schools in Oregon???

[tod]

Originally Posted by Carol, Oregon coast

Being a teacher, I happen to think Oregon schools are far better than the private ones. We teach the regular stuff...reading, writing, math, social studies, science. Depending on the area you live in, your child might have music, band, PE, swimming, community service projects, and at some grade levels, they earn money and take overnight field trips to historic Oregon spots or even to Washington, DC. In my area, it seems that the private schools can offer a religious perspective, which we can't, and they also take the kids whose parents feel that their child is never in the wrong at public school. My children attended public school in Oregon, Washington, and Calilfornia, and I think you have to be proactive in asking what courses are offered at the school you're considering. For instance, does the high school offer advanced math classes? Do they have a relationship with a junior college that will allow a student to attend both and earn college credit? What colleges/universities do students generally attend on graduation? They don't take mediocre graduates at Harvard or Pepperdine. Good luck!

Hey your a teacher that's what you would!

[klove1228]

Don't forget about all the half days and three day weekends in public school now. I think they call it teacher service days.

[bluebird39]

Hi there,

I think I posted about this before. I lived Central Point for many years. The schools in Oregon are one of the main reason we left Oregon. They were getting so bad. That being said though, family is a good reason to move there.

As mentioned, Jacksonville OR has a good school, and Ashland also has a good reputation. There are also some schools in East Medford that are good. West Medford will be a bit more racially diverse, but lower income. The 3 mentioned above have the highest prices in real estate.

What you need to do is to find someone from England who lives in Oregon and can compare the 2 school systems. I have no idea what schools are like there, but suspect they're much better than schools in the US.

A really good point was brought up about 3 day week-ends and half days. My son's school was going to half days every Wed to cut costs, and he had 2-3 inservice days a month, on average (no school). That's unheard of here in Michigan, even with a bad economy. My kids had no inservice days here, and only 2-3 half days for the whole year. Here the teachers are required to spend "X" number of hours with their students, something that Oregon didn't seem to require. When my son was in kindergarten with 45 other kids, he only spent an hour or 2 a day with his teacher. All of the rest of the time was spent with "teacher's aides", which were mostly parents of kids in the school, and had little or no training. It was so frustrating.

I will say that I agree that it's not the teachers who are at fault. The teachers at their school were very good, there were just not enough resources and too many kids, too little time.

Here in Michigan they have longer school days, and we didn't even have to buy school supplies. They have field trips every month here (only 1 a year in Oregon, and that was strictly with money from parent fundraising). They also teach swimming, ice skating and downhill skiing, and have tons of extra curricular activities here. There was NO after school activities at their old school.

I'd avoid CP schools. You might look into Phoenix-Talent schools too. I have heard more and more bad stories from Ashland, and most of my friends are trying to get their kids in to the dual language (Spanish/English) program in Phoenix-Talent. I honestly have heard very few bad reports from them. There are still affordable places in Phoenix and Talent, and they have a smaller district.

Good luck!

[dik909]

perhaps checking out Oregon's state education website can provide insight into OR's specific benchmarks and standards as they conform to 'No Child Left Behind' ??

also, reading this thread has been helpful as a teacher hoping to move to Oregon within a year. i was born/raised just outside of Portland, but would like to find something more westward central, or southwest OR.

hmm...

[UK*Tracy]

Thanks for all your input.