Which W / BCC school is least difficult to not be very wealthy

[Anonymous]

Quince Orchard

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are looking at BCC catchment then Rock Creek Forest and Rosemary Hills (including CCES/NCCES for 3-5) are going to be your best bets.

I was going to say this. We live in RCF and many couples are two feds, or one fed + one nonprofit worker or an academic. Lots of highly educated people who are not rolling in money. The elementary school also draws from the nearby apartments which tend to be immigrants, so it’s quite diverse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:hi OP, I am in a similar situation as you, and have been reading up on comments on this topic on DCUM. From what I understand: Whitman and Churchill are wealthy and pretty white. WJ and BCC are more diverse in every way. BCC also has the IB program. All four HS are supposed to be super good. My office is in downtown DC, and I do not want a long commute, so will probably go with BCC. I would feel super poor at Whitman, especially as a single Mom.

Churchill has a strong Asian contingent that is very studious, mostly Chinese. Downtown Bethesda has a small community of Japanese expatriates and diplomats from various nations of Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia, so the BCC cluster is very international, which is why the IB is there. The people we know from Whitman are by no means very wealthy! Your kids will find their friends wherever they go.

I think that instead of parsing all these excellent schools, you and OP need to drive in all these neighborhoods, get a feel for each of them, then find housing (rental, house, apartment, townhouse, whatever) that you can be happy in, that suits your commute! Your needs matter too, not just those of your children!

[Anonymous]

There are a lot of small regular people houses in Whitman district. Sure many are being torn down for huge new builds, but there is still a decent inventory to keep track of.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][b]There are a lot of small regular people houses in Whitman district.[/b] Sure many are being torn down for huge new builds, but there is still a decent inventory to keep track of. [/quote]

And you can buy them for $1 million, if you outbid the developers!

[Transplant_1]

Anonymous wrote: Churchill has a strong Asian contingent that is very studious, mostly Chinese. Downtown Bethesda has a small community of Japanese expatriates and diplomats from various nations of Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia, so the BCC cluster is very international, which is why the IB is there. The people we know from Whitman are by no means very wealthy! Your kids will find their friends wherever they go.

.....

Thank you for this. It's actually very helpful. Walter Johnson seems to be a mix of it all: "wealthy whites," internationals, immigrants (it appears to be not dominated by one area of the world, but a mixture). Could it be characterized in that way? Just curious.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][b]There are a lot of small regular people houses in Whitman district.[/b] Sure many are being torn down for huge new builds, but there is still a decent inventory to keep track of. [/quote]

And you can buy them for $1 million, if you outbid the developers![/quote]

PP, you do understand that not everyone can afford a $ 1 mill house, right? Especially not a single mom with two kids. It is not even easy to find such a rental.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:hi OP, I am in a similar situation as you, and have been reading up on comments on this topic on DCUM. From what I understand: Whitman and Churchill are wealthy and pretty white. WJ and BCC are more diverse in every way. BCC also has the IB program. All four HS are supposed to be super good. My office is in downtown DC, and I do not want a long commute, so will probably go with BCC. I would feel super poor at Whitman, especially as a single Mom.

Churchill has a strong Asian contingent that is very studious, mostly Chinese. Downtown Bethesda has a small community of Japanese expatriates and diplomats from various nations of Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia, so the BCC cluster is very international, which is why the IB is there. The people we know from Whitman are by no means very wealthy! Your kids will find their friends wherever they go.

I think that instead of parsing all these excellent schools, you and OP need to drive in all these neighborhoods, get a feel for each of them, then find housing (rental, house, apartment, townhouse, whatever) that you can be happy in, that suits your commute! Your needs matter too, not just those of your children!

Hi, PP, yes, that's correct, I heard good number of Asian students at Churchill.
But I think it is the other way around: BCC has IB, and that is why the internationals attend that HS.
We lived one year in the Pyle/Whitman zone, my kid attended Elementary School there. Most kids live in houses, mostly big ones, only very few in apartments. I am not saying all, but many people whose kids attend these schools have money, though a number of them are renting their house. I have looked at all of these communities and my assessment is that looking at both my and my kid's needs, BCC would be best fit. Easy commute to downtown, good school, IB program etc. Though a bit worried about the recent drug use news at BCC, but I guess the other HSs also have this problem, just has not been publicized in school paper.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][b]There are a lot of small regular people houses in Whitman district.[/b] Sure many are being torn down for huge new builds, but there is still a decent inventory to keep track of. [/quote]

And you can buy them for $1 million, if you outbid the developers![/quote]

PP, you do understand that not everyone can afford a $ 1 mill house, right? Especially not a single mom with two kids. It is not even easy to find such a rental. [/quote]

PP was being sarcastic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our kids graduated from WJ and we did none of those things. A lot of stereotyping in your post, OP. Our kids played sports, did a lot of SSL hours and had part-time jobs. They drove a used car (ours, not theirs).

