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View Poll Results: Follow our dreams or stay with what's comfortable?
Do it! Go to Alaska for an awesome adventure, you'll love it. 31 67.39%
Don't do it! Stay home because you will die here. 15 32.61%
Voters: 46. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 10-18-2018, 02:23 AM
 
Location: on the wind
22,858 posts, read 18,149,192 times
Reputation: 74036

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Haolejohn View Post
First off. Colorado is going to have much better health care than anywhere in Alaska. The more remote it is, the worse they quality is IMO. I’ve not been in the southeast and I’d love to visit. I’m a teacher in the state and the pay in the SE districts isn’t enough.

Make sure you read the NA for the district. Some districts allow up to 8 years experience and some only allow 3. The pay is higher typically than down south but the increase in cost to get anywhere as well as utilities and food eat that extra income up fairly quickly. How large is your family? We spent $6k a year in plane tickets and that was for one trip out per year.

Our insurance sucked and each school district is different though. Housing quality won’t be near what you are used too.

Also, the quality of education won’t quite be the same. Neither will sports or other extra curricular activities.
I recommend doing some more research and if you questions about the schools, please PM me. I’ll give the whole picture as it pertains to Alaska.
Lots of good info here. I lived in SE for a long time and though I didn't have kids in schools there myself, I had plenty of friends/coworkers who did. A lot of them fall back and end up relying on homeschooling. A lot of them plan annual trips out of state to take care of health care too. People get excited about higher salaries offered up here but they don't realize that higher salary will be eaten up quickly with the higher cost of living, housing and travel for necessities (and you will travel more to get more) in particular. It doesn't always work out in your favor. Just check into it from multiple angles before deciding.

Last edited by Parnassia; 10-18-2018 at 02:32 AM..
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Old 10-18-2018, 07:08 PM
 
Location: Juneau, AK + Puna, HI
10,407 posts, read 7,507,369 times
Reputation: 15720
Quote:
Originally Posted by 918x361x303 View Post
We are the opposite. Both my wife and I would make more $ in Alaska than Denver. I think we may be the exception lol. My wife is s teacher and teacher pay in Colorado sucks compared to cost of living. Colorado is like 47th. The per student funding is generally bad here also, actually, which I don't think most people would expect.






That's pretty much the conclusion I've come to as well.



And I love rain.

I'd pick Petersburg over Wrangell. It's a more scenic location and a better sense of community, IMO. Also, a fine place to raise kids.
The HS currently has excellent volleyball and cross country coaches, and just about every kid in the school participates in some extracurricular.
I think their academics are solid too. Quite an impressive school.

BTW, what's with your screen name? That's a big box.
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Old 10-19-2018, 08:50 AM
 
Location: Southern Colorado
3,680 posts, read 2,932,726 times
Reputation: 4809
OP has recently referenced the sizable appreciation of their home and real estate. Might want to consider the cycle of booms and busts, growth and recession. I plan to sell my Denver home next spring. Also selling a Ft Myers rental soon. Buy low, sell high.

Alaska is a pretty extreme move though. We all love the scenery but there is certainly a price to be paid. Gathering opinions on the internet? Usually interesting but keep one thing in mind. Us humans are pretty crazy. We are "apes who learned how to drive."

I'd especially beware the typical poster who vehemently knows exactly what each person should do. They always communicate with great certainty and strive for dominance with every opportunity. Those people seem magnetically drawn to dominate internet conversations. Disagree and boom - another stalker is unleashed.

"The less people know, the more confident they often are."
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Old 10-19-2018, 01:30 PM
 
13 posts, read 13,925 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Blind Cleric View Post
I'd pick Petersburg over Wrangell. It's a more scenic location and a better sense of community, IMO. Also, a fine place to raise kids.
The HS currently has excellent volleyball and cross country coaches, and just about every kid in the school participates in some extracurricular.
I think their academics are solid too. Quite an impressive school.

BTW, what's with your screen name? That's a big box.

We are leaning towards Wrangell, as I said, but Petersburg having the better schools is a big plus. I know to not take the Niche, Great Schools, etc rankings as gospel, but when every ranking/rating you find has Petersburg schools significantly higher, I tend to put more stock in anything when there's a unanimous consensus.

Our daughter is very smart and driven academically and her teacher is having her tested for Gifted and Talented - I think next week. I don't think she'll need help anywhere along the way (obviously you never know) and that shifts our focus a little more towards the availability and quality of the gifted/accelerated programs at the schools.

