Anonymous wrote:Agreed with East Silver Spring or Cannon Road ES come to mind. Cannon Road is right off the ICC and it has relatively little to no traffic to get to VA. Welcome to MCPS!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking for advice on Montgomery County pyramids, particularly elementary schools. We are a professionally, well-educated AA family and buying a home ($700 - 750k range) next year - work in Arlington and DC and would like to avoid an excessive commute. We are thinking Silver Spring but open to other recommendations. We would like advice on schools and understand assessing school quality is somewhat subjective. Our son will be entering 2nd grade this fall. We are looking for culturally diverse schools, with a culture of respect (from the top-down), academic enrichment, enthusiastic teachers and extracurricular activities. I understand this may make some people uncomfortable; however, we are looking for schools where my son won't be the only AA child in his class. I experienced that for 11 years in Catholic Schools and would like him to have a different experience. Race/ethnicity is definitely not the only factor - we want our son to value the importance of interacting with kids that may not look like him and come from homes with like-minded parents.

I don't want to turn this into a race debate and appreciate your honest feedback.

Thanks!

with those job locales, and assuming they are jobs with high security (i.e. not changing jobs every couple years), I'd live in NW DC any ES that rolls up to Deal and Wilson. Kid will have a blast, ES are great, MS has vastly improved and HS is half/half and kid will find his niches.

Anonymous wrote:Wootton, Churchill, Walter Johnson all have AA students beyond one kid per elementary. These schools lack the economic diversity but that's not always a bad thing because the kids that look like you are not economically different from you or the kids of all the other races. It can be difficult to be one the few high performing/UMC minorities when most of the kids that look like you are very poor and/or low performing. The schools that have the stark economic and performance segregation tend to have racial issues.

This might be why so many UMC minorities choose Bethesda, a W school, private or Prince Georges/magnet program.

Anonymous wrote:

OP, some days it can easily be a 2 hour commute to VA from Montgomery County.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SS through DC to VA is a complete nightmare!

But isn't SS to the American Legion Bridge in the morning also really bad? I can see why people are recommending SS/TP based on the kind of school experience they're looking for, but if there aren't good routes through DC, then I would look on the Western side of the county since it's closer to Northern Virginia.

It would be pretty rare for a child to be the ONLY black kid in his class, even in the least diverse Montgomery County elementaries. I might look at Garrett Park or Rosemary Hills/North Chevy Chase or other Bethesda areas. If you get on the beltway at 355 or even closer to Virginia like River Road then the commute is bad but not as bad as if you have to take the beltway E/W too. Garrett Park might be a good option. Depends on whether 2-4 black kids per classroom is acceptable to OP or too much like being an "only."

Anonymous wrote:SS through DC to VA is a complete nightmare!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking for advice on Montgomery County pyramids, particularly elementary schools. We are a professionally, well-educated AA family and buying a home ($700 - 750k range) next year - work in Arlington and DC and would like to avoid an excessive commute. We are thinking Silver Spring but open to other recommendations. We would like advice on schools and understand assessing school quality is somewhat subjective. Our son will be entering 2nd grade this fall. We are looking for culturally diverse schools, with a culture of respect (from the top-down), academic enrichment, enthusiastic teachers and extracurricular activities. I understand this may make some people uncomfortable; however, we are looking for schools where my son won't be the only AA child in his class. I experienced that for 11 years in Catholic Schools and would like him to have a different experience. Race/ethnicity is definitely not the only factor - we want our son to value the importance of interacting with kids that may not look like him and come from homes with like-minded parents.

I don't want to turn this into a race debate and appreciate your honest feedback.

Thanks!

Are you open to DC at all? We are a very similar family (down to the rising 2nd grader) and we live right across the line from Silver Spring in Shepherd Park in NW DC. It is a very diverse neighborhood with lots of other families like ours. You'd have to increase your budget to at least 800-850K, though.

As for MD, I agree that eastern Silver Spring and Takoma Park may be good bets. However, one of you will have a longish commute to Arlington--it might be tolerable if you leave very early.

PP again. One other thought--I understand your experience with Catholic schools, but many of the private/parochial schools in this area are a lot more diverse. My good friend bought in a relatively inexpensive area of NE DC, but has her kids in a diverse Catholic school. My kid just finished her first year in private, and although the school is probably only 10-15% black I swear that half her class was black/biracial. She is far from a lonely only.

You may want to post your specs (commute, price range, school quality) in the real estate forum and ask for recs re: where to live.

Anonymous wrote:You are turning it into a race issue. You will have a terrible commute to Arlington. You are better off living in VA.

Anonymous wrote:We are looking for advice on Montgomery County pyramids, particularly elementary schools. We are a professionally, well-educated AA family and buying a home ($700 - 750k range) next year - work in Arlington and DC and would like to avoid an excessive commute. We are thinking Silver Spring but open to other recommendations. We would like advice on schools and understand assessing school quality is somewhat subjective. Our son will be entering 2nd grade this fall. We are looking for culturally diverse schools, with a culture of respect (from the top-down), academic enrichment, enthusiastic teachers and extracurricular activities. I understand this may make some people uncomfortable; however, we are looking for schools where my son won't be the only AA child in his class. I experienced that for 11 years in Catholic Schools and would like him to have a different experience. Race/ethnicity is definitely not the only factor - we want our son to value the importance of interacting with kids that may not look like him and come from homes with like-minded parents.

I don't want to turn this into a race debate and appreciate your honest feedback.

Thanks!