You are a parent of primary school-aged children. You have been given the opportunity to score a REALLY high-paying job in a remote area of your country. This job would allow you to sock enough money away within 3 yrs to have a hefty deposit for a house in a metro area.
HOWEVER, this remote area has two schools. One where the rents are under 1kAUD per week, and one where they are over 1k. Ideally, you pick a lower rent, right?
But the lower-rent area has a school that scores lower on the literacy and numeracy scale. The upper-rent area scores higher.
The kicker is that there is no catchment for the school that scores higher on the scales…kids from the low-rent area can go there no worries.
I want the best for my kidlets, but I also want the best for kids who are disadvantaged by the system. I know it’s fucked either way, but there must be a compromise somewhere, right.
I don’t understand the question. All things being equal, why wouldn’t you live where the rent was cheaper and send the kids to the better school? I don’t understand how any of the kids are “disadvantaged by the system”, given that the system allows them to go to either school. Nor do I see how you paying more rent helps anyone except the landlord.
Yep, if there’s no defined zone that sends children to particular schools, then it’s the parent’s fault for not either sending their kids to the better school, or demanding better performance of the worse one. They’re literally choosing to accept lower performance.
It’s actually a sticky wicket. The crux of the situation is that your kids can help kids whose parents don’t care simply by being there, but it disadvantages your kid.
Here’s something that happens in our elementary school. Same school, same district, but the wealthy White and Asian parents that are involved request teachers while the poorer minority students do not. The principal honors all of the requests, but what happens is that the ‘best’ teachers end up with classes full of wealthy, White and Asian kids and the other teachers end up with classes with poorer students that skew minority. We just got our son’s yearbook and you’ll see classes that are all universally blonde or Asian well-dressed kids in a class and then another class with all black and Hispanic students who are shabbily dressed. The kids in the rich classes move through as a cohort. They always have the same kids in their class and the same friends. They end up on the same sports teams and essentially form a wealthy, white and Asian enclave that is largely separate from the rest of the school. When there are parties, their parents bring in tons of food and entertainment, while the poorer kids have zero parental involvement.
So as relatively wealthy, white parents, we find ourselves in a bad situation. We know what happens and we can certainly request to be put in the ‘rich’ class, but then we just perpetuate the cycle. We have chosen to not request, but then we actively see that our kids are not getting the same advantages as the wealthy kids and that their friends tend to be worse influences. At the same time, if we’re not there, the classrooms get nothing. It was so bad that last year, there was a party in one of the ‘poor’ classrooms that consisted entirely of giving book reports because there were no parents willing to bring in food or decorations. In the ‘wealthy’ classroom, there were 10 people who wanted to be homeroom mom. In the two poor classrooms, they didn’t have anyone. The ‘wealthy’ classroom had so much food in one of the grades, that the parent coordinator took some of their leftovers to the ‘poor’ classroom so that they would have something. My wife just went on the class field trip on Monday to the zoo and in the ‘wealthy’ classroom, every kid had a parent with them and sometimes both parents. In the ‘poor’ classroom that our son is in, my wife had to chaperone a large group of kids because none of their parents could come. There was a STEM night last week and nearly every single ‘wealthy’ family came to participate in the activities and out-of-school learning and in my son’s class, it was him and one other kid. The worry that you have is that if we decided to do what every other ‘wealthy’ parent does, then there is no one in the ‘poor’ classrooms. We were the only family that donated school supplies. We were one of two that brought food for parties. We were the only one with a parent volunteer. We were one of three that showed up for performances.
We are able to leverage our privilege to help those kids with zero privilege, but we know that it ends up hurting our own kids, so it’s really a very tough decision and a tough situation.
Why can’t you have your kids in the “wealthy classrooms” but still volunteer to help the “poor” classrooms?
I mean, I’m all for helping less advantages classes, or kids, or districts or whatever. But I’m not going to give up giving all the advantages I can to my own kids just to do it.
Here’s the thing- parents’ first obligation is to their own children.
Now if that obligation includes worrying about the other kids, then that’s fine. But you’re not expected to short-change your own students on behalf of other kids- that’s THEIR parents job. And if they’re not willing, that’s not generally your problem, unless you choose to make it so.
I mean, my kids go to a magnet school that’s 40% black and 30% Hispanic, and frankly, I’m very frustrated with the near total absence of non-white parental involvement with anything involving volunteering, fund raising, etc… Our Dad’s Club is like 40 white guys and 3 hispanic guys, despite the school being 70% minority. The PTA is probably no different from what I’ve seen.