Is that volleyball coach young and/or likely to be there in 6-7 years? Lol. My daughter is really into volleyball and has made rapid improvement and is quite good. I expect that to continue. I think softball might end up her sport, though. She just played her first season of softball last Spring and she's nearly ambidextrous both hitting and throwing. I'm not a parent who over inflates their child's abilities, either. We gently but consistently steered her away from soccer. Lol. There's a slew of people on both sides of my family that played ball in college. My paternal grandpa made it to AAA in the Cardinal's organization by 20 before he blew out his knee. Just giving the run-down in order to lend more validity to what I've been told of her volleyball and especially softball ability.

At least for activities and sports for the kids money is no object, though. We fend for ourselves primarily, and rightly so, but my old man has money and we are very fortunate that he will cover any costs for activities and sports that we're not able to. So I'm not sure the HS softball will matter as much as just getting her on a good travel team but im just starting to really understand all this. Weird to think so seriously about sports for an 8 year old but these girls committ in like 8th grade for softball. It's crazy!

Though none of us know what the future will bring we are aren't seeking this relocation out with some kind of wanderlust throwing our lives topsy-turvy for a short term adventure. We are going into this with the intent to set down permanent roots somewhere.



Quote:
Originally Posted by ColoGuy View Post
OP has recently referenced the sizable appreciation of their home and real estate. Might want to consider the cycle of booms and busts, growth and recession. I plan to sell my Denver home next spring. Also selling a Ft Myers rental soon. Buy low, sell high.

Alaska is a pretty extreme move though. We all love the scenery but there is certainly a price to be paid. Gathering opinions on the internet? Usually interesting but keep one thing in mind. Us humans are pretty crazy. We are "apes who learned how to drive."

I'd especially beware the typical poster who vehemently knows exactly what each person should do. They always communicate with great certainty and strive for dominance with every opportunity. Those people seem magnetically drawn to dominate internet conversations. Disagree and boom - another stalker is unleashed.

"The less people know, the more confident they often are."

As far as is leaving Colorado we just aren't into the things that draw people here the most so the benefit isn't worth the cost. Winter sports: no. The restaurant/bar scene: no. Going to Rockies games: somewhat but rarely. Broncos games: same. Constantly out and about taking advantage of the weather and all the sun: it's nice but not a big thing for us. Without listing everything that draws people to Colorado you get the idea.

As far as how much stock to put into what I'm reading on the internet I I think I have a rare ability to put just about the right amount of stock into various data and what each person says. I'm pretty good at understanding all the angles someone might have, recognizing biases, and giving everything pretty dang close to the correct weight/value.

Unfortunately this will be the first home we buy. We'll almost certainly rent the first year while we get the lay of the land and save up a little more on a down payment. We want to buy something in good shape with "good bones" as they say . Some reno maybe but no huge makeover needee. Thsts about it. Of course we both have some preferences but neither of us is particularly finnicky or has any super strong preference for this particularly or that particularly when it comes to the age of the home, a particular style of home, certain finishes, etc. Just posting this about houses so folks know that either community should theoretically work as far as what we want in a house.

Last edited by 918x361x303; 10-19-2018 at 01:51 PM..
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Old 10-19-2018, 02:30 PM
 
Location: Juneau, AK + Puna, HI
10,407 posts, read 7,507,369 times
Reputation: 15720
Quote:
Originally Posted by 918x361x303 View Post

Is that volleyball coach young and/or likely to be there in 6-7 years? Lol. My daughter is really into volleyball and has made rapid improvement and is quite good. I expect that to continue..
Well, I guess you could email him and ask! Jaime Cabral, in his 30's. Originally from Hawaii. He obviously has played quite a bit in the past and knows the game well. Obviously your kid wouldn't improve as much with poor coaching. I don't know about Wrangell coach but could find out.

Sitka and Juneau have the best softball programs in SE at this time, I believe.
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Old 10-22-2018, 12:11 AM
 
26,486 posts, read 36,332,953 times
Reputation: 29543
Hardly anyone ever mentions Petersburg or Wrangell on this forum so I tend to forget about them in discussions regarding the panhandle, but they're both good enough places. My part of Southeast tends to get the end-of-the-roaders who ferry up from Washington. Anyway, living in SE has a really high adjustment curve, so just be open and adaptable. A lot of the services and amenities most people take for granted are limited or lacking. Just depends on what matters to you.
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