Education quality or proximity?

[amandapdx]

Hi all,

First post on the forum! I have a decision to make and, having just found MMM and FI, I'm wanting to get your take. My son started in our local public school this year in kindergarten, 10 blocks from our house. It's very diverse and low-income, with an active parent community but high turnover of principals and over-reliance on worksheets, standardized testing, rewards for good behavior and teaching to kids, rather than facilitating them exploring their interests. This bothers me a lot. The best part is he is in a Spanish immersion program, which I would love for him to know. He hasn't really made friends but generally does fine there and is still bright and engaged.

I just got him into a local charter Montessori school that starts in 1st grade. It's lovely and I think would be a great fit with his energy - he went to Montessori preschool and loved it. I've heard great things about the program from other parents. However, it is several miles out of the way (a 25-minute bike ride not in the direction of my work downtown) and, though it is 1st through 8th grade, the grades above 3rd are at a separate campus, guaranteeing us two drop-offs for our two kids for most of their elementary school and an extra year of paid Montessori for younger son if I want to prevent all the switching for the kibdergarten year  (younger son is 3 now).

So on the one hand, we have a close, local school with lots of diversity and the learning of a new language, but with serious concerns about educational quality. On the other, a great educational model I believe will work great for my kids, also free, but relatively far away with complicated logistics because of that.

It will come down to what we believe is more important, but I'd love to get some thoughts from this community as we work through it!

(Financially, we're both 40 with moderate incomes in expensive Portland, OR and I was laid off for 4 years during the recession, during which we had two kids and I built an ice cream business. Business now sold, back at work as a city planner. We won't be able to retire super early but now that we're on more solid ground I'm inspired and energized to change our priorities toward frugality and good choices.)

[frugal rph]

My son is also in a Spanish immersion program at our local public school.  It is not in a low income area but also has an active parent community, standardized testing, rewards for good behavior, and teaching to kids.  I lived about 20 minutes away by car during her kindergarten year, but I moved 2 blocks away this past summer.  Twenty minutes does not seem like much, but it wore on me over the year.  Plus, you have to commute there and back twice a day.  The time really adds up, especially for 2 working parents.  I love being so close to the school.  I am also only a few minutes away from the middle school, so when my 7 year old is there and my newborn is in elementary, the commute will still be easy (and walkable). 

If your concerns about the local public school are serious and you feel that your kids will be adversely affected, I would make the sacrifice to take them to the Montessori school. Otherwise, I would not.  My personal feeling is that it is a huge advantage to learn a second language and that smart kids with involved parents will do well almost anywhere.

[TrMama]

You want to pay extra for a monolingual program? I find that mind boggling.

When you make this decision, think long term. Really long term. When your children are adults will they be more appreciative of knowing Spanish? Or of the fact they went to a school with a slightly different philosophy than the local public school?

We have our kids in public immersion school and there's no way I'd switch to a private school that required me to commute to it. Does the Montessori school offer busing?

[KCM5]

Have you considered moving closer to the Montessori school if that's what you value?  That commute would be too much for me, but if the school is really great and you'll have both kids there, it may be worth moving. We're currently working on getting our child into a similar public montessori but I can see how the spanish immersion would be valuable, too. It probably depends on the kids. How does your child handle the worksheets/testing?

Personally, proximity is worth a lot to me (the public montessori we're looking at is right by my work on my current bike commute - score!) but not to the detriment of my child's happiness/education.

[KCM5]

You want to pay extra for a monolingual program? I find that mind boggling.

When you make this decision, think long term. Really long term. When your children are adults will they be more appreciative of knowing Spanish? Or of the fact they went to a school with a slightly different philosophy than the local public school?

We have our kids in public immersion school and there's no way I'd switch to a private school that required me to commute to it. Does the Montessori school offer busing?

To clarify, the OP said they'd be paying for an extra year of Montessori preschool in order to only switch the youngest's school once. It appears that the 1-8 school is public/free.

[amandapdx]

Thanks, KCM5 - you've got it right. The school we just lotteried into is free and public also. It's just a charter school. And the extra year of paid preschool would be optional if we didn't mind switching our youngest a couple of times - not an idea we love. If I had kept my current kindergartener in Montessori an extra year (if I had known we could definitely win the lottery and get into this charter), the decision would be totally clear. Part of my hesitance is that he is familiar with his current school already.