Walter Johnson is the least snobby school of the W schools.
You would be shocked to hear the names Whitman kids called WJ kids.

True, but the WJ kids are very elitist and racist internally and towards non-W school kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our kids graduated from WJ and we did none of those things. A lot of stereotyping in your post, OP. Our kids played sports, did a lot of SSL hours and had part-time jobs. They drove a used car (ours, not theirs).

Walter Johnson is the least snobby school of the W schools.
You would be shocked to hear the names Whitman kids called WJ kids.

True, but the WJ kids are very elitist and racist internally and towards non-W school kids.

DCUM gonna DCUM!

[Anonymous]

I'd agree that WJ might be the best fit. (Or the new Woodward, depending on your timetable.)

FWIW, we are fine financially, but certainly not uber wealthy. We don't take fancy vacations every year or have a tesla. And my kids are fine at Churchill. They talk a lot about the extravagant wealth of some who show it off but more like it's a curiosity. Actually, one of the kids pushed hard freshman year for us to update our kitchen to match her friends' fancy kitchens, but by sophomore she was resolved to our lifestyle. The other kids have never said a word that sounds like wealth jealousy.

Interestingly, I later learned that several of the kids with fancy kitchens got financial aid for college, so they weren't uber wealthy, either!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'd agree that WJ might be the best fit. (Or the new Woodward, depending on your timetable.)

FWIW, we are fine financially, but certainly not uber wealthy. We don't take fancy vacations every year or have a tesla. And my kids are fine at Churchill. They talk a lot about the extravagant wealth of some who show it off but more like it's a curiosity. Actually, one of the kids pushed hard freshman year for us to update our kitchen to match her friends' fancy kitchens, but by sophomore she was resolved to our lifestyle. The other kids have never said a word that sounds like wealth jealousy.

Interestingly, I later learned that several of the kids with fancy kitchens got financial aid for college, so they weren't uber wealthy, either!

Because your primary residence doesn't count for calculating assets for financial aid. Now is the time to do that renovation, so the extra cash doesn't show up on the CSS. Or you can invest in art/collectibles/etc... It has to be done a certain number of years before the college application process.

But the other way to think about it is whether you want to give your kid a boost for need-aware schools by not filling out financial aid forms in the first place...

Such are the trials and tribulations of upper middle class families

[Anonymous]

Transplant_1 wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Churchill has a strong Asian contingent that is very studious, mostly Chinese. Downtown Bethesda has a small community of Japanese expatriates and diplomats from various nations of Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia, so the BCC cluster is very international, which is why the IB is there. The people we know from Whitman are by no means very wealthy! Your kids will find their friends wherever they go.

.....

Thank you for this. It's actually very helpful. Walter Johnson seems to be a mix of it all: "wealthy whites," internationals, immigrants (it appears to be not dominated by one area of the world, but a mixture). Could it be characterized in that way? Just curious.

PP you replied to. Yes, I think it would.

Personally, I prefer the expanded AP options at WJ over the fewer APs but the presence of IB at BCC. However BCC is a smaller school, and walkable to many things, whereas WJ is enormous, overcrowded until fall 2026, and close to only the library and that shopping center (but kids have to be careful crossing Democracy or Old G to get to any of that).
Also, I prefer the cute neighborhoods in the BCC area and I'm not fond of that beltway/270 pollution node.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Transplant_1 wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Churchill has a strong Asian contingent that is very studious, mostly Chinese. Downtown Bethesda has a small community of Japanese expatriates and diplomats from various nations of Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia, so the BCC cluster is very international, which is why the IB is there. The people we know from Whitman are by no means very wealthy! Your kids will find their friends wherever they go.

.....

Thank you for this. It's actually very helpful. Walter Johnson seems to be a mix of it all: "wealthy whites," internationals, immigrants (it appears to be not dominated by one area of the world, but a mixture). Could it be characterized in that way? Just curious.

PP you replied to. Yes, I think it would.

Personally, I prefer the expanded AP options at WJ over the fewer APs but the presence of IB at BCC. However BCC is a smaller school, and walkable to many things, whereas WJ is enormous, overcrowded until fall 2026, and close to only the library and that shopping center (but kids have to be careful crossing Democracy or Old G to get to any of that).
Also, I prefer the cute neighborhoods in the BCC area and I'm not fond of that beltway/270 pollution node.

It's all just hairsplitting. They're both the same as any MCPS HS.