school 150x150 Public Schools in Gentrifying Hoods: Who Wants to Go First?

Four year old C, only one year away from kindergarten.

Today is the first day back to school for my high school junior, J (who also turns 16 today!!!). Eighth grader E starts back on Wednesday, and C’s preschool year gets underway the first week of September. So I have school on the brain this week. Specifically, I am thinking about our neighborhood’s public schools, and whether C will enroll there next fall, when she starts kindergarten.

Jon, the kids and I live in what is often referred to as a “gentrifying” urban neighborhood – the kind that has a lot of Subaru and Volvo wagons sporting Obama and NPR bumper stickers parked in driveways of restored Victorians (raising hand…except we sold our Subaru wagon and now, as y’all are aware, have a SOLID GOLD MINIVAN)

But our neighborhood is gentrifying, not gentrified, meaning that there are still alot of the pre-NPR-sticker residents who make their homes here as well, some as homeowners and many as renters.  I truly love that our neighborhood’s demography is diverse economically, socially and yes, educationally.  My kids see and meet all kinds of people every time we go out for a walk.  But this lovely, organic mix of different kinds of neighbors seems to stop cold at the schoolroom door.

There’s a joke I’ve heard various neighbors make somewhat self-consciously since we moved into our house five years ago that our “neighborhood schools” are all located in other neighborhoods. And while I haven’t actually done any sort of scientific survey, that does kind of seem to be the case. What I mean is that I don’t personally know one single person who has moved into our neighborhood in order to do the whole live-in-the-cool-urban-neighborhood-in-a-cool-old-house thing who sends his or herchildren to the public schools for which we are actually zoned.  Instead, their kids attend various private schools in our community, or the parents have managed to get transfers so their kinds can attend public schools in “nicer” parts of town.  I do know several people who have children who were accepted in to the public elementary magnet school that’s not too far away from our neighborhood, but even then, that’s not the same as attending OUR neighborhood’s public schools.

And we are no different. When we moved to this neighborhood five years ago, my three older children were already well-entrenched in a private Episcopal k-8 school located 18 miles west of our new home, in the affluent suburbs of our city. My three oldest kids remained in their school after we became urban-dwellers (E is just starting his final year there).  J now attends a public high school in the toniest zip code in town, something made possible because her father’s house is in that neighborhood, and E will likely follow suit next year.

But now C, who has never lived anywhere else other than where we live now, is four years old. She attended a private preschool part time last year, and she will again this year (we don’t have a public preschool option at all).  But after that – next year – we have to make the kindergarten decision, and I am already feeling really stressed about it.

I have no regrets whatsoever for my three eldest attending the wonderful private school they all attended K-8, and I am grateful that it was possible. But Jon and I both really feel like C needs to go to school in our neighborhood if at all possible. Because my older kids have always attended school in neighborhoods in which I could not actually afford to live, I have spent the last 15 years driving 20-40 0r even 60 miles round-trip out to the ‘burbs anytime one of them was invited to a birthday party or sleepover. There was never the option of a spontaneous “let’s call Susie or Joey and see if they want to pop over to play this afternoon” because Susie and Joey lived waaaaaaaaay on the other side of town, with most of the other kids who were in my kids’ classrooms. Also, because the schools my kids have attended have been so far away, we often get home much too late in the day, and it’s logistically challenging to attend weeknight activities there, like PTA meetings and ball games.

There are many factors that should go into choosing a school for your kids, and over time, I’ve come to believe that having the school be located in the same neighborhood where your kids live – or at least pretty close – is a lot more important than I thought it was when my son Henry started kindergarten in 1995. At that time, I believed that all kinds of other factors were FAR more important than geography, or a sense of community. But my views have evolved after a lot of years and a lot of miles driven. And Jon agrees – we both want C (and G when she is old enough) to attend a neighborhood school, or something as close to that as possible.

But that’s the thing. The public schools for which our neighborhood is zoned aren’t considered very good. Their test scores don’t measure up, and in some cases, the physical facilities aren’t great. They certainly don’t look or feel anything like the bright, shiny public elementary schools in the more upscale parts of town. Plus, as I said, I don’t actually know ONE SINGLE PERSON who is currently sending his or her child to our neighborhood’s public schools. And let’s face it, it’s scary to think of having my own child “go first,” as it were.

But on the other hand, how can my neighborhood’s schools ever get any better if those of us who keep moving into this zip code because we say want to stake our roots here, and raise our kids here keep outsourcing the educational part of our adopted neighborhood’s appeal? Isn’t that a little like saying, “we like you city people, with your funky old houses, and your sidewalks, and your diversity and all, but we just don’t want our children to sit next to yours at school. I’m sure you understand, mmmmkay?”

I think it kind of is. And admitting this to myself makes me squirm. I don’t want to be like that.

But I also don’t want my child to be the exclamation point for my progressive political views. If we “go first,” what will that mean for her? How long would it take for other neighbors to follow?

I certainly do not mean to imply that NO one in our neighborhood sends their kids to the schools for which we are zoned. I am sure that many parents are very happy with the schools, and I guarantee you that there are some terrific teachers doing amazing work in our neighborhood’s schools. But I am not imagining it when I attend a party or event at a neighbor’s house, and as I chat up parent after parent after parent – all of them transplants into our neighborhood, like Jon and me – and NONE of them tells me that their kids are enrolled in our adopted neighborhood’s public schools.

So I am torn. This is a tough call to make. Of course, Jon and I will visit the various schools and meet the principals and look at test scores, etc over the next year, as we look ahead to kindergarten. And we will almost certainly also look at applying to that public magnet school I mentioned, learn how to apply for a public school transfer, and also consider whether we could possibly afford private school for C even if we wanted to make that choice.

Lots to think about….

How about you? How important is it to you that your kids attend public schools rather than private? What about the idea of neighborhood schools? How much do you value the importance of your kids’ schools being in relatively close proximity to your home? Help me think this one through in the comments below.

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Public Schools in Gentrifying Hoods: Who Wants to Go First?