But ultimately I’m doing what I do because it helps my kids, not because I feel any obligation to the other kids. The only real difference between Senoy’s school and mine is that we don’t get to pick teachers, so it’s more mixed and the volunteering, etc… is more spread out. Which is probably part of my frustration- if my kids were in a class where all the parents volunteered equally, I probably wouldn’t notice or feel like I was being taken advantage of.
Check out both schools and talk to parents and teachers from both schools before you make any judgment.
For all you know, the school with the lower test scores just happens to have a brand new science lab and a greenhouse where each classroom maintains its own vegetable garden–and both things would be right up your kids alley. For all you know, the leadership at the school with the higher test scores is chaotic and primed to implode any minute. For all know you know, the only reason the school with the lower test scores has lower test schools is because they serve more immigrants than the other school, and the parents at both schools are equally loving and attentive.
In other words, it would be stupid to make a decision like this based on a brief description and your imagination. Don’t be stupid.
Test scores are often a function of the children and parents, not the teachers and the school. In my city there is a high school with very high scores, but its facilities are not as good as the school my kids went to and the teachers were pretty much the same. The parents were far more aggressive in demands of their kids, which was good and bad.
Check out the teachers and opportunities at the lower ranked school. If they are inferior to the better school, choose the better one. But they might be better. The high school my kids went to was the oldest, and was the place where the people in town and school government went, and it got more money than the “better” school.
In my town they were moving one elementary school from the top high school to a lower ranked one. The parents had a fit, though the top high school was badly overcrowded. What happened was that the scores of the lower ranked high school went up when the kids from this elementary school wound up there, and it turned out okay.
ETA: If you were buying it might be a different story, since when we bought here the real estate agents showed us school test scores, since they contributed significantly to the value of a house. Since you are renting it is not an issue.
Pay more for rent (assuming the neighborhood is commensurately nicer in terms of safety and aesthetics), and send the kids to whichever school has the most poor kids.
IME, your outlook is determined by how you feel about your surroundings. If you live in poor & run down neighborhood, you act poor and you tend to have a more dismal “survival” outlook. As for the schools, the most selfish pricks I’ve ever known have come from money. I don’t want my kids associating with that if I can help it. Kids who want to learn will learn, kids who don’t will find a way to skive. Unless the low rent school is teaching actually wrong stuff, it won’t do enough damage in three years to set an academically-oriented kid back any appreciable degree. It is more important to raise a good human being than it is to raise an academic achiever.
Your job is to help your kids as much as possible but not to the detriment of society. In my view that means sending them to the best schools you can while supporting the people who can’t do that with what you have left.
In my case that means moving to the district with the best high school in the state and to the part with the best elementary and middle schools under it but then voting to improve school funding across the district and state. In practice that mean out county voted for the only increase in school funding in the state and both of the state wide measures got voted down so I don’t really do anything to help the poor kids but I at least tried to raise my taxes.
I don’t understand the people who feel obligated to throw their kids under the bus for the betterment of society any more than I understand the people who choose to buy cigarettes rather than feed their kids.
Thanks for sharing this, though I find it diametrically opposed to any decision I would ever make. Like, it’s near bizarro world level rationale that I can’t comprehend. Your choice to make of course.
As for the OP - neighborhoods matter. To the extent I could afford it, I’d choose to live in the best environment possible and attend the best schools possible. The financial aspect of the OP leads me to believe that both are available, so that’s what I’d do.
Just because there is not catchment area today doesn’t mean that there won’t be one tomorrow. And just because there isn’t a catchment area doesn’t mean there can’t be other restrictions, like limited places. After dealing with priority children like those with siblings already there, proximity to the school is going to be a significant discriminator.
You’ve got me really curious about the demographics of the area…
So - about the size to support exactly 2 state primary schools. Probably about 10k people or so. And it’s got rents OVER A THOUSAND DOLLARS??? You can (just) get a 3-bedroom in Toorak for less than that! Where the hell is this place? (WA mining-boom town, perhaps?)
Anyway … if it’s not zoned, it’s not zoned. Pick the place to live and pick the school separately. Yes, it does mean that there may be neighbor kids they get less contact with because they’re not at the same school - or it may be that everyone in the street with kids has actually made the same decision.
