Schools (Fort Lauderdale, Coral Springs, Plantation: theater, school district, university)

[movingSept]

Moving from New York to Florida. Can live anywhere from Lauderdale to Boca, West Palm. Will decide on area once we find a school. Looking for a good private school, academically? What schools would you recommend

[fauve]

You have many choices. American Heritage (Plantation), Pinecrest (Fort Lauderdale), University School (Davie), and North Broward Prep (Coral Springs) are all very highly regarded. Sagemont in Weston is also great - especially for younger kids, and there are some great Catholic schools too. What age are your kids?

[Momma_bear]

I am in Broward. In Broward you have American Heritage (Plantation), University School (Davie), Pinecrest (Fort Lauderdale), North Broward Prep (Coconut Creek), Sagemont (Weston). These are non religious, college prep schools which have PK-12 in one school.

My kids go to American Heritage. We are happy there. The school focuses on the "whole child". There are lots of extracurricular activities for the upper school kids (don't know about lower school as my kids started there in 6th grade). The school is really 2 schools, American Heritage and American Academy. Heritage focuses on average to above average students. The Academy focuses on kids who may have learning issues. The requirements for graduation are different but the kids do interact in PE, electives, and on the sports teams.

The school has every athletic team you can think of and was named one of the top sports high schools in the country in 2008. In addition to athletic teams the school has excellent theater, music and art programs. There seems to be a constant stream of honors on display on the marquee when I go to pick up my kids.

People seem to love the lower grades at University but I hear some complaints about the upper school. Pinecrest is also very well regarded. North Broward Prep has a really nice campus (my son has played lacrosse there) but I don't know much about the school.

For Catholic high schools there is St. Thomas Aquinas, Chaminade Madonna, Cardinal Gibbons and Archbishop McCarthy. St. Thomas and Archbishop are probably the best academically.

St. Thomas is a very good school and I know quite a few people who have students there and all of them are very happy at that school. St. Thomas consistently has one of the best footbal programs in the COUNTRY and countless NFL stars have gone to school there. All their athletic programs benefit from the notoriety of the football team. They have very good quality athletic programs in addition to their excellent academic programs.

I have written more about AHS and STA because those are the schools I am most familiar with. There are other, smaller Christian and Catholic schools sprinkled around the county. I do not know all of those schools. We did not begin to look at private schools until our kids were in 6th grade so I don't know that much about the programs in any of the schools in the younger grades.

[vvolin]

My child was at University School in Davie for six years, so I can give you some feedback on that school. There is an entrance exam and children who score average or above are admitted. I think the "average" concept is somewhat flexible. The idea is to detect particularly challenging learning disabilities, as the school does not target to those.

Starting from first grade, students are tested the first two weeks of each school year and, also based on the previous year recommendations, they are placed in 5 different classes per grade for English and 5 for Math (that is, a child could be in a high performing English class but in a more average Math class). The classes are relatively homogeneous in the learning style and performance level. In this way children who are well above average find a more challenging academic environment, while those who need more attention are often concentrated in classes with fewer students.

In each class of English and Math students are further divided into three groups of similar abilities, groups which can change over the course of the year. This allows each child to work exactly at the level she finds it challenging enough without being overwhelmed.

Two years ago, the transition of my daughter to a very good public school district in Connecticut, notoriously one of the three best States for public education, was disappointing. She was essentially working at least one grade ahead at University School. Also during our six sabbatical months in Australia she ended up being moved a grade up. My child is not a genius, she is just a very good student. USchool was good for her.

[StilltheSame]

Hi moving - if you search previous posts in this forum you will find a wealth of information about private schools in the area -if northern broward or palm beach is a possibility you may also want to look in that forum. Good luck!