Frisch.. for high school next year

singleagain ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 9:45 am

Good morning all

On behalf of my friend who doesn't have an Imamother account but is looking at Frisch for her daughter to start highschool next year.
Straight copy paste form her messages to me: I'll try my best to add her Q's and clarifications but can we start with this?

I guess just general student life info. How hard is it to fit in- a lot of cliques? boyfriend/girlfriend drama? Overall a friendly feel or do kids get lost because it's such a big school?

Maybe also about materialism, how intense is it. Like if you're not super wealthy would you fit in

oohlala ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 10:50 am

It’s probably best to ask around in a more local Bergen county group.

↑ singleagain ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 10:51 am

Do you know of any?

↑ oohlala ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 10:54 am

There’s a fb group called Teaneck Bergenfield moms. She doesn’t have anyone to ask in her neighborhood personally?!
My husband went here years ago and had a very good experience academically and socially but I imagine things have changed over the years.
I have heard that they do their best to take nice friendly kids.

amother

Banana

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:00 am

My kids are younger but I do know it’s hard to get into Frisch.

amother

Green ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:02 am

I can't answer your specific questions but I live on the UWS and alot of kids from the neighborhood and got to Frisch. A friend of mine (not fancy, not wealthy fwiw) son just started 9th grade there and she was really impressed at what she saw so far. Our family is to the right of Frisch but my husband always comments that the Frisch kids may look 'scruffy' but they are really good kids and represent well in shul and community events and that the school does a really good job of making kids not only love school but love Yiddishkeit.

amother

Mulberry ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:16 am

DC graduated too many years ago for me to speak intelligently.
We were very happy. My child has great Frisch friends, got a great education, is self confident, independent, and frum.

She should definitely speak with current parents about what they like and those about what they don’t like. What they don’t like is probably more important than what they do like. You want more than OMG it’s amazing. Shiryah is the best! My child loves Frisch!!!

Some tips to realize when speaking to parents, there is a lot of kool-aid about Frisch. Know your audience as some people may feel like anything negative about Frisch or the academics/class size/adjustment/social hierarchy is a negative reflection on their kid, so they may be less upfront. Pose questions in a very non-leading way.
Additionally, because there is so many more applicants than seats, people with younger children who are not there yet may also be hesitant to say anything but praises in fear their younger ones may not get a seat. It is unfounded, but this is how people think.

You may want to speak to people and pose it more of what are some peoples complaints and how do you feel about them? What are some challenges some people had as a freshman that they overcame, and what did the school do to help or was it on the kid/parent? Point blank questions about class size and if they feel it works with their tuition? How big house is the school, what does that mean? How did it impact their kid and their neighbors kids….?

(ETA regarding materialism-I buy all shoes at DSW clearance, clothing is end of season clearance. My children have never had a Montclair coat, and nothing is worse than some having the same thing-we like to be unique. I personally don’t get all the “in style” threads on this site)

↑ singleagain ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:21 am

My friend is not on Facebook and she's not on this website that's why she asked me to post. She found one thread from several years ago and instead of arriving it I started a new one

She also in her peer group. Her child is one of the oldest so she doesn't really know anyone else to ask questions of

Does anyone know a current fresh parent who I can maybe put in touch with my friend someone who would be willing to discuss things with her and have a more generalized conversation? Obviously this isn't the easiest way to get information, but she doesn't know even who to ask

amother

↑ Mulberry

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:27 am

Is she in Bergen county? Can she ask around shul? Ask the elementary principal to connect her with families who sent to the different schools?

amother

↑ Green

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 11:33 am

She needs to join facebook or imamother. Or both.

↑ singleagain ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 12:00 pm

Okay, my friend does not is not interested in joining Facebook or email mother for her own personal reasons

Anyone hear a current frish parent who wouldn't mind emailing with my friend if you would message me with your email address and then I can pass it on to my friend or I can give you hers. Whatever is more comfortable. I'm just trying to help connect her

Like I said, her child is one of the oldest in the peer group who is going to high schools so she's not quite sure who to reach out to unless someone has a contact at frish as that can put her in touch with a current parent. But honestly that's a little bit more biased because the school was obviously going to give someone who has no issues and you want to talk to various parents. Still a little bit here

amother

Charcoal

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 12:18 pm

It has a good reputation. They attract good teachers. It’s a co-ed school so there might be the boy girl stuff which I would never want to put my kids through.

amother

Anemone ↓

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 12:33 pm

You're not going to find so many frisch people on here. She really needs to reach out to more local people and ask her school admins to put her in touch. I don't send to Frisch (we send to more right wing schools) but the kids I know who go there are typical LWMO, so if that's what she's looking for, they'll fit right in. Yes, there's boy/girl stuff, you will get that at any co-ed school. Also Frisch is notoriously hard to to get into, they get way more applications than they have spots. She will definitely need to apply to other schools.