In any case I would be kind of amazed if the official catchment area of the good school and the high/low rent boundary line up EXACTLY. Yes, it’s very relevant when you have primary school kids, but that’s not usually the majority of renters. I’m going to assume they do have an ‘official catchment’ even if they don’t happen to be using it at the moment
FTR, my question was really exemplified by senoy’s post. Disadvantage can be exacerbated simply by those with advantages side-stepping the issues. And the issues affect us all at the end of the day.
Simply, my daughter is looking at a job promotion to a remote community 4,500km away. It’s in the mining belt. It’s also home to local indigenous families who have (for the most part) not benefited from the mining boom in Australia. So they’re poor, with few job prospects, literacy and numeracy issues, compounded with substance abuse issues and no immediate remedies available. The kids will most likely just repeat the lives of their mums and dads and grandpas and grandmas. The schools try their hardest with scant resources, but the outcomes so far haven’t been stellar.
But we’re just going to be blow-ins for maybe 3yrs max before the isolation and the heat get the better of us, then we’ll head back to civilization. It seems damned selfish of us to get the financial benefits of living in such a community without acknowledging that our mere presence makes the lives of the local people more dire, even something as basic as sending the white grandkids to the ‘better’ school. Sure, if she doesn’t take the job someone else will. Doesn’t make the ethical quandary any easier to swallow.
I feel like there is a degree of hypocrisy in what you presented for your particular “situation”. I don’t hear you fretting over whether your daughter should even take this job in the first place. So you are willing to enjoy the main benefits of moving to a lucrative job in a remote, depressed region while wringing your hands over which gated community to send your kids to school from to assuage some sort of “liberal guilt”?
Gotta say, this was my first impression, given that the job is “REALLY high-paying”!
But there are a couple of factors at play. First, I’d be hard pressed not to get my kid into the best schools available - or at least near the best. In our area, schools are local. So generally the pricier areas have the better schools. Even if the kid is only there for 3 years, that will set the tone for future achievement.
And you have to make your decision as to whether you want to live in the higher/lower rent areas. Does the lower priced area have greater crime, or other dynamics the parents may not favor? Are the homes well maintained? Not saying all poor people are undesirable neighbors. And rich folk can be asshole neighbors. But if one area is cheaper to live in, that affects who will live there. When I lived in Section 8 (subsidized) housing, most of my neighbors were fine folk. But there were also a greater percentage of loud parties and drunk shouting late at night, etc. The crappy minority can have an outsized impact.
If you lived in the lower rent area, would there be a stigma (towards the parents OR the kid) if the kid were shipped out to the higher rent schools? IMO there IS a benefit of neighborhood schools. I went to a distant high school rather than my neighborhood school, and lacked friends nearby.
In retrospect, I regret that we raised our kids in lily-white suburbs. We thought our decisions were based solely on proximity re: our jobs/family, school quality, and stability of property values. Now I realize there would have been one alternative which had excellent schools, would have worked with my commute, and is WONDERFULLY diverse. Our kids grew up fine, and my life has been OK, but I think we would all likely have benefitted from a more diverse environment.
IM pretty extensive experience, super-high performing wealthy schools are actually often pretty mediocre for most and downright toxic for many. They are extraordinarily conformist, put a ton of pressure on kids to achieve within a very narrow view of success, and generally coast on their laurels. They often rely on parents to arrange tutoring or otherwise remediate kids. There are also, perversely, fewer opportunities per capita. Because the institution puts a high priority on absolute success, you have to be really good at something to be able to do it at all. They are also real big on creating bottlenecks: you can’t take advanced classes unless you meet criteria that are well beyond the minimum to be successful in the course. This keeps the test scores up and reinforces the idea that the school is elite and hard-core.
I have avoided putting my son in that kind of school. I have also avoided putting him in schools that are low-performing and do not have much of a culture of success.
So yeah, I will repeat monstro and say go look at them. However, I would also say that things like new facilities are much less important than the attitude of the teachers and admin. Do they want every student to learn? Do they want the experience to be positive for every kid? Is there support? Scores are evidence, but the context of the scores is vital to understanding them.
Do you have any experience in situations similar to what the OP describes - a small town (15k pop), with 4 public primary schools and (apparently) open enrollment?
In the Chicago area, what you describe might apply to - say - the New Triers, or Chicago magnet schools. I have lived in suburbs where some primary schools had better reps than others, but not the “toxic” dynamic you describe.
But never having lived in a community of 15k, I’m having a hard time imagining how the schools could differ as much as the OP describes.