Mission or Moreau?

Students often ask me for advice when choosing between Moreau and Mission. Below is some advice from a former student of mine:

I am currently a student attending Mission San Jose High School and I went to a private middle school(Challenger), so I am somewhat familiar with the High School application process and choosing the right high school. Thus, I have some advice for some parents who want their best for their child but are unsure about the right path to chose:

Many parents understand that Mission is academically demanding, and they feel this rigorous environment will have a positive impact on their child. However, this understanding is only partly true. At Mission, there is a heavy emphasis on grades and getting into a good college, so most students are talking about colleges from the very beginning of freshmen year before any of them have any idea what their GPA or extracurriculars will be like. Although talking about colleges occasionally is important, this is not the case at Mission. Instead, many students constantly calculate their GPA probability of getting into UC Berkley after every test they do poorly on. Although this may seem comical, this attitude compounds into much more serious and complex issues, such as cheating, test-laundering, and depression. With such problems, it becomes very hard to learn as people become focused on grades only; 99% of students would rather cheat to “get” an A in a class rather than try to learn math, science, etc. and earn an A by constantly challenging and pushing themselves.

Besides the unhealthy academic atmosphere, the high competition generates another intrinsic problem-harder classes. As students will do anything for an A, the amount of A’s/class would be very high if the classes were at an average level. Thus, many teachers are quite hard and provide little to no help for the student(increasing the problem of cheating) and this leads to many hard working students getting a B simply because they didn’t do “enough”.

As I did not go to a private high school myself, this is speculation based on a few of my friends who go to Moreau and another private high school(St. Francis).

In general, the environment at a private high school provides a stark contrast to that at Mission. As most students need some proficiency in extra-curricular activities, most of the students have something unique to offer to the school. There is a wider variety of people at private high schools, and this leads to greater diversity. For example, someone at Moreau might have gotten accepted because they were good at playing flute, someone else because they were good at karate, someone else because they had a talent for basketball. This is in contrast to Mission where people being good at an extracurricular is pure coincidence; 90% of the school is focused mainly on grades, they just participate in a few extracurriculars for 3 years with the sole motive of getting into an elite college. Cheating, depression, etc. also seems to be a lot lower in private schools, as most of my friends talk about how the cheating was even less than at Challenger.(I cannot provide any insight as to why this is the case). Thus, it seems likely that most students would focus on the learning aspect of school, as most people want to go on to do great things and want to gain as many skills as they can, rather than being solely focused on grades.

In the end, choosing the right school is a parenting choice. Some parents want to place their children in a competitive environment, as they feel this sets up their children for better success in college. Mission would clearly be the better choice for such a family; high competition and emphasis on college is abundant here. My only advice for this family is to not forget the main purpose for high school, and that is to develop their child into a contributing member of society, and not a robot who is only focused on college. Some parents prefer a smaller emphasis on academics so that their child will have an opportunity to become excellent at a certain extracurricular. For example, some students are great at Chess and want the opportunity to spend 3-4 hours every night on Chess without being too worried about their homework. In such a scenario, Moreau would be the best fit for the family, as private schools generally give less homework so that students can peruse their artistic endeavors.