When to Start Touring Schools - Choosing B/w Options

[Anonymous]

We have a 2.5 year old and soon a newborn. The topic of schools comes up a lot in our conversations. When do families start touring schools? As in, if you were planning to send your child to public school, do you take a tour when they are 3 years old to see if you like it or do you wait until they are 4, and it's time to register? I'm asking because waiting to take the tour right before when registration starts seems really stressful. Am I overthinking this?

For our situation, we live in South Arlington and are planning to tour all the choice options as well as our home school. I am thinking if we do this when he's 3, we have time to also tour some of the more affordable privates if we want when he's 4, though we'll be almost certainly going public.

Any thoughts on the timing? I know there are already lots of debates about the schools in Arlington. I know that the schools might change some in the next 2.5 years. Just trying to figure out when to start!

TIA!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a 2.5 year old and soon a newborn. The topic of schools comes up a lot in our conversations. When do families start touring schools? As in, if you were planning to send your child to public school, do you take a tour when they are 3 years old to see if you like it or do you wait until they are 4, and it's time to register? I'm asking because waiting to take the tour right before when registration starts seems really stressful. Am I overthinking this?

For our situation, we live in South Arlington and are planning to tour all the choice options as well as our home school. I am thinking if we do this when he's 3, we have time to also tour some of the more affordable privates if we want when he's 4, though we'll be almost certainly going public.

Any thoughts on the timing? I know there are already lots of debates about the schools in Arlington. I know that the schools might change some in the next 2.5 years. Just trying to figure out when to start!

TIA!

This family never toured any schools. I called the public school we're zoned for, in the spring when our first child was 5, and they put her on the list for kindergarten orientation, and then we went to kindergarten orientation (which did not include a tour of the school), and then in the fall she went to kindergarten.

Other people may do things differently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a 2.5 year old and soon a newborn. The topic of schools comes up a lot in our conversations. When do families start touring schools? As in, if you were planning to send your child to public school, do you take a tour when they are 3 years old to see if you like it or do you wait until they are 4, and it's time to register? I'm asking because waiting to take the tour right before when registration starts seems really stressful. Am I overthinking this?

For our situation, we live in South Arlington and are planning to tour all the choice options as well as our home school. I am thinking if we do this when he's 3, we have time to also tour some of the more affordable privates if we want when he's 4, though we'll be almost certainly going public.

Any thoughts on the timing? I know there are already lots of debates about the schools in Arlington. I know that the schools might change some in the next 2.5 years. Just trying to figure out when to start!

TIA!

This family never toured any schools. I called the public school we're zoned for, in the spring when our first child was 5, and they put her on the list for kindergarten orientation, and then we went to kindergarten orientation (which did not include a tour of the school), and then in the fall she went to kindergarten.

Other people may do things differently.

Are you happy there?

[Anonymous]

I can't think of anyone I know in public, prior to college, who has toured schools before the child went to kindergarten. If you toured the local elementary and didn't like something about it would you move? Just curious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't think of anyone I know in public, prior to college, who has toured schools before the child went to kindergarten. If you toured the local elementary and didn't like something about it would you move? Just curious.

We wouldn't move. Arlington has a few choice schools and a few other neighborhood schools you can try to transfer into, though the rules may change for some of that. If we didn't like our neighborhood school, we would try to get into one of those. Either way, we're applying to as many choice programs as we can. It's just that if we didn't like the neighborhood one, we would try harder to get into those, or possibly consider a private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a 2.5 year old and soon a newborn. The topic of schools comes up a lot in our conversations. When do families start touring schools? As in, if you were planning to send your child to public school, do you take a tour when they are 3 years old to see if you like it or do you wait until they are 4, and it's time to register? I'm asking because waiting to take the tour right before when registration starts seems really stressful. Am I overthinking this?

For our situation, we live in South Arlington and are planning to tour all the choice options as well as our home school. I am thinking if we do this when he's 3, we have time to also tour some of the more affordable privates if we want when he's 4, though we'll be almost certainly going public.

Any thoughts on the timing? I know there are already lots of debates about the schools in Arlington. I know that the schools might change some in the next 2.5 years. Just trying to figure out when to start!

TIA!

This family never toured any schools. I called the public school we're zoned for, in the spring when our first child was 5, and they put her on the list for kindergarten orientation, and then we went to kindergarten orientation (which did not include a tour of the school), and then in the fall she went to kindergarten.

