Reston area public schools

[Anonymous]

Shopping for a house.
We know there are greats schools in McLean, Vienna, Falls Church, but nothing really looks good in our price range 550K. Recently, however, I've seen some nice looking houses for sale in Reston. Can somebody please give me a scoop on the schools there?
TIA.

[Anonymous]

I don't have any personal experience but I have heard there are some good elementary schools but it gets dicey in middle and high school. What areas of Reston are you looking at?

[Anonymous]

OP here: we looked in 20191 and 20194 zips.

[Anonymous]

NP here - 20194 has the most highly regarded schools. Most of those children go to Herndon for middle and high school which I think is preferable to Hughes and South Lakes.

[Anonymous]

So Herndon schools are considered a better choice than the ones in Reston?

[Anonymous]

Many elementary schools in Reston are excellent - 20191 has Subrise Valley, Hunter Woods and Crossfield - all very good and typically test very well. Dogwood has had a mixed reputation and i am sure this post will get a rise out of a Dogwood parent - ia m talking testing and general reputation though. dont know much about 20190 but is largely thought to be comparable or better than 20191. The Middle School and High School (Hughes and South Lakes) have had some questions though - those schools bring up the rear at the County level. Having said that we have neighbors that have been very satisfied putting their kis through those schools. In another few years the demographics of Hughes and Soth Lakes will change with the boundaries havibg changed last year. So it depends on how old your kids are

[Anonymous]

Hughes and South Lakes may be slightly below average at the county level, but they are not the lower-performing schools in Fairfax by any margin. As the poster indicated, there was a redistricting in 2008 that expanded the Hughes/SL boundaries to pull in more upper-income students. The main difference between Herndon and South Lakes is that Herndon has an AP program and South Lakes has IB.

[Anonymous]

OP here: thank you all posters. Very helpful info.
How is AP different (better) than IB? I thought that it is different school districts use a diffferent name for the same thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here: thank you all posters. Very helpful info.
How is AP different (better) than IB? I thought that it is different school districts use a diffferent name for the same thing.

I would argue that IB is better than AP. AP is in the vein of "teaching to the test". After researching the 2, I have concluded that IB offers a curriculum that is based far more in critical thinking, depth of subject matter and quality writing. Unfortunately, my DC's is at an AP school, but due to lack of other challenging courses must take AP.

[Anonymous]

Please visit the IB website for lots of information on the program. They do a great job of explaining what an IB education is.

http://www.ibo.org/general/what.cfm

[Anonymous]

OP here: Thank you, everybody.