Life Lessons for Two Private School Headmasters

It’s nice that Patrick McCabe has a lot of rich and famous friends, but if I were an alum, I wouldn’t be encouraged by what I read (“The Education of Patrick McCabe,” by Andy Meisler, Oct. 6). It looks like McCabe is interested in turning Santa Monica’s Newbridge School into a low-rent former military school, such as his own alma mater.

I would suggest that McCabe pick up a copy of “Summerhill School” or read a few books about Montessori education because his alternative education experience is certainly limited. In a progressive school there is nothing wrong with addressing teachers and administrators by their first names. And “Friends of Pat” being the main attendees of Newbridge School’s First Annual Fund-Raising Dinner and Auction (with a slight nod to “slightly uncomfortable-looking teachers”)--well, take a hint: This isn’t a good long-term plan. Remarks about parents’ ability to afford Newbridge should never have been made within earshot of a reporter. It comes across as insulting, especially for those on financial aid.

Beth Stefan

Via the Internet

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Meisler’s article unwittingly accounts for the disparity in test scores between private and public schools when McCabe argues that students with special behavioral or learning problems don’t belong at Newbridge. When public school teachers and administrators are responsible for educating these students, they have to devote a disproportionate amount of time and energy to nonacademic matters. As a result, student performance suffers. There’s nothing intrinsically superior about private schools. They simply have the freedom to admit and expel at will. Those students who remain are taught in small classes that are the envy of public school teachers.

Walt Gardner

Los Angeles

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How could Thomas Hudnut, the headmaster of Harvard-Westlake School, be so disconnected from the reality of public education that he would assert that teaching is a “job you get right out of college

Now 46, I left my comfortable management-level position (and salary) at age 43 to pursue a teaching credential and teach elementary school in the Los Angeles Unified School District. I have used every ounce of management and life experience accrued in my professional and personal history to great advantage during this transition. Teaching has been the most challenging, exhausting and gratifying professional experience in my life so far.

Ken Meyer

Arcadia