Is there a way you can search for homes by school district?
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
|
We are interested in buying a house in the Woodson and George Mason HS pyramid. We are open to Annandale, Falls Church or Fairfax as long as they are feeders to Woodson or George Mason.
Which website is best to find homes for sale in these boundaries? Can you list zip codes that feed into these high schools? Thanks. |
Anonymous
| You have to google fairfax county school boundary locator and go to the specific site, and type in the specific address. It varies from street to street, and sometimes within streets. For example, A friend's child is zoned for one elementary school, and the kid 2 houses down on the same street is zoned for another elementary school. |
Anonymous
| You can search by schools on many of the end-user real estate sites BUT it depends on whether the listing agent listed the school when they entered it in MRIS in the first place - many don't enter it at all and some enter it wrong. Best bet is to look at the map on the FCPS site and find a real estate site (longandfoster.com, homesdatabase.com, etc.) that allows you to map and draw a map with as close to the FCPS boundaries as you can. Than if a particular house is close to the boundary, check the FCPS locator. |
Anonymous
George Mason is easy...city of falls church. In fcps, it takes more work, and boundaries do changes. |
Anonymous
| Franklymls.com let's you search by school, assuming the listing has the school included in it. |
Anonymous
|
If the MLS code starts with FA, it's in the city of Falls Church and feeds to Mason.
Out of curiosity, OP, what's wrong with Marshall (between Vienna and Falls Church?) and Madison (town of Vienna)? They are in the same general area and also have a generally good reputation. Also remember some realtors will get the school wrong, whether by accident or design. So even franklymls.com is wrong (you can do HS=Woodson in the search field of franklymls.com). http://boundary.fcps.edu/boundary/ There are some changes to Woodson's zone coming in 2012-13, I think part of Annandale's zone is going to Woodson. There's some changes out in Centreville too but those won't affect you. Oddly enough it was fought by the older residents (who liked Annandale) and cheered by the younger families (who like the Woodson reputation more.) |
Anonymous
Totally random to suggest that you're just considering Woodson and George Mason. No help for you. |
Anonymous
Not the OP, but guessing that Marshall is not considered due to the IB program and Madison is not considered as it is too far out (from a DC-centric commute). Woodson avoided the IB program and Falls Church City is an easier commute into DC. |
Anonymous
Anonymous
Mason is an IB school. |
Anonymous
|
Random choices.
The Falls Church City school system is currently dealing with major overcrowding issues, and since your kids would be with the same group of kids from K-12 it's a very small town feel with everybody all up in your business all the time. I work in Falls Church City, and it's only the people who live there who proclaim it's praise all the time. The Woodson district is a nightmare to commute from. It's a good school, but it's not a big deal, and not normally sought by newcomers to the area. |
Anonymous
Woodson "avoided the IB program?" Did any of you live here back in the 90's when George Mason was the only IB school in the area? That was why people started touting FCC as the best district in the area in the first place. Believe it or not, lots of people want the IB program for their kids, it's a much more well rounded education than picking and choosing a few AP classes. |
Anonymous
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1060207/replies?c=4 Fairfax 'backlash' ousted IB program By George Archibald THE WASHINGTON TIMES Parents and teachers at Woodson High School in Fairfax succeeded in ousting the Geneva-based International Baccalaureate curriculum. This is the first year that college-bound Woodson students are no longer enrolled in the European program pushed by the United Nations and have returned to the U.S. College Board's Advanced Placement (AP) program. "The school was an AP school. They were just in the process of converting over to" the IB program, Fairfax County School Superintendent Daniel Domenech said of the Woodson battle that started in 1999. There was "a significant backlash against the IB program" as he became county superintendent, Mr. Domenech said in an interview. Woodson parents and teachers rebelled because they found that IB's required standard-level courses making up half the curriculum's two-year high school diploma program were not accepted by top-ranked Virginia colleges that their highly achieving children aspired to attend. "It is the death knell," E.J. Nell Hurley, mother of four daughters in Fairfax public schools, said of the IB program. Mr. Domenech credited Mrs. Hurley, an unsuccessful candidate for the Fairfax County School Board in elections Nov. 4, for leading the fight to remove the program from Woodson. "The admissions director for the University of Virginia told us, 'If you are at an IB school and you are not going for the IB diploma, don't waste your time applying to UVa. or any other top-rated schools. Your child's application will go to the bottom of the admissions pile,' " Mrs. Hurley said in an interview. She said the University of Virginia gave just nine academic credits to a J.E.B. Stuart High School graduate with an IB diploma, after two years of IB courses, while the university gave her oldest daughter, Ellen, 36 credits — a full year of college work — for AP courses taken at Woodson. Mrs. Hurley said her younger daughter, Caitlin, told the J.E.B. Stuart graduate: "You did all that work and you got nine lousy credits?" She then said: "Mom, I'm not going to do all that work and get so little recognition for it. It's not worth it." Bradley W. Richardson, director of IB North America in New York, said that while many colleges do not give credit for standard-level IB courses, "over 150 universities in North America now give credit for the full IB diploma and, therefore, are giving credit to standard levels." Mrs. Hurley said she was inspired by teacher Susan H. Shue, chairwoman of Woodson's social studies department. Mrs. Hurley said Mrs. Shue stressed that IB was usurping control over the school program. "She had the guts to stand there in front of the brand-new principal and the area director," Mrs. Hurley said of Mrs. Shue. Mrs. Shue did not wish to be interviewed. Mrs. Hurley said Mrs. Shue told school officials that "because the whole school has to become oriented around the IB program, the master schedule has to run around the IB students. ... That's part of the requirement to be an IB school, that the IB diploma is the premier drive on running the entire school, and it hurts every other student." |
Anonymous
| The article posted is from almost 8 years ago. Many universities are giving credit for IB SL courses now. |
Anonymous
"Many" does not include UVA: http://records.ureg.virginia.edu/content.php?catoid=27&navoid=722#adva_exam The International Baccalaureate The undergraduate schools of the University offer possible credit for scores of 5, 6, or 7 on many higher-level IB examinations. No credit is awarded for standard-level examinations. If you follow discussions comparing AP and IB SL credit, you'll see that Virginia colleges give credits for AP but not for IB SL -- see this thread re: College of William & Mary: http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-william-mary/1174606-w-m-ib.html |