Re: School districts with poorer reputations

we live in Amityville, but we do not own, we rent.

With that said, I am taking a year-by-year approach.

Right now my DD is in pre-k.. since Amityville is poor compared to other districts there is universal pre-k with free lunch due to head start. The pre-k is a STATE funded program. It is not funded through property taxes.

Right now, the education she is getting at the public school is leaps and bounds above what she would be getting at the catholic school around the block from me. Yet people pay $500-700/month so their kids don't need to hang out w/ children from the other side of the tracks or those that live in the trailers on 110.

It amazes me that Amityville Village is 85% white and yet probably 1% of those kids go to the public school b/c people are "afraid" and yet, if everyone sent their kids to the public school the demographic of the school would change and the school scores would change as well!

I am pretty sure my DD will stay in her school next year as well for K.. if we still haven't bought a house (and I would like to buy in Amityville because it is a beautiful town.. people that don't know about it really shouldn't knock it 'cause it's really lovely) then she'd likely stay at least through 5th grade.. then we would have to re- evaluate at that time. But since it is a while away, I'm not thinking about it.

Re: School districts with poorer reputations

If i didnt have children, the school district wouldnt matter & id live wherever i want and not take that into concideration.
If your a person that has children or wants to have children, i would take the SD into concideration.
Its hard to discuss this topic b/c everyone wants to think they live in a great SD- i would check the stats online, then go physically see the school if they would let you take a tour- prior to purchasing- if you found a house you LOVE.

Re: School districts with poorer reputations

I am an admitted school snob and frankly I don't care who is offended by that. DH and I took a list of the top rated LI schools and focused our home search on those areas with commutes that would be reasonable for us with affordable taxes. We ended up in a town we never though to look in, but because of school district lines running through our property,state education law allows us to choose between one good school district and one ranked as superior while paying the lower taxes. That's why we bought where we bought. There was no way we could afford the district otherwise. I make no apologies for it. It was a BIG selling point of the house and we had to jump on it. There is a lot of money in the district we will declare as ours - we are in the middle of that spectrum. There are mansions as well as trailer parks full of kids that go to the same schools.

Its not just the test scores that made a difference to me. It was the availability of varied programs such as after school, special needs and gifted programs (should we need them), sports programs etc. Our district has everything we wanted and needed. We really lucked out.