Another transplant Q--city v. suburb

[nJohn]

You can do my route: lived in the city but commuted to the suburbs for high school. I attended a private school which cost a pretty penny. If you can afford to send your kids to a magnet school or private school in Chicago then I'm all for it. To be honest, it's all about opportunities, what you want for your child, and how much you can tolerate incompetence and red tape.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Avengerfire

I was not attacking the question as "the city is better than the burbs for school." I was just stating if the OP decided on living in the city they would be much better off on the NW side in many ways and would not need to shell out money for a private school nor as much for a house that they would have to if they moved in the "hip" areas of Chicago.

That's cool. I'm not trying to attack--but am pointing out that the standards are different between a "good" CPS school and a "good" suburban public school. I've been disappointed by most of the "good" CPS schools I've looked into for my daughter's elementary school education. I don't want people to think that they can just move to the Northwest Side and get an education as good as they would get in Naperville from their neighborhood school.

CPS has some great selective enrollment schools that blow suburban schools away for academic performance, but getting in can be tricky. But if your kids are amazingly gifted (who's aren't, right?), there would be some great educational opportunities in the city through CPS. International Baccalaureate programs are also available at a few CPS high schools. But of course, that doesn't happen at the elementary school level.