Why is there such a high concentration of SN resources around Rockville?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are a ton of special needs schools in that area.

OP here. This is part of why I'm asking the question. Why are they all here?

[Anonymous]

Rockville is at the confluence of 495 and 270. There is cheap office space (relatively speaking). There are a lot of specialists out there, not just special needs specialists. You are looking at this a bit skewed. Yes, my kid's OT and PT is there. But so is my optho and my dermatologist and my NT child's 2 specialists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a ton of special needs schools in that area.

OP here. This is part of why I'm asking the question. Why are they all here?

They aren't all there, OP:
http://www.exceptionalschoolsfair.com/about-us.html

Instead of complaining about something pointless--it's not some vast conspiracy, what is it that you are looking for--schools, OT, ST, what?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a ton of special needs schools in that area.

OP here. This is part of why I'm asking the question. Why are they all here?

They aren't all there, OP:
http://www.exceptionalschoolsfair.com/about-us.html

Instead of complaining about something pointless--it's not some vast conspiracy, what is it that you are looking for--schools, OT, ST, what?

I really didn't claim it was a vast conspiracy. I'm just surprised that when I've looked at schools, ABA, PT, etc - the preponderance seem to be centered around Rockville, when I have never considered that the nexus of population density. I didn't know if there was some special reason - it seems like it's already been pretty well answered: newer problems emerging, cheapest place to put them, malpractice caps. I'm satisfied with the answers, and just wishing we had similar resources in closer distance.

[Anonymous]

I just think it's related to the reason that shoe stores and car dealerships tend to cluster together. Once demand for something is directed at a location, it tends to be self-reinforcing. Some of the early SN schools started here. It's more convenient to use a child psychiatrist and an OT gym nearby, etc. That ecosystem means that this general area is a good place to start a new SN school, which feeds the cycle. Also I'm not really sure I would call Rockville the epicenter. Certainly the phenomenon encompasses Rockville, but also Potomac, Bethesda, Chevy Chase, etc.. And of course the NIMH is in Bethesda...

[Anonymous]

I live in DC and when I first started in my journey I pondered this same question a lot. Four or five prominent special needs schools all in the same area, at least two special needs gyms...the list goes on and on...plus doctors etc
However I think this is a question one focuses on when they are in the semi-shocked state that this is what we have to deal w. Once I accepted my child's situation I stopped giving a crap about this questions. I'm focused on helping my child, not on alk the ways the situation sucks.
As it happens ive gotten what I need closer to home and when I do have to go out that way it's not so bad. In any case im out there more for my NT kid.

[Anonymous]

Such an interesting question. We live on Capitol Hill where there's actually a decent number of excellent resources, and yet I still find myself driving to Rockville at least once a week. I've often wondered why I'm always driving to Rockville and not some VA suburb.

We presently do Sat classes at MocoMovt (previously Dynamite), see Dr Shapiro, plus get orthotics in nearby Potomac.

Luckily the GW parkway is oNe of the loveliest drives out there.

[Anonymous]

NP. Same here.

Here's what I found on wikipedia re Rockville:

"Rockville is also the center of the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Area's Jewish population, containing several synagogues, kosher restaurants, and the largest of the Washington area's three Jewish community centers, part of a complex which includes a Jewish nursing home, day school, theater, and educational facility. There are also high percentages of Jewish population in the surrounding areas of North Potomac and Potomac, which are largely residential and not as commercially suitable as Rockville. Rockville also became home to a Jewish population who fled Iran during the Islamic Revolution in 1979, continuing their cultural and religious Persian Mizrahi traditions."

The Jewish community is generally wealthy and are likely to demand and use resources for children with special needs.

I have coworkers in the medical field who say it seems to them the Jewish population has a slightly greater percentage of children with ASD or ASD-like traits. I hear this over and over again. These practitioners would never say this publicly, but this is what I hear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP. Same here.

Here's what I found on wikipedia re Rockville:

"Rockville is also the center of the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Area's Jewish population, containing several synagogues, kosher restaurants, and the largest of the Washington area's three Jewish community centers, part of a complex which includes a Jewish nursing home, day school, theater, and educational facility. There are also high percentages of Jewish population in the surrounding areas of North Potomac and Potomac, which are largely residential and not as commercially suitable as Rockville. Rockville also became home to a Jewish population who fled Iran during the Islamic Revolution in 1979, continuing their cultural and religious Persian Mizrahi traditions."

The Jewish community is generally wealthy and are likely to demand and use resources for children with special needs.

I have coworkers in the medical field who say it seems to them the Jewish population has a slightly greater percentage of children with ASD or ASD-like traits. I hear this over and over again. These practitioners would never say this publicly, but this is what I hear.

Yes, I think they would and in addition to that there are genetic illnesses too. One of the pgd testing panels is referred to as the "Jewish panel." But as to what another poster was mentioning, it's not just SN resources that are out this way, there are a lot of private schools in general and very large churches too. When Bethesda started to get big this is where you could find large tracts of land to put institutions/organizations.

[Anonymous]

Rockville is an actual town. Many addresses in Montgomery county are not. You can write whatever you want on the envelope -- Bethesda, Rockville, Potomac -- for the most part it's just a state of mind.

[Anonymous]

Montgomery County is one if the nations centers of medical expertise and biomedical commerce.

[Anonymous]

As PPs have pointed out, it's not just SN schools clustering in that area, privates in general are quite concentrated in certain parts of MD. There is definitely a statistically aberrant concentration of private schools in Potomac and North Bethesda, many of them extremely close to one another. Of course, most of these arose before the SN institutions did, so it makes sense that the SN resources would cluster a bit further out.