Academics at Ravenscroft School (Durham, Cary: magnet school, university, moving to)

[sycomores]

Hi

[sycomores]

Hi
We are moving to the Triangle area, my husband will be working in North Durham. We are on the waitlist for Durham Academy and felt it to be a very good fit for my two, aged 11 (going into 6th grade) and 8 (going into 3rd). Not sure what wait list means, and chances of realistically getting in or not. We are likely to move to the area in the summer. We are in France, in a bilingual French/English school, before this, were in Switzerland in German/English bilingual school. My kids have been stretched in the language department and are used to doing a fair amount of homework so we are really interested in strong academic schools in the area. We liked the feel of CH and would consider areas of Durham too. Having said that we visited Ravenscroft, and of course it was excellent not sure if its academic standing is at par with DA? We would like to go to Charter/Magnet school but fear we have missed the lottery deadline. If anyone has any advice/info on reality of getting into DA off wait list I would appreciate it. And also comments about academic rigour at Ravenscroft? Thanks

[ncfifi]

Hi, Well, Ravenscroft works for you because you can have both of your kids in the same school. If you would consider having them in different schools, you could look at Cary Academy for your older child. It definitely competes with the two schools you're looking at for academics, possibly in a more creative/modern/technological way. CA has great language and exchange programs as well. I think DA and Ravenscroft compare relatively well academically. I think, in the end, it comes down to the school communities being a little bit different based on the outlook of the families, which has a lot to do with where they're coming from in the Triangle (more/less university/hospital/business people, etc.). Good luck with the DA waiting list. I can't tell you anything about how that works, unfortunately.