“Where did you go to high school?” An upcoming Behind The Minds program explores the classic St. Louis question from an educational standpoint: public vs. private.

According to the St. Louis Regional Chamber, there are about 80 private high schools in the St. Louis area. This program investigates if attending a private high school makes a difference in a student’s future in a variety of ways:

1.     The show follows a middle school student and his parents who are in the midst of a difficult decision: where should he go to high school?

2.     The program includes a panel discussion of six students representing both public and private high schools. The students discuss how they selected their high school, ways their school has prepared them for the college transition, and advice for middle school students and their parents.

3.     The program analyzes the results of an independent study about how public vs. private high schools affect students’ chances of obtaining a higher education and their long-run income.  The study by St. Louis Federal Reserve Economist Michael Owyang found that people who attended a private high school earned 2.6 percent more than their high school peers. In addition those who attended Catholic high schools earned 13.6 percent more than those who went to a public high school.

Owyang says that there’s more higher education attainment coming from parochial and private schools, however there are uncontrollable variables that affect the results.

“Parental involvement is extremely important,” Owyang said. “It may be that students that are going to Catholic schools, parochial schools or private schools already have parents who want them to go to college…but if they had sent them to public schools, may have been more inclined to attend college anyway,” he said.

“I hope parents take away the message that finding the right high school fit for their child could help him or her perform better; no matter if it’s public or private,” said Behind The Minds Producer Angie Weidinger.

Behind The Minds: “Where did you go to high school?” airs Wednesday, February 13 at 7 pm on HEC-TV. It will be available on demand at hectv.org on Thursday, February 14.

Behind The Minds is an award-winning newsmagazine program that shows how educators, students, and the community are successfully solving problems confronting elementary/secondary education. February 2013 marks the tenth anniversary of this program that is the only television show in St. Louis focused solely on education. It airs on HEC-TV on Wednesdays and Fridays at 7 pm and on KTVI 2.2 Tuesdays at 1:30 pm.

HEC-TV is St. Louis’ leading producer of education, arts and cultural television programming and can be seen on Charter digital channel 989, over the air channel 2.2, U-verse channel 99, and on the web at hectv.staging.wpengine.com.

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