Tell Me About Growing Up on the Coast

[jenfarm_]

Originally Posted by texasdiver

When I was growing up I had several good friends at Marshfield HS in Coos Bay. They all left home for college and never looked back. Same exact phenomenon I saw with my co-workers kids during the decade that I lived in Juneau Alaska.

What happens to kids in these kinds of remote resource and tourism related towns is basically two things: They either settle in and basically face limited economic prospects for the rest of their lives in tourism or resource industries--become "townies" so to speak, working at the local Fred Meyer or some such. Or they get out and don't look back. There are a rare few who manage to scrape up and find good middle class professional jobs in things like health care or government (esp. the Federal government) but those jobs are hard to come by and don't show any preferences for local hires. So even kids who leave to pursue professional education with the idea of coming back often don't do so because jobs are still scarce on the coast and they make lives elsewhere.

Another issue is the schools. Due to a long list of reasons too complicated to go into here it is very difficult for local school districts in Oregon to maintain an adequate tax base and funding. Tax levies are hard to pass in Oregon under any circumstances due to complicated supermajority requrements and other restrictions. But they are especially hard to pass on the coast due to the population demographics. Too many absentee part-time residents who don't vote and retirees without kids from out of state who reflexively vote against any local tax levies. There aren't nearly enough families with kids to support education on the coast compared to say the newer suburbs around PDX that are full of families with school age children or the college towns with lots of educated professionals who support education. Plus the coast is linear so it is difficult to consolidate schools without creating long long bus commutes up and down 101. It's not like the valley where you can draw kids from a radius in all directions. That means there are a lot of smaller mediocre schools without a lot of offerings all along the coast.

All great and valid points in this. I totally agree.

Originally Posted by Minervah

One problem I see with this question is that people can say what it was like growing up on the Coast when they were growing up but I would suspect it's very different now because all of the changes going on all over Oregon over the past years. So this information isn't going to be very valid for anyone who wants information on growing up on the Coast is like at present.

The only constant seems to be that kids who grow up there mostly want to leave when they become adults.

Yep.

[KatieEllen]

Originally Posted by jenfarm_

I grew up in the Florence area. Born in Washington, moved down to the Oregon coast when I was about 4 years old. Went to school from preschool to high school graduation at the same school, with the same kids. My school was smaaall when I went to school there but it's even smaaaller now, if that's even imaginable. I had 25 kids in my graduating class and we were one of the larger ones. I actually really enjoyed it. Sure, it wasn't all great. Opportunities were small but it was easy to be a big fish in a small pond.

That being said, once I graduated I couldn't get out fast enough. Growing up where I did was an experience I wouldn't change for the world but I now live in Houston and moving here was the best decision I ever made. Haha. I feel I had a bit of an advantage being from a different area. I had family in Seattle and Portland. I knew about "the world outside of our tiny town" which is more than a lot of the other kids could say, unfortunately. A lot of my friends growing up had never left the county. There are a large majority of the kids I grew up with that are still in that area. Not to say they aren't doing well, most of them are. They've had their own successes in different ways. Some I, unfortunately, can't say the same of. I feel like if you are going to raise your kids in a small town like that, you need to spend extra effort in reminding them that there is more to life than just there. Keep their minds open but taking advantage of the smaller class sizes and more one on one chances with teachers is always good.

Raising my kids here in the huge city of Houston is going to be such an experience for me because my upbringing was the complete polar opposite. LOL. We'll see how that goes.

All in all, growing up on the Oregon Coast was amazing and I love that I still have friends and family back there that I can go visit whenever I want and enjoy the area in the way that I love to now... being able to leave when I've had my fill and go back "home" to Texas. Lol.

ETA: Now that I live here in Houston, I talk to other people about my childhood and how I grew up and I realize how unique and special it was. It seems like I really grew up in a whole other world. It's definitely given me an open mind to a lot of things.

Thank you so much JenFarm! This is exactly the view point I was hoping to get from someone who's lived it.. I really really appreciate you taking the time to write your experience!

[KatieEllen]

Originally Posted by texasdiver

When I was growing up I had several good friends at Marshfield HS in Coos Bay. They all left home for college and never looked back. Same exact phenomenon I saw with my co-workers kids during the decade that I lived in Juneau Alaska.

What happens to kids in these kinds of remote resource and tourism related towns is basically two things: They either settle in and basically face limited economic prospects for the rest of their lives in tourism or resource industries--become "townies" so to speak, working at the local Fred Meyer or some such. Or they get out and don't look back. There are a rare few who manage to scrape up and find good middle class professional jobs in things like health care or government (esp. the Federal government) but those jobs are hard to come by and don't show any preferences for local hires. So even kids who leave to pursue professional education with the idea of coming back often don't do so because jobs are still scarce on the coast and they make lives elsewhere.

Another issue is the schools. Due to a long list of reasons too complicated to go into here it is very difficult for local school districts in Oregon to maintain an adequate tax base and funding. Tax levies are hard to pass in Oregon under any circumstances due to complicated supermajority requrements and other restrictions. But they are especially hard to pass on the coast due to the population demographics. Too many absentee part-time residents who don't vote and retirees without kids from out of state who reflexively vote against any local tax levies. There aren't nearly enough families with kids to support education on the coast compared to say the newer suburbs around PDX that are full of families with school age children or the college towns with lots of educated professionals who support education. Plus the coast is linear so it is difficult to consolidate schools without creating long long bus commutes up and down 101. It's not like the valley where you can draw kids from a radius in all directions. That means there are a lot of smaller mediocre schools without a lot of offerings all along the coast.

Thank you for your input!

I've heard the schools can be poor, part of the problem being the retirees voting down school bonds, not wanting their taxes to go up, so I'm feeling apprehensive about the education in the area. This may be a deal breaker for us with moving down there. Education, arts, and sports are very important to my kiddos so not sure if this will be a good fit.

The 2 options you bring up about kids receiving their HS diploma and never returning or staying put with mediocre jobs seems to be the case with the area I'm currently from as well.

[jjpop]

I think the point that Minervah makes about when a person spent their youth living at the coast is a huge one. From my perspective (having been born and graduated HS on the Northern California coast), I can tell you that my home town has undergone tremendous changes over the past 20-30 years. So while I would be able to tell you what my experience was in the 70s and 80s, it may not be typical of what it's like for youth now in 2016.

I can tell you that taking off on my bike from my childhood home and riding bikes on trails through redwood forests was a great experience. But I've never really been the rural type and I craved a world that had more to offer culturally--even when I was young. That's why I left my hometown about 2 weeks after graduating HS and didn't look back.