Moving to College Park
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Anonymous
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We are planning to relocate to College Park in Summer 2024. I'm looking for guidance on High School options. College Park Academy looks promising, but I'm concerned about the lottery process since we are not current residents.
It looks likely we'd be zoned for Northwestern High School. Can any share current feedback on their experience? Are there any non religious private high schools? |
Anonymous
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What type of student is your child? What environment are they coming from?
you’d have to really research non religious private schools, I do not believe there are any in the area Idk about the lottery because those are luck of the draw, but you could try to see if you could get into Roosevelt as well. Personally, I wouldn’t send my kid to Northwestern. |
Anonymous
| I live in University Park, just blocks away from Northwestern. My kids aren't yet high school aged, but I know very few kids from the neighborhood who go to Northwestern--it is widely considered not a great option. For public, most families try to get into Eleanor Roosevelt (STEM magnet) or College Park Academy. For privates, the top choices are DeMatha (boys), Seton (girls), Sandy Spring Friends, St. Anselm's Abbey (boys)--I think they're all technically religious, but I don't know anything about the daily religiosity actually happening at any of them. I'll chime back in if I think of any others that I'm missing. |
Anonymous
| You aren’t eligible for the lottery if you haven’t moved yet. |
Anonymous
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My kid is at Northwestern High School in the Visual and Performance Arts program.
They are extremely happy there. So far all the teachers and staff have been great. The sports teams and extra curriculars are meh at best but that means that our kid gets to play and get leadership roles in student government etc. They are in all AP and Honors classes and they have a tight friend group. NWHS is a place where you will find trouble if you want to but you can also avoid it easily. BUT, I know that not all the kids at the school are as well served as mine and I don't think there are many high achieving kids outside of the specialty programs. I think that if your kid can get into that program then it is an option if they aren't interested then you are probably better finding a private for one year and then trying for the lottery into CPA, ERHS, CMIT etc the following year. Another public option is the IB program at Parkdale. It is under enrolled I know at least one family who moved over the summer and was able to get their kid in after jumping through a bunch of hoops. Again, the specialty program is great but the regular comprehensive program is meh at best. If you want to go that route, I would reach out to the IB coordinator at the school and county levels as soon as you have your new address and start the conversation. The school board member for that part of the county is also very responsive and I would bring them into the conversation as soon as you get your first no. Duval's Aerospace program is similar. I know that they were recruiting students into August. Your student will need to have taken the PSAT. The default PGCPS answer is going to be no but you should keep pushing if that's what you want to do. Private schools would include Dematha, Seton, Vincent Pallotti High School (Laurel), Key School (Annapolis), Sandy Spring Friends School, Bishop McNamara (Capitol Heights), Holy Redeemer, St Jeromes. Many of these are "religion light" and I know plenty of non-catholics who attend. I don't know of any highly regarded secular privates in PG county. |
Anonymous
ETA- My child is a sophomore if that matters. |
Anonymous
| Have you already bought a place in College Park? If so, I think you can do the lottery. If you are planning to work in college Park, you might extend your housing search to Greenbelt. Greenbelt feeds into Eleanor Roosevelt. |
Anonymous
This is good advice. Eleanor Roosevelt is a solid school. |
Anonymous
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There are a lot of good options for high school for College Park residents. The performing arts program at Northwestern is top notch. For kids interested in STEM, there's Eleanor Roosevelt, but Duval also has an aerospace engineering program that looks amazing. Parkdale has an IB program. My kid is in 8th grade and goes to College Park Academy. A lot of kids leave after 8th grade so it might be possible to get them in even as a 10th grader. The big problem for all of these schools is that you need a PGCPS address and a student ID number yesterday to apply to these programs.
And ERHS requires a PSAT score. You can try moving to greenbelt and having your kid attend ERHS. Private schools have the same issue - deadlines have mostly passed for fall admission. |
Anonymous
Yeah, I think PG is Eleanor Roosevelt or Bust. |
Anonymous
This is completely false. There are several other High Schools that are options, especially in the specialty programs. For Northwestern, the VPA and the Project Lead the Way programs are excellent. In addition to the ones listed in previous posts, Charles Flowers and Bowie High are solid schools. Flowers has had some issues with fighting but the Principal is back and according to the students I have talked to things are under control. You do need PSAT scores for ERHS and DuVal, although DuVa Aerospace Program is not really competitive since most kids choose ERHS if they are offered the seat. My middle child is looking at the Academy of the Health Science which the younger one wants to go to Roosevelt. I'm not sure they will get into those programs but if not, they will go to Parkdale's IB program. |
Anonymous
| OP - is your child going to high school in Fall 24? |
Anonymous
I used to teach at CPA. I don't recall us taking 10th graders, but even if they do, I would really think about how that might affect your kid. I imagine that, post-Covid, it isn't as difficult to adjust to the online learning part of it. The main issue is going from 9th grade at a "normal" school to CPA, which lacks a lot of the traditional high school experience. When I was there, all of the electives and advanced courses were online only. You kind of lose that collective learning experience as a result. Most of the kids go to a room (The Independent Learning Center or ILC) and sit at a table to take their classes on their laptops. The classes were async, so it wasn't a virtual class where they would talk to other kids. They were reading the online text, doing the work by themselves, and if they had questions, they could email the teacher or schedule a call during office hours. I found that kids who started there in middle school did better than those who came in ninth grade. It definitely takes some getting used to. |
Anonymous
| I live in College Park and we are zoned for Parkdale. My research into the data for the IB program (can be found on the PGCPS WEBSITE) was disappointing. The regular population at Parkdale is being cheated of an education and should be sued by the parents for denying their children an adequate education and danger. The US Civil Rights Office at the US Dept of Ed, the NAACP and Latinx activist groups, particularly bc of the ESOL program, should also join in this lawsuit. The students themselves have vainly posted youtubes about the poor conditions at the school, seeking help. In my part of College Park, not one parent sends their child there, they homeschool, send to private schools, pray their child tests highly enough for the STEM program at Roosevelt. In other words, CP is not yet a great place to live for public middle or high school choices except for the remote chance at the charter or limited access programs. |
Anonymous
I find comments like this so odd. There are 2 thousand kids at Northwestern. Obviously kids "go there." But not families that look like you, PP? Is that it? |