We just did it too, Chad - we own a low mortgage house in a 9/10 (per Great Schools) high school zone, but middling elementary and middle schools. My middle 2 kids were unexpectedly not doing well in private school and both needed to transfer to public school, so we rented out our house and moved into a rental in a highly-resourced district just outside Austin (Eanes ISD). While I believe that some schools may be better than they seem on paper, especially depending on which teachers you get, I had had a call (off the record) with the counselor at previously zoned school and she told me point blank to figure out another option, that things were out of control in their kindergarten classes and that enrolling my child might well make him even more challenging.
This kind of zero-sum thinking always troubles me. Good schools are “scarce” so we have to limit access through zoning or lotteries or what have you. More magnets. More selective admissions. More policing district-drawn boundaries. More administrative burdens to filter out the undesirable children’s parents.
We leaned into our “bad” school and had a great experience. I encourage everyone to ignore the score, which is mostly a reflection of the SES and diversity of a school, and do your part. Your kids will be fine, or even better for it, as will the community when it stops being divided into haves and have nots.
Did you talk to others to find out what it was like at the schools and why one was rated lower? We are sort of in a similar situation where the elementary school is known for being better than the middle and high schools here but I’m trying to find out what it’s actually like going there. I grew up going to a 10 public high school and found some downsides with that as well!
We just did it too, Chad - we own a low mortgage house in a 9/10 (per Great Schools) high school zone, but middling elementary and middle schools. My middle 2 kids were unexpectedly not doing well in private school and both needed to transfer to public school, so we rented out our house and moved into a rental in a highly-resourced district just outside Austin (Eanes ISD). While I believe that some schools may be better than they seem on paper, especially depending on which teachers you get, I had had a call (off the record) with the counselor at previously zoned school and she told me point blank to figure out another option, that things were out of control in their kindergarten classes and that enrolling my child might well make him even more challenging.
This kind of zero-sum thinking always troubles me. Good schools are “scarce” so we have to limit access through zoning or lotteries or what have you. More magnets. More selective admissions. More policing district-drawn boundaries. More administrative burdens to filter out the undesirable children’s parents.
We leaned into our “bad” school and had a great experience. I encourage everyone to ignore the score, which is mostly a reflection of the SES and diversity of a school, and do your part. Your kids will be fine, or even better for it, as will the community when it stops being divided into haves and have nots.
Did you talk to others to find out what it was like at the schools and why one was rated lower? We are sort of in a similar situation where the elementary school is known for being better than the middle and high schools here but I’m trying to find out what it’s actually like going there. I grew up going to a 10 public high school and found some downsides with that as well!