I think she would have loved to have found college to be protected and precious, yet in reality it almost never is - having learned to deal with people who don’t understand her take on the world gave her the skills to adjust to college life in general. She knows artsy kids who seem to think those challenges and demands don’t apply to them. I’m not saying this is the result of going to a PA HS, but my personal opinion is that public school forces you to learn some very valuable life lessons.</p>