↑ singleagain

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 12:40 pm

Her kids have been at co Ed schools for ever so I'm not sure that's gonna be an issue

And it's not the only school she's looking at.

Again asking if anyone would be willing to email with my friend please pm me an email and I'll put you in touch with her

amother

↑ Anemone

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 12:58 pm

Can you join the Teaneck/Bergenfield Jewish moms group? You don't actually have to be a mom to join, you don't even technically need to be in Teaneck or Bergenfield davka (though you do have to be from BC, so New Milford, Fairlawn, etc). You can reach out to the admin to see if you can join and then post this there. I think you'll get more connected that way. Is your friend part of Teaneckshuls? It's an email listserv, not social media, so that might be worth a try for her.

gingleale

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 1:06 pm

Pming you.

amother

Diamond

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 1:14 pm

I would advise her to ask her kid's current school principal for names of families from that school who currently have a kid there who would be willing to speak to them. She can ask for all the schools she is looking at. This is seen as a normal thing to do. She can also ask her shul rav/rebbetzin for this.

↑ oohlala

Wed, Sep 25 2024, 2:36 pm

If she’s not on fb and has wattsapp she needs to join some block or neighborhood groups. I don’t think you’ll get specific info here. She will need to ask neighbors and friends on her block or other parents at school.

amother

Wandflower

Sun, Oct 13 2024, 1:23 am

singleagain wrote:

I guess just general student life info. How hard is it to fit in- a lot of cliques? boyfriend/girlfriend drama? Overall a friendly feel or do kids get lost because it's such a big school?

Maybe also about materialism, how intense is it. Like if you're not super wealthy would you fit in

My daughter started at Frisch as a 9th grader this year, so we're still new to the experience, but happy to answer any questions I can.

It is a huge school, roughly 250 kids in each grade. Someone in this thread referred to it as a big tent school, which is a great way to describe it. I think probably all of those experiences will be at Frisch, it just depends how you personalize your experience there. What classes your child ends up in, what kinds of club/extracurriculars they select into, etc.

For example, this is our experience: my daughter came from a smaller school, and didn't really know anyone going it. She's in all honors classes, so she's with the same kids for multiple classes a day, so she's made friends easily with the kids in her classes. She went on the freshman shabbaton, and made some new friends there as well. In her grade of 250 kids, she probably has 8 girls she's really friendly with, which isn't a huge number, but it's a great amount of kids to have someone to sit with at lunch most days! According to her, even though she's friendly with a few boys in her class, girls hang out with girls, and boys hang out with boys.

One of Frisch's core four values is Community of Kindness, which I sort of assumed was an aspirational idea, but not something that was relevant in real life, but my daughter has made it clear that Frisch deliberately cultivates a school community where it's seen as "cool" to be friendly and welcoming and kind to people. In her first week, she was frequently stopped by upperclassman checking in to see how her day was going, and if she was lost and needed help (and sometimes she was!)

It's only been a little over a month, but so far her experience has been really positive.

That said, I know someone else whose kid is in grade-level classes, and has struggled more to find a tight friend group, as the populations of their specific classes don't easily lend themselves to putting them with the kids they're likely to be friends with. Because it's such a big school, your child's experience there will depend in a major way on what level classes they end up in, and what extracurriculars they take, so those are important questions to think about too.

One extra note, we found Frisch to be very accommodating in making schedule changes. My daughter was in a class that wasn't a great fit for her, and they were very open to switching her to a more appropriate class after we reached out. They do push very strongly for kids to advocate for themselves (I reached out to her guidance counselor to start the conversation, and while she was open to talking to me, at the end of the call she said "if we decide to move forward with this switch, I need your daughter to come discuss it with me directly.")

Happy to answer any further questions if your friend has any!