It would be challenging to move closer to the school. First, they have two campuses so we'd have to try to split the distance, which might work distance-wise; however, Portland's real estate market is exploding and we would not be able to purchase another house, or even rent something comparable, for what we are paying on our mortgage. We also can't afford to spend more on housing, and in that area houses are as much as double what we have currently. People buying right now are also offering up to $60,000 above asking and still getting beat out by other offers that are better, all cash, etc. A smaller house or apartment would net us very little in terms of savings with rents and housing costs being what they are, and would be a hard sell to my husband, who never wants to move again! Plus we love our neighbors, the 'hood, etc.

Thanks for the comments! I'd love to hear from others on what factors played into their education decisions.

Amanda

[silkyhorse]

We are also looking at options for schooling, as our son will start 4k in the fall.  We have the public school 2 blocks away, a Christian school 4 blocks away, and the public charter school is about a 10 minute adult bike ride.  With two schooling options within easy walking distance, we immediately ruled out the charter school.  Our particular priorities include a Christian education, so we're trying 4k at the Christian school (and probably kindergarten, too, since the Christian school offers half-day and the public is only full-day and I want my kids home with me as much as possible!).  At that point, we'll re-evaluate for 1st grade. 

Once he's in 1st grade, I'd like to keep him at whichever school we choose for the long term so he can build good, strong friendships.

Btw, the public school is lower-income and rates a 5 at greatschools.org.  That also plays into our decision a little bit, as the schools on the "better part of town" rate 8 and 9.

[mm1970]

Well, I'd personally go with the school that feels better for your family.

We live in a not-great public school district, and we transfer our 3rd grader to a different school, that is still not great, but better than the first.  They are about the same distance from our house.

However, I have an almost-3 year old in daycare.  He is in daycare at my good friend's home daycare.  He loves it there.  He is learning so much.  I liked my older son's daycare, but this one is much better.

She is 5 miles southeast of our house.  Our work is 10 miles northwest of our house.  So, as painful as it is (and it is), we drive 5 miles in the wrong direction, 2x a day, for our childcare.  I really struggled this year because I thought about switching to a preschool that would be more conveniently located and cheaper, but this really works so well for him.

And that means most likely I will only have one year of a single drop off and pick up (kinder/6th).

[former player]

Does "a 25-minute bike ride not in the direction of my work downtown" mean an extra 50 minutes in the morning and another extra 50 minutes in the afternoon?  That sounds impossible.  Even half that long term will drag you down.

Philosophies only get you so far: very often practicalities matter more.  The nearer school sounds like a safe and sane learning environment for your son, and with two educated and engaged parents, he is likely to do just fine there.  Also, consider this: why should your son have to start having a long commute aged 6?   A long commute when he starts work will be quite soon enough.

[madamwitty]

Re: moving closer to the charter school: Another point to consider is that charter schools are not guaranteed to stay in the same location, depending on the conditions of their lease.  (For that matter, the neighborhood school could potentially move, too.) Consider also the renewal date of the charter and any potentially anti-charter legislation in the works. There is likely to be more uncertainty regarding the future of the charter school.

That said, I send my daughter to a charter school and we love it. Fortunately I didn't have to choose between proximity and quality, as our charter school is actually marginally closer than our neighborhood school. Lucky us!

[RootofGood]

We sent our kids to "the worst school in the district" and everything has turned out spectacularly well.  Test scores consistently in the 90-99%tile range, diverse interests, their involved in extracurriculars, and have extremely diverse classmates and friends.  Our "worst school in the district" was also just recognized as the second best magnet school in the nation, so it's maybe not as bad as the test scores from the challenging demographics would suggest. 

The school is in our neighborhood and we walk the 0.5 miles there every day.  We attend virtually every after school event and all the awards ceremonies and volunteer gigs during the day.  It's no big deal to go to their school an extra 2-3 times per day (like we did this past week a few times) since it's 1-2 minutes to drive there or 10 minutes to walk there.  If the school was 20-30+ minutes away (which we could have chosen for a much better school as far as test scores go), we wouldn't be going to all the events during and after school.  They would also have a loooooong bus ride or us parents would be spending an extra 2 hours per day shuttling kids around (instead of my current leisurely 40 minutes of walking every day to ferry them to/from school on foot). 

[amandapdx]

Thanks, all. I'm in the process of talking with some other parents and am hearing great things about the school. We have our orientation tomorrow, after which we'll need to make a final decision.

It looks like my husband could get my son there and pick him up without substantially increasing his car commute each day (it's a very different route and we'll have to be very organized to get him to work on time consistently, but the drive shouldn't be much longer), so this might work without too much hassle, if we decide to make the switch.

