Sumter, SC (Columbia, Greenville, Irmo: crime, unemployment, elementary school)

[jcbr1999]

I have been offered a job teaching elementary school in Sumter, SC. I am from Indiana and just want to find out some information on the area. I have vacationed in South Carolina my whole life but always at the beach. How safe is Sumter? Is is close enough to Columbia to live in Columbia and commute? If so what parts of Columbia are close enough to live in? I would just like some basic info on the area and if it would be a decent place to live. I would appreciate any help I can get, this is a big decision!

[01Snake]

The thread has been moved.

[slaleman]

Hopefully, it's not a position teaching geography, as this was posted in the San Antonio, TX forum... =-)

[sapphire]

Well, when you do find out, let us know how liberal they are, and for heaven's sake, let's hope there is more than one grocery store. We might all pack up and move.

[waccamatt]

Like any city, there are areas in Sumter that are relatively safe and some that have more crime problems. A Columbia to Sumter commute is not impossible - it is about a 50-55 minute drive from downtown Columbia to downtown Sumter, but from the eastside of Columbia it would only take 35-40 minutes.

[Buckeye in SC]

Originally Posted by jcbr1999

I have been offered a job teaching elementary school in Sumter, SC. I am from Indiana and just want to find out some information on the area. I have vacationed in South Carolina my whole life but always at the beach. How safe is Sumter? Is is close enough to Columbia to live in Columbia and commute? If so what parts of Columbia are close enough to live in? I would just like some basic info on the area and if it would be a decent place to live. I would appreciate any help I can get, this is a big decision!

With gas prices so high, doubt you'd want to commute to Sumter from Columbia, we live on the east side by Ft. Jackson and Sumter is still about 35 miles from us. I would recommend you look into some of the Cola area districts, we moved down last summer from Ohio for my wife to teach, and she got a job in Richland 2 S.D., supposedly one of the best in the state. That district is growing like crazy and is short on teachers for the upcoming school year. We've also heard that Lexington S.D. 5 (Irmo/Lexington area) is pretty good too.

We still have not been to Sumter after living here a year, but most things we've heard about the area aren't too positive, that said though, you never really know if an area is a fit for you unless you go there yourself, you might love Sumter and hate Columbia (although, I'd find that hard to believe, we've really enjoyed the city thus far)...good luck to you.

[Palmetto Heel]

Unemployment in Sumter runs about 10% and that causes a lot of social problems. Some help may be on the horizton due to military base relocation to the area.

Plenty of people commute but I wouldn't want to do it. That's just me.

[Captain Worley]

I used to commute from Columbia to Sumter. One thing to remember, and it might not sound like a big deal, but it is, is that you'll be driving into the sun both ways.Sumter has some nice areas and some really bad areas, but it will be pretty obvious once you start driving around.Good luck. It ought to be interesting in the job with Districts 2 and 17 merging. They don't seem to be playing nice right now, at last 17 doesn't, but that's just my opinion.

[Ceezer]

Originally Posted by jcbr1999

I have been offered a job teaching elementary school in Sumter, SC. I am from Indiana and just want to find out some information on the area. I have vacationed in South Carolina my whole life but always at the beach. How safe is Sumter? Is is close enough to Columbia to live in Columbia and commute? If so what parts of Columbia are close enough to live in? I would just like some basic info on the area and if it would be a decent place to live. I would appreciate any help I can get, this is a big decision!

Check out my response in this thread: http://www.city-data.com/forum/colum...-shaw-afb.html

As for the Columbia-Sumter commute. I've been making it about 9 months now and it's tiresome. My drive is about 48 miles and is fairly direct; it takes about 50 minutes, despite being 90% highway/interstate. My little 4-banger Subaru has to be filled 5 times in a pay-period, and at $45/tank it's costing about $400/mo. That really hurts since I took a severe pay cut moving into the civilian market from my DoD job just 4 miles from home.

If you can find a way to avoid this much driving, I would highly recommend it. You could try splitting the difference by checking out the outlying areas of Camden/Lugoff. That would put you just about 20-25 minutes from Sumter and only 15 minutes from NE Columbia/Sandhills.

[Ceezer]

While I've been guilty of putting down certain aspects of Sumter myself, I wouldn't call it the 'armpit of SC'. I can point to several towns here that make Sumter look like Greenville...

I don't know what schools you looked into or how long ago it was, but as I stated in the other thread (the one I linked in the post prior to yours, I'm real happy with where my daughter is in terms of care & involvement.