Other people may do things differently.

Are you happy there?

The kids are in high school and middle school now. But yes, the elementary school was fine. In Montgomery County.

[Anonymous]

Okay, I think this article articulates what I mean:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/to-find-the-best-fit-for-private-kindergarten-start-early/2015/11/03/0b3e2550-79bd-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html

My question is, do people do this for public school in districts where there are choices, or just private?

[Anonymous]

Start the fall before he would start attending. If you start looking at schools earlier than that, you won't know enough about what he needs or what makes a school a good fit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Okay, I think this article articulates what I mean:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/to-find-the-best-fit-for-private-kindergarten-start-early/2015/11/03/0b3e2550-79bd-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html

My question is, do people do this for public school in districts where there are choices, or just private?

In DC, where there are a ton of charters, yes, people absolutely do this. If that's the case with Arlington, then sure.

[Anonymous]

FWIW, if you go the private route, you'll do tours the fall before (so September 2017 for September 2018 start). Applications are due generally by January, and decisions are made in March. (This is for independent schools, Catholic schools may do things differently). Given that, I'm not sure I'd bother looking at any schools more than a year before the anticipated start date.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FWIW, if you go the private route, you'll do tours the fall before (so September 2017 for September 2018 start). Applications are due generally by January, and decisions are made in March. (This is for independent schools, Catholic schools may do things differently). Given that, I'm not sure I'd bother looking at any schools more than a year before the anticipated start date.

Okay, so if I wanted to look at schools for the 2019 fall, would it make sense to look at one group of schools in the fall of 2017 and one in 2018, so as not to be overwhelmed looking at two different groups of schools? Theoretically, I mean, because I'm pretty sure unless we find $20K in our couch cushions, we'll be going public...

[Anonymous]

We toured a bunch of public ES when we were moving into the area from the West coast. Six I think it was. And we found a place to live within the boundaries of one of them. They were all great schools, just with different Principals and different housing stock within their boundaries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FWIW, if you go the private route, you'll do tours the fall before (so September 2017 for September 2018 start). Applications are due generally by January, and decisions are made in March. (This is for independent schools, Catholic schools may do things differently). Given that, I'm not sure I'd bother looking at any schools more than a year before the anticipated start date.

Okay, so if I wanted to look at schools for the 2019 fall, would it make sense to look at one group of schools in the fall of 2017 and one in 2018, so as not to be overwhelmed looking at two different groups of schools? Theoretically, I mean, because I'm pretty sure unless we find $20K in our couch cushions, we'll be going public...

No, you'd look at all of them in fall of 2018. You shouldn't be looking at so many that it's overwhelming, especially if private isn't an option.

[Anonymous]

Look online and find out the dates of the kindergarten orientations in the spring. We did this for FCPS the year before DS attended to help us make the decision if we wanted to go to public or private. Many of these include tours and families commonly attend for this reason. No registration needed. I don't know how it works in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FWIW, if you go the private route, you'll do tours the fall before (so September 2017 for September 2018 start). Applications are due generally by January, and decisions are made in March. (This is for independent schools, Catholic schools may do things differently). Given that, I'm not sure I'd bother looking at any schools more than a year before the anticipated start date.

Okay, so if I wanted to look at schools for the 2019 fall, would it make sense to look at one group of schools in the fall of 2017 and one in 2018, so as not to be overwhelmed looking at two different groups of schools? Theoretically, I mean, because I'm pretty sure unless we find $20K in our couch cushions, we'll be going public...

No, I would not go looking in Fall 2017 if your kid would be starting Fall 2019. For one thing, the admissions people at the privates are pretty busy, so I doubt they'll let you take the time to do tours and have your kids do play dates or classroom visits if you're not actually applying that year.

If it were me, I'd really sit down and decide if you want to go the private route or not. Having options is fine, but you'll want to seriously narrow them down. K may only be $20K a year (several privates are significantly higher, like double that, even for that grade), but tuition increases every grade or couple of grades. Additionally, it does up a few percent every year. Of course, there are cheaper private options, like parochial schools, but you'll want to figure out if you're willing to go down that route for 12 years. If not, don't even bother applying. I say that because it's a big time investment and why spread yourself thin looking at 50 schools when there are really only a few that you're truly interested in?

FWIW, my kids are at a private and I love it, but the application process around here (depending on which schools you're looking at) can be exhausting.