I'll check back in and let you know what we decide; I am leaning toward the Montessori model, which I believe will be really crucial in helping my kids keep their love of learning and curiosity longer than "normal" public school.  I'll let you know what we do!

Amanda

[BananaPants]

We bought our house 9 years ago, less than half a mile from the best elementary school in the district.  Even though we were aware of that, we expected to be able to sell and move to a nearby town with really good schools by the time we'd have our first child and have that child be old enough for school anyways - and then a whole lot of life happened, including the real estate bubble collapsing, and this is not a good time for us to be trying to sell the house.  So at least our kids will go to that great school, right?  Nope, three years ago they closed that school, built a new one, and redistricted to get more ethnic and socioeconomic balance.   Now we're districted to the same elementary school as the city's housing project, which is a Title 1 school.   Several of our neighbors have opted for parochial school for their kids to avoid having them exposed to what they see as a negative environment (in other words, they don't want their kids around poor minorities, an attitude that we do not share).

We considered entering her in the magnet lottery for the Montessori magnet or one of the two STEM magnets.  If she got a magnet spot then our younger daughter would have automatic placement at the same school.  But the odds of getting ANY lottery spot are only around 1 in 5, and if we had gotten it we would be putting a just-turned-5 year old on a school bus for an hour each way.   Then we looked into private options but the only affordable options are the parochials, and we're not Catholic so we'd pay full tuition. 

Our kids' godmother and my dear friend is an elementary school teacher.  She said that the biggest predictor of a child's academic success is parental involvement.   I also remember reading in the book Freakonomics that a child's academic success is related more to who the parents are, rather than what they do.  Our kids are in an intact, middle class home with two college-educated parents - statistically speaking, they'll probably be fine regardless of which schools they attend.  Our city's schools aren't bad, objectively speaking.  They're similar in school quality and demographics to the public schools my husband and I attended; we are both the product of public education, even through college. 

I admit that I'm concerned that our older daughter, who is a bright and inquisitive child, could be discouraged and bored in a school environment if her teachers end up having to teach to the lowest common denominator.  We expect to do additional at-home enrichment and work with her at home to keep her engaged and learning, which I suspect we'd be doing to some extent regardless.  We just may need to do MORE of it.  We have major issues with Common Core (particularly for early childhood education) but we'd be facing that even in the magnets or in our local parochial schools, which are all adopting Common Core as well.    So she'll go to the Title 1 school for kindergarten and we'll reevaluate a year from now.  If we have to consider the magnets or parochial school, we will. 

[RootofGood]

Bananapants, I mentioned up thread that we're in the worst school in our relatively awesome very large district.  Our kids are doing great in this school with very challenging demographics (tons of poor minorities :) ).  And you can guess which kids tend to excel: those with educated parents holding relatively professional jobs that place a strong emphasis on education, learning, and enrichment.  Also those kids who have parents that are pretty active at school seem to do well. 

Test scores tell the same story.  If you're white or Asian, hold a bachelors degree (or better), and/or have above average income, then your kids tend to score very well at this school. 

The upside of the school is that there aren't a ton of wealthy kids surrounding our children instilling spendy habits and expectations.  I've heard from friends who have kids in the wealthy public schools nearby that there's a lot of keeping up with the Joneses at school.  Not really the case at our school. 

[amandapdx]

Thanks to everyone who weighed in on my question. To follow up on my original post, we are going to send our kids to this public Montessori charter out of our neighborhood!

With a kindergartener who is already complaining that school is boring, that the only time he likes is when he chooses his own work (something he'll do much more at the new school) and that he doesn't have the time he wants to finish things (also an issue resolved by longer work periods in the Montessori model), this just feels like a much better fit for him. We will work to incorporate learning Spanish in other parts of our life, but this seems like the right decision for me - I feel he will in a place that won't just crush his spirit and make him listen and follow rules all the time, but will be in a place where he feels he is an important member of a community and his opinion matters.

I'm looking forward to the transition and getting involved in the school. I'm hoping to still go down to one car (finally retire our 1994, 240,00-mile Corolla) so we'll see if I can still make that work with this decision, but otherwise I think this is the right thing for the kids. And I'll work to offer him extra-curriculars in our neighborhood so he can stay acquainted with the neighborhood kids too.

Thanks again!

Amanda

[La Bibliotecaria Feroz]

I didn't see much discussion above about individual differences between children.

We have two young children. I'm not sure they will go to the same school. Their personalities are really different--one loves and thrives on structure, the other much less so. Our neighborhood school is verrrrry structured. Might be awesome for Big Brother but might not work for Little Brother.