Close-in MCPS or NW DCPS?
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Anonymous
| We need to move this summer and are looking at either Chevy Chase/Bethesda or NW DC. We have two kids, the youngest will start K in the fall. We have lived in DC for many years and would like to stay in the District but are nervous about the large class sizes at the most accomplished DC schools (JLKMM or whatever). However, I have heard and read that the MCPS ES' in the areas close to DC are also overcrowded (we don't want to move out of the Beltway for commuting purposes). Anyone out there have experience in both systems? Pros/cons? Our oldest is in private now but we are sick of it (status, cost, social dynamics, etc). We want to make the move so our youngest won't have to switch schools until middle school. TIA. |
Anonymous
| From talking with friends, class sizes at the WOTP elementary schools are smaller than those in close-in Montgomery County (low 20s at Lafayette, etc., high 20s at Rosemary Hills, etc.). But the real difference is in high school choices. |
Anonymous
| The impression I have from friends is that the elementary schools in upper NW are better than close in MoCo, middle school is a wash if you are zoned for deal but Wilson is pretty different from BCC or Witman- whether it's better or worse depends on you and your kid. |
Anonymous
| Pretty similar till HS. Whitman and BCC definitely better than Wilson as it is today. |
Anonymous
Yeah, I don't know how you could argue otherwise. We may stay in DC yet still ourselves, but I think objectively it is hard to argue any potential benefit to slightly smaller classes in ES isn't outweighed by a more robust curriculum and excellent fellow students by high school. People can argue about how they love Wilson and one kid went to Yale one year, but it is just not the same learning environment as the test-in schools in MCPS, or Whitman or BCC. |
Anonymous
| can you forward your cell# to viber or something? has anyone done that? |
Anonymous
| ^^wrong thread! |
Anonymous
For the sorts of people we are talking about in this specific thread (not "in DCPS in general"), the kinds of families who would entertain a move to a Bethesda neighborhood that feeds to Whitman .... for this subset of Wilson teens: 1. more than one teen, one year was admitted to an Ivy. It's common. On my street alone, there's a Columbia U. and a Northwestern. Next block is a William and Mary and a Washington U., pre-med. My "block" is, I am certain, the kind of address OP is considering. I'll leave it at that. 2. These kids find each other at Wilson and take the same classes with each other and do the same extracurriculars and stay in the academies in large part. Good or bad, there is for the moment still that school-within-a-school option at Wilson. I do think that MCPS curriculum at the gen ed schools is more robust than the DCPS HS curriculum. I do think your kids won't be chosen to go to Blair Magnet, aka the "test-in" MCPS school. They just won't. Neither will mine. |
Anonymous
What are the upsides to living in far corner upper NW DC compared to close-in Bethesda? Honestly curious to hear from someone who has high-school aged kids. Is it cheaper real estate? Why is it better? It is certainly not more "urban" than living in Bethesda, if you are honest with yourself about what is urban. I ask because I would love to stay in DC, like the OP, but just have trouble justifying it. Though I guess if you compare it to living 20 miles out it makes a difference in terms of quality of life, but how is it different than living a mile over the DC border. I have a feeling this is what the OP is getting at. |
Anonymous
While it's true that the area along the Red Line in NWDC is not the Bronx, it's more citified than all of the neighorhoods IB for Whitman and most of the homes IB for BCC, with the notable exception of the homes right along the Red Line in Bethesda. Try walking to anything from, say, Wood Acres. Anything at all. |
Anonymous
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"close-in Bethesda" could be understood as walkability to the redline. not saying Bethesda is urban, just saying it is not less urban than, say Tenleytown.
How do people choose Tenleytown over Friendship Heights? That might be the best way to frame the discussion. |
Anonymous
| Living in walking distance to Friendship Heights metro is a lot closer to downtown than homes in Whitman district, which is not metro accessible. |
Anonymous
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Right- so for the sake of argument, let's call it walkable to the redline:
DCPS vs. MCPS -Go! |
Anonymous
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My friend with a kid in K in MoCo is at a school where there are 10 K classes, 27 kids/class, 1 teacher, no aide.
I am at Hearst (not one of the sacred JKLM but a great school in my opinion), but my kid is in a class with 19 kids, one teacher, one aide, and we know almost every child in the 2 K classes. We are within easy walking distance to the Red Line. I'll take my situation over my friend's any day. I'll think about high school later. |
Anonymous
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I'm the first "walkable" poster. Something that is very important to me as a parent is the proximity of our red line / nwdc address to transit and to "stuff you can walk to that is interesting for a tween and teen." I realize this is a personal value that is not universal.
Our tween walks or rides his bike to Wisconsin or Connecticut ave. to get a sandwich, visit starbucks, see a movie at Avalon or Mazza, or buy himself a shirt. If he needs (fill in this blank) for a school project, he goes out to get it himself at CVS, FedExKinkos or the like. He knows how to get himself around on Metro, at least along the red line and also to Gallery Place. I'm not -quite- ready for him to take Metro downtown and hang out, but when I'm satisfied that he's ready to handle downtown on his own, the subway is "right there" and he knows how to navigate it. |