@QuantMech I’ll admit that I am biased by a google search showing that the parents have have other lawsuits. It does make me question if they are litigious in nature.
And you take some of those comments out of their context, QM. How a poster presents an issue has a lot to do with the advice given.
Bottom line, none of us know if the parents are correct. Empathy for them, as an auto reaction, doesn’t work, in the absence of details. Just going by the claims isn’t enough. Wasn’t enough for the courts, either.
Except a neutral third party – a judge – who had an opportunity to review all of the pertinent facts, said ‘no, they are not correct’. In fact, they are so far from being ‘more or less correct’, the judge said: Summary Judgement for the Defendant (Sidwell). In other words, there is not enuf here to waste the court’s time and resources on a trial.
People hold grudges and act upon them, even if it is not in their interests. Consider divorcees fighting for years afterward, often to the detriment of their kids caught in the middle of those fights. Or why some countries with historical grudges against each other have much worse relations than an outsider would think they would have based on their current interests.
If these parents and various employees of the school had been fighting many battles, it is easy for both to hold grudges that they may act on.
Except in cases of divorce and other “grudges”, there is a less likely risk of being sued for discrimination, etc, and trying to drag it to the supreme court! And in divorces with kids there is an ongoing need to have some continued connection. Sidwell knows how toxic this family is and was likely looking forward to getting rid of this family. Retaliation would risk this. They would be more likely to want to live by the adage “don’t go away mad, just go away”.
I wonder if this is one of those “average excellent” kids whose family just didn’t get what they expected? If I had a kid like this, I’d be pushing for everything to be shown in the best light; but in this case I don’t think the LORs or school helped her at all.
I was looking at her high school track times; compared them with our midwest state’s top times. They were good, but not the top or truly outstanding (like she’d have placed 7th in one race in our state meet.) Her academics sound good too – NM commended is nice! I’d be very proud of this kid if it was my child! Yet, if she had a chance me thread here, she’d probably be considered “average excellent”. The family had expectations; and it doesn’t sound like the school supported her; but not sure if that really was the tipping point.
It is hard to exaggerate the level of entitlement and obnoxiousness of some Sidwell parents. Not all, of course, and no doubt one finds these types at many schools. But the faculty and staff there earn every penny they make and then some.
I don’t think she should have “gotten over it.” I think she (and her parents) should have managed it more diplomatically. If for their own good. And they probably would have seen better results (but probably not the $50k I’ll admit.)
She’s all over the news with this lawsuit. Who would want to hire her? Is she really acting in her own best interest?
But for a school to do this, and do it effectively enough, you would need a number of school employees to actively collude on a strategy to do this. For a school like this… it just doesn’t sound realistic imo.
There does not need to be a collaborative or conspiratorial effort on the part of the school. Individual employees who dislike the parents could do just the minimum required services (e.g. write a recommendation, but a blandly generic one rather than the usual kind that people at these schools write that boosts admission chances are more selective colleges).
Then it’s not the school who’s “retaliating”. It’s just not a consistent argument to me. Especially as the argument seems to combine math teacher, principal, GC, coach at minimum? They all independently decided they were miffed and going scuttle her chances? Don’t buy it. Neither did the judge, apparently.
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As for the “powering through” debate, I presume colleges need to understand what they are getting in LORs, otherwise they are meaningless. To call every student gifted makes the term meaningless, and anyway gifted does not necessarily mean high performing, as is well known. A kid who “powers through” can outperform a gifted student grades-wise (though admittedly hopefully not at Sidwell which one assumes knows how to support gifted children). I agree with the poster above who suggests this is just another average excellent disappointed kid, who managed to do something in her gap year to improve her chances. Her LORs etc from Sidwell presumably were the same and didn’t impede her eventual admission to Penn.
That $50k gain looks to have been wiped out by the legal fees award and potential impact on future earnings. I don’t really understand what they were actually hoping to gain with this. For someone accusing a school of retaliation, this smacks of just trying to get even themselves. Maybe it’s hindsight but this all looks to have been incredibly shortsighted.
Legal fees awards to SF, plus their own legal fees…
If you review Richard Carnell Bakers LinkedIn profile there’s a theme to his work. I would not feel “bad” for him as another poster suggested. My guess that this case is good for business, the type of business and themes he seems focused on pursuing.
he may be the one keeping it alive. Or has an agenda of some sort against the school.
Not sure a “no win” Supreme Court filing and promoted to the media is typical of the legal advice I have received over the years.
Generally the costs of the case far outweigh a settlement of some sort. Or if a legally flimsy case more will tell you to save the money.
@doschicos I’m trying without success to find other lawsuits the parents filed - can you give me some hints for the terms to google, other than their names?
Not really. In summary judgment, the judge accepts the facts as true and decides the matter on the law. What the judge really said was ‘it doesn’t matter’ to the facts. Even if everything is as the plaintiff’s claimed, if the gc wrote a less than glowing report or that test scores were sent late or that a math grade was incorrect, there is no violation of the law here so no need to have a trial.
I just searched on one of the parents names and found a site that listed some lawsuits without much other detail @GnocchiB. Sending you a PM.
This was a claim about contracts – not law – as the plaintiff claimed that Sidwell breached their written agreement. But the Judge said, nope, the “Adetus…did not make a sufficient showing of any adverse action by Sidwell.” In other words, either what Adetus claimed was bogus, or if true, did not rise to the level of breaking thier contract.
@roycroftmom “It is hard to exaggerate the level of entitlement and obnoxiousness of some Sidwell parents. Not all, of course, and no doubt one finds these types at many schools. But the faculty and staff there earn every penny they make and then some.”
I’m sure you’re right. Although the same can be said about most elite private schools where $40,000 per year can buy you not an insignificant amount of entitlement. Which is exactly why people chose those schools to begin with.
They probably did not find out independently, since staff room chatter and the older lawsuit presumably made those parents well known. But they may have acted independently of each other and of the school (note: consider the principal-agent problem in how the staff may act differently from what may be in the best interests of the school).
One does not have to cross the line into something that would lose a lawsuit when one merely does the minimum expected by law and contract, as opposed to going above and beyond as what may be the typical expectation at these kinds of schools. When much of the perceived value of schools like this is unwritten and unspoken levels of support getting into highly selective and prestigious colleges, there is a lot of leeway for staff to adjust their actions between the expected level of helpfulness and the minimum required level of helpfulness.