Anonymous wrote:NP here. Everyone says to find out what the parents in the neighborhood think of their school, but how do you find that out if you don't like in the neighborhood? Do you just walk up to people at a playground or on the street and asking them about schools? Would they really given an honest opinion to a stranger? And how do you really get a large enough sample of people to know that you're getting good advice? I get calling the PTA but they woudl only tell you good things too. I'm not sure how else to evaluate a school other than the available testing and demographic data.

* live (not like). sorry for all the typing problems!

NP here. Everyone says to find out what the parents in the neighborhood think of their school, but how do you find that out if you don't like in the neighborhood? Do you just walk up to people at a playground or on the street and asking them about schools? Would they really given an honest opinion to a stranger? And how do you really get a large enough sample of people to know that you're getting good advice? I get calling the PTA but they woudl only tell you good things too. I'm not sure how else to evaluate a school other than the available testing and demographic data.

9:19, Greatschools provides a good deal of that information if not most/all.

I would choose (and did choose) better schools as the primary factor (since you say commute is irrelevant - really?). But I would NEVER base my assessment of the schools on some random website like greatschools.whatever. Do your due diligence: research the stats, and ideally reach out to the schools themselves or the parent communities. If this is MCPS, the school-at-a-glance has a ton of info: test scores, socioeconomic and ethnic/racial info, student-teacher ratios, etc. Fwiw, we are in a top-rated school district, but not THE richest or THE whitest. If you post the specific schools here, then you may get feedback, albeit not scientific.

Part of what makes a great school is parental involvement. See if both schools have active PTAs. Do they offer a variety of after school clubs (chess, painting, drama, etc)? What does the fundraising look like? You can always email the head of the PTA to get an overview of what kind of parental involvement goes on at the school. It can be really disheartening to want to change/improve something at the school your kids go to but not be able too because parents can't/won't get involved.

What are the schools? There are some really great schools that have lower test scores just because they serve more diverse populations. Do more research on whether families in the area are happy with their schools.

Anonymous wrote:We were in the same boat and we chose the slightly lesser rated schools in the more diverse neighborhood. We imagined what things would be like for our kids going to a mostly white, rich high school where all the other kids are driving their new cars to school when they turn 16, and we decided that we prefer the diversity and we don't want our kids to be embarrassed about being driven around in an old Honda. We feel like the neighborhood we chose is less superficial.

Doubt it you did it based on money

Whats wrong with basing the rating on test scores what other standardized comparable way do you propose?

I think I would pick number 2 to avoid having my kids grow up with the rich kids in the less diverse house in number 1 school area. I'm guessing #1 is Bethesda or equivalent, and the more I read on this board the more I would like to avoid the people who live in that area.

If you feel those are the people you want your child associating with, then go ahead and pick #1.

I guess it depends. If the ratings you're talking about are based primarily on test scores, I wouldn't give them much credence. Test scores say far more about the population of students than about quality of teaching, and I'm someone who believes that kids will benefit most from a diverse (both racially and socio-economically) educational environment. Assuming there are no safety issues, I would lean more towards option #2.

Definitely #1

Anonymous wrote:We were in the same boat and we chose the slightly lesser rated schools in the more diverse neighborhood. We imagined what things would be like for our kids going to a mostly white, rich high school where all the other kids are driving their new cars to school when they turn 16, and we decided that we prefer the diversity and we don't want our kids to be embarrassed about being driven around in an old Honda. We feel like the neighborhood we chose is less superficial.

we chose the better school. we drive our kids to school (elementary) in an old Honda, or walk. our kids will walk or bike to school all the way to graduation from high school, they will definitely not have a new car at 16. we are not superficial people, we teach our kids not to judge people based on what people have (and this means not to judge rich people based on what they have) but who they are and how they behave./ We also teach them that they should never be embarassed or feel bad for what they do not have.

Not OP, but I'm pretty sure they're from greatschools.org.

Where do those ratings come from? If it's some website, then I would not pay much attention.

We chose house over schools b/c we thought we would be sending DC to private schools: applied to private schools and the one public charter we liked. Got into charter so we got the large (cheap) house, diverse nabe and all the other goodies like being able to walk to work.