And people here insist ACPS is improving. Jesus.

This is a lot better than all the nannies' kids that show up at our elementary schools!

I don't know where you live but we were in a weird position where our one street in our entire subdivision was zoned for a different elementary school than everyone else. We (and some of our neighbors) successfully pupil placed into the other elementary claiming that having to attend a different school than all the other kids in the neighborhood would be a social hardship. We were honest and both schools were very understanding. Having said that, both schools were excellent and our reasons for transferring were purely social. I think the administrators understand our particular strange situation, but find that accommodating individuals is easier than changing the zoning. I expected a battle, but the process was actually very easy. Depending on your situation, school administrators may be sympathetic (but the transfer season IS closed).

Which school?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They define 'residency' as where the child sleeps at night.

Custody agreements 50-50 are iffy.

We own a house in the District but don't live in it. I could not technically send my kids to the school its zoned for.

It is not legal. We are at an APS school that has booted several for next year due to this type of situation. Some are relatives homes, some are complete lies, etc.

There was a famous case recently (somewhere north of here) where the mother was charged with Fraud for sending her kid to the school the grandparents were zoned for. It was the exact situation you describe. Google.

In that case the parent and grandparents were in different school districts and so the parent was cheating the taxpayers of the grandparents' school district. OP is in the same pyramid as her parents so she wouldn't be financially cheating the school district. Plus there is a childcare exception that OP can legally use if the school is open to transfers.

Nope. It's a HUGE deal in Arlington Co due to over-crowding and boundaries--enough douchebags do this and it is the difference between a trailer classroom at your school. They don't care if you are in the same 'team boundaries' or not. They have rooted a bunch like rats from our school this year.

Anonymous wrote:Curious where you live with a newer 6000 sq ft house in Fairfax and a mediocre school?

Could be anywhere in eastern Fairfax County. There are many pockets of in-fill "tract mansions" within the boundaries of schools that have high percentages of FARMs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just switch houses with the grandparents. Problem solved.

Our house is a 6000 sf new home. We were planning to buy my parents a ranch house in the 400-500k range.

And I live in a 3000 sf home built in 1930 specifically for the choice public elementary school. I could move a 1/2 mile away and be in a different zone and save $250k. All of us are in the same situation, but it appears not all of us are honest. We have an anonymous tip line at our school for this thing. We also have an employee that is full-time in charge of residency issues and investigations.

DH and I spoke about it and we are going to stick to our mediocre elementary school. Hopefully our child will get into AAP in 3rd grade.

If kindergarten turns out to be a complete disaster, we will put him in private or look into moving.

People seem to be focused on our house size. I stated that I want to do this totally legally and that I did not want to hide where we lived if we were granted the transfer/pupil placement. I wanted to knw how easy or difficult it was to do this legally.

The posts were reacting to your post about the size of [i]your[i] house and made it sound like house size was the reason you did not want to move. Many of us have been in that same position of having to choose a larger new house in a less desirable school district or buy a smaller older home in a better school district. It is a trade off that your posts seemed to indicate you were not willing to make.

Anonymous wrote:They define 'residency' as where the child sleeps at night.

Custody agreements 50-50 are iffy.

We own a house in the District but don't live in it. I could not technically send my kids to the school its zoned for.

It is not legal. We are at an APS school that has booted several for next year due to this type of situation. Some are relatives homes, some are complete lies, etc.

There was a famous case recently (somewhere north of here) where the mother was charged with Fraud for sending her kid to the school the grandparents were zoned for. It was the exact situation you describe. Google.

Why are 50-50 custody agreements iffy?

Anonymous wrote:They define 'residency' as where the child sleeps at night.

Custody agreements 50-50 are iffy.

We own a house in the District but don't live in it. I could not technically send my kids to the school its zoned for.

It is not legal. We are at an APS school that has booted several for next year due to this type of situation. Some are relatives homes, some are complete lies, etc.

There was a famous case recently (somewhere north of here) where the mother was charged with Fraud for sending her kid to the school the grandparents were zoned for. It was the exact situation you describe. Google.

In that case the parent and grandparents were in different school districts and so the parent was cheating the taxpayers of the grandparents' school district. OP is in the same pyramid as her parents so she wouldn't be financially cheating the school district. Plus there is a childcare exception that OP can legally use if the school is open to transfers.

I agree, definately try out the school for a year or two before you decide against it or before you sell your current home.

Good luck OP, I've also been in situations where I had to help out my parents financially on a long-term basis which is stressful and adds another level of complexity to life.