>> It's not secret. It's out in the open and people who don't do it are looked at with scorn or dismissal.
Amongst the participants, it isnt secret -- you see all the other participants at the center weekly, or more. I think a lot of it is a class thing that runs side by side.
For the outsiders, it is a secret. I was part of a group in K12 that didnt even always have consistent nutrition. The Kumon kids were a strange breed -- folks who had money to "splurge" on "private" education.
All the kids I knew in those programs hated it. Last thing they wanted to do after school was more school. They wanted to play games or sports but their parents decided being an A student in elementary school is better than any potential social or physical development.
Western society loves to make every kid "special" either in their challenges or abilities. We seem to forget that every kid IS special, in the sense they are diverse, inconsistent, immature and range dramatically across different types of skills & abilities. If you're a middle-class or higher new parent in the West, let me give you my parenting book for free: chill the fuck out.
Well, it could also be priorities, not extra money to splurge. Private school costs way more. Kumon OTOH may be just a couple hundred a month, modest enough even a working class person can easily afford by bucking up and treating their childs' education as higher priority than having cable or being able to ever eat out, or not having to work a second job on saturday mornings.
This is how I was raised and how my family went from sugar cane peasant farmers to school teachers in one generation and from school teachers to software engineers and doctors in just one more. From 6th grade dropouts to high school degrees in one generation, and from there to masters degree in one more.
Culture matters. Values matter.
There was a time in my young life when my parents slept on the couch so the kids could have a bedroom, so we could live in a tiny place so we could pay less rent and afford to live in a really really good public school district where many kids' parents were ivy league college professors.
Amongst the participants, it isnt secret -- you see all the other participants at the center weekly, or more. I think a lot of it is a class thing that runs side by side.
For the outsiders, it is a secret. I was part of a group in K12 that didnt even always have consistent nutrition. The Kumon kids were a strange breed -- folks who had money to "splurge" on "private" education.