We do not live in a good school district and are looking into several private and charter schools in the west Houston/Katy area. If anyone has personal experience with any of the following schools or knows something that would be beneficial in our decision making, please share.

The schools we are interested in are Faith West, Aristoi Classical Academy, John Paul II and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton.

Also, three of the above schools only go to 8th grade - so Pope John 23 in Katy is a possibility for high school. If anyone has anything to say about it, or the likelihood of students entering the high school from the other ones, we'd like to hear about that too.

Ultimately, of course, the goal is for our children to have a safe, happy learning environment and to be able to go to Texas A&M (or any other major University if they so wish)...

Thanks!


[This message has been edited by BrazosDog02 (edited 1/9/2013 4:42p).]

My siblings and I went to John Paul II, so I can speak to that. If I recall correctly we were one of the first 100 or so families when it was all temporary buildings. It has changed a lot since I started there, but some of the same administrators are still working there. For example, my computer science teacher is now the principal. I'm not sure what the cost is now, but my parents always said it was very reasonably priced relative to some of the other catholic schools on the West side.

I graduated with about 50 students and the majority went to either Strake, St. Thomas, or St. Agnes. My brother and I went to Strake, and our sister went to St. Agnes. John 23 was started after I left with a lot of support from one of the largest supporting families of John Paul II. Their first few children went to St. Pius for HS because they believe in co-education and they wanted a closer/better option than what St. Pius offered.

My wife and I recently had our first child and are already looking at our options and John Paul II is one we are strongly considering. We live in the area and are on the South Side of the Bayou and are in HISD, granted we have a few years before we really have to worry about it. I do hear there is a waiting list now, though.

edit to address your last concern: The majority of students, even if they didn't go Strake, St. Agnes, St. Thomas, etc. ended up going to either A&M, tu, or other decent universities. Obviously you can look up the stats on the high schools that JP II typically feeds into. Those are the big 3 and all three are very good schools.

[This message has been edited by cwpaggie07 (edited 1/7/2013 1:14p).]

First kid is at JP2. We know a lot of families there already from our time at SJV. Very good Catholic school. I don't know anything about those other schools, but I'm sure that they are all good and most of their kids do well compared to their public school peers. My suggestion is to tour all of them and get a feel for what you like and don't like. I'd definitely consider your commute to the school as well, because you're all over the map with where those schools are at.

Both of my brothers went to and graduated from Faith West. Most of the kids they graduated with also graduated from Teaxs A&M.

My wife graduated from Faith West after going to Mayde Creek for her first 2 years of HS. She says she liked it, but it was a bit difficult for her to socialize as many of the students there had been at faith west since elementary age so the cliques were well formed by hs age. She also told me that many of the kids did not represent ideal christian morals if you catch my drift, but I'm sure that's the case at any school. I went to Cinco Ranch so my high school experience was almost like a private school in term of demographics, but not in class size.

This is good information. We appreciate it.

I am pro Faith West because my sister-in-law teaches there. She seems to think that it is fairly well run. The times I have visited the campus, I have been surprised at how small the place is -- then again, my kid is a junior at Bellaire High School with 3,400 students. Her kids are/were active (one graduated) in sports while there. The graduate attends an SEC school, and has done well in college, indicating to me that she learned something while at Faith West.

OK...so here is the 'rest of the story'.

We've toured all of them and really liked several of them. The wife was looking through the forms online for Faith West and found the admission forms. They look pretty standard grade. However, upon reviewing the 're-entry' forms for returning students, she stumbled across a "corporal punishment" form. It was not an optional form. It appeared as though it was purely a permission form. We only surmised that this is something that is shown and mentioned AFTER one is accepted and has paid the non-refundable fees. I will freely state that I am staunchly against corporal punishment of my child by anyone at a school. This is not because my precious little snowflake is perfect, but rather I will be the sole administrator of proper ass whippin' and simply don't trust a school administrator to decide when that is appropriate. So, we figured we should check with all of the others regarding their policies. She emailed them all. All other schools responded the very same day she wrote them and they stated that they have no such policy. Disciplinary issues are handled and escalated as needed with the parent. Faith West is still MIA - in the past, they are hit or miss with response time (or a response at all for that matter).

So....yeah...it's looking a little hokey. We will probably be emailing a few other people at Faith West with the same question in hopes of someone actually clarifying/confirming the form. Other than that, we liked what we saw.

We'd really like to hear more about the remaining 3 schools if anyone knows anything - they are actually the 3 that we know the least about.

Brazos,

I'm familiar with JP2. I only know Faith West and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton by name. My brothers and I went to JP2. The principal is married to an Ag and has two sons that are Ags.

My wife and I are looking at sending our daughters to JP2 starting with a summer program for the oldest this year.

Feel free to PM me for more information.

Another for JPII here. This is our first year and are very happy with it.

OK. Thanks for the info. Finally heard back from FWA...looks like Corporal Punishment policy is required to be signed and accepted, in case anyone else was interested.

With that information, JP2 is now our #1 choice even thought it's quite a distance to drive. We will be using St. Elizabeth as the back up, and Aristoi as 3rd choice because we hear it's quite hard to get into JP2 - potentially 3x as many applicants as available openings.

We are still open to hearing if anyone has personal experiences with any of the 5 listed schools. As seen with Faith West, one piece of information (good or bad) can change everything.

Thanks again to everyone that has responded.

Brazos,

A few more bits of info on JP2. It's a two time National Blue Ribbon school with the most recent designation coming in 2008. The principal will be receiving an award from the National Catholic Educational Association as a distinguished principal. I don't have the annual report at the house anymore, but many of the kids are successful in getting into private high schools and succeeding onward from there. I believe the tuition is very competitive with other area schools.

I was a volunteer on the planning committee for their annual 5K race and fundraiser this past November and typically attend the annual auction dinner. It's good to still see original founding families still participate and how new families have continued to carry the "torch". CWP above is correct in that some of the same teachers, administrators, and board members are there that have been with the school since day 1 when it was temporary buildings.

Regards,

TT

Plus jp2 had an 'Aggie' day after the bama win. If your kids aren't baptized, plan on attending another school.

Right - we have only heard great things about JP2, and thought their facilities were great, tuition reasonable, etc. Downsides for our family is the distance and only going through 8th grade. If only there was a Catholic K-8 school in or closer to the Katy area, because it's takes us long enough to get that far.

And our kids are baptized, so we have that going for us, but we still worry about there not being many openings. Hopefully it will all work out.

So, aside from all of this. Here is a can of worms for you guys.

How does everyone here feel about the corporal punishment in schools? More specifically, how does everyone feel about policies that do not allow for opting out, aside of course from simply not going to that school? I grew up in a school where it was used, enforced, and my parents allowed it....i got to take advantage of it. So, to me, its really not all that foreign. However, to others that were not brought up with it, it seems to be absolutely barbaric and unallowable. For me, now, I don't think anyone except me gets to physically punish my child....just not gonna happen. Thoughts?

Too far for me, but I've always thought this would be a great school to go to if I were a boy. Several of my friends teach there. www.westernacademy.net/

Ah, nevermind, I see you're looking for something less West Houston and more Katy. Western Academy is just inside the Beltway. Good luck, I am still several years away from this issue!

Read some of the online reviews about St Elizabeth Ann Seton. Doesn't sound like the nuns there are particularly interested in feedback from parents.

The problem with really cheap private schools that are subsidized by churches is that you are then a recipient of charity, as opposed to a valued customer.

Our little guy will be going to St. Cecilia in the fall. It's kind of on the Westside...