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Old 09-24-2013, 07:29 PM
 
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Here are a couple of articles from 2007 and 2010 that help confirm a lower number, but it's still pretty high (1 in 4 in 2010) and of concern to the district.

Education | Seattle School Board turns its attention to middle-class families | Seattle Times Newspaper

Private vs. public education - Blog - MyNorthwest.com
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Old 09-24-2013, 08:32 PM
 
Location: a warmer place
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These maybe somewhat helpful but they are dated. Public school enrollment in the past 3 years has skyrocketed. For example Coe expected 450 students this year and ended up with 520. The APP program has grown exponentially. Hamilton has 1100 students this year and also some amazing test scores. 98% passed their algebra EOCs last year. This is middle school not high school. I have a 12 year old taking geometry and biology. The return to neighborhood schools, the recession, who knows...many people are choosing to send their kids to public schools in the city. There are great schools here.

Yes, there are issues with Seattle Schools. I definitely have my issues. But you can get a very good education in public schools in this city if you are vigilant. Look at the amount of National Merit Scholars coming out of Garfield this year.
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Old 09-24-2013, 09:49 PM
 
Location: State of Transition
102,126 posts, read 107,402,364 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by icecoldlemonade View Post
Sorry for the maybe naive question.

We were doing city research for a move to Seattle in a few years. Most of our friends who live in Seattle do not have children so they haven't been able to give us much information on an interesting schooling phenomenon we observed. Why do so many people in Seattle send their kids to private schools?

According to city data, for example, 93.5% of Queen Anne residents send their kids to private school.
86.5% of Ballard residents and 76.6% of those in Laurelhurst do the same. If you pop into any of the neighborhood specific data charts, you'll see that the majority of Seattle residents are private schooling.

Having grown up in So. California, my experience was that non-religious middle and upper middle class people only do private school if the public schools are located in a terrible, dangerous neighborhood that have test scores suffering due to the lower income students (who may be ESL). But most of these Seattle neighborhoods are tagged as middle and upper-middle class areas with higher income and educated residents. While the schools aren't lauded like the ones in Bellevue, most of them rank pretty highly on Great Schools (lots of 8s and 9s). And having casually visited a few of these neighborhoods, I thought they seemed like very safe, even cute, family-friendly urban areas!
I don't know where you grew up in CA, but most of East Berkeley and much of North Berkeley have always sent their kids to private schools. Berkeley only has one public HS for the entire city (a strange phenom in itself), so there are many neighborhoods that reflect similar stats as you quote for Seattle. If over 90% of Queen Anne residents send their kids to private schools, who attends Queen Anne HS? Who attends the HS serving Laurelhurst? I wonder if those figures are exaggerated.
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Old 09-24-2013, 10:16 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ruth4Truth View Post
I don't know where you grew up in CA, but most of East Berkeley and much of North Berkeley have always sent their kids to private schools. Berkeley only has one public HS for the entire city (a strange phenom in itself), so there are many neighborhoods that reflect similar stats as you quote for Seattle. If over 90% of Queen Anne residents send their kids to private schools, who attends Queen Anne HS? Who attends the HS serving Laurelhurst? I wonder if those figures are exaggerated.
Nobody attends Queen Anne HS. It hasn't existed for 30 years.
I do think those figures are exaggerated.
Madrona is a Seattle neighborhood with a bad elementary school, and a higher per capita income than Seattle as a whole. Yet Madrona, according to these stats, has a higher percentage of residents sending their kids to public schools than Queen Anne, a neighborhood with great schools.
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Old 09-24-2013, 10:20 PM
 
Location: State of Transition
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ira500 View Post
Yet Madrona, according to these stats, has a higher percentage of residents sending their kids to public schools than Queen Anne, a neighborhood with great schools.
So who attends those great schools on Queen Anne? According to the stats, it's gotta be 93% students from outside Queen Anne.

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Old 09-24-2013, 10:32 PM
 
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We are looking to move to the area. Initially, we were attracted to Wallingford, and the two international elementary schools there (JSIS and McDonald). But, now we are swinging away from it. This is partially for logistical reasons: We will be working on the Eastside so the commute is easier from there, and we have three kids so it is tough to find a place with enough space in the city. But we also have some issues with the schools:

1) The aforementioned administrative problems. JSIS's attendance zone has been shrinking, so there are people who bought homes in JSIS's zone only to get zoned out. Now they are looking to convert both international schools to option schools, so more homeowners may get zoned out. APP has moved a few times, Spectrum is full in many places... I just don't like choosing to go to a place where I am uncertain of whether my kids will end up at a decent school or not.

2) The math curriculum (Everyday Math) has been roundly criticized. Most Eastside school districts have dropped their reform math curriculum (EM or TERC) in favor of more traditional curricula.

All that said, if we already lived in the city, I don't know that we would go private or move, especially if one of us had a job in that area. Private is expensive, moving is a hassle, and it seems like you can find some pretty good schools even in Seattle.

Interestingly, the real estate agent we are working with said most Seattle families send their kids to private school. She didn't even mention the great public schools that also happen to be reasonably convenient to our jobs. So, that perception is out there, for sure.
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Old 09-25-2013, 12:59 AM
 
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Because people respond to what they feel rather than to what factual analysis would provide them.

It's the same reason that they won't let their kids walk to (private or public) schools despite the fact that it's orders of magnitude safer to let them do so than it was in the 60's, 70's, 80's, or 90's.

We worry disproportionately about the dramatic based on what is put in front of us. It is not remotely pragmatic.
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Old 09-25-2013, 07:37 AM
 
5,075 posts, read 11,041,925 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Back2Texas View Post

Interestingly, the real estate agent we are working with said most Seattle families send their kids to private school. She didn't even mention the great public schools that also happen to be reasonably convenient to our jobs. So, that perception is out there, for sure.
You need a new agent. This one is either clueless or only used to dealing with insanely rich clients that aren't concerned with these factors.
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Old 09-25-2013, 11:09 AM
 
94 posts, read 203,751 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mkarch View Post
You need a new agent. This one is either clueless or only used to dealing with insanely rich clients that aren't concerned with these factors.
Yeah, I'm not super impressed with her. To be fair, she's provided by my husband's (Eastside-based) company, as part of his relocation package. So it may just be that she's used to dealing with people who don't really want to live in Seattle anyway

Regardless, we've done enough research on our own to know there's more to the story than what she's telling us, but I'm sure a lot of people would just take her statement at face value.
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Old 09-25-2013, 11:28 PM
 
9,618 posts, read 27,289,641 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by icecoldlemonade View Post
I'm sorry - let me clarify. The percentages refer to school-age children and not all residents. So, 93% of school-attending children in Queen Anne are said to go to private schools. The data is straight from the city-data neighborhood analysis pages. If you scroll 3/4 down the main Seattle page, you can see a list of each neighborhood. And on each neighborhood page, there will be a breakdown of public vs private school attendees.

Here are the direct links:
http://www.city-data.com/neighborhoo...eattle-WA.html
http://www.city-data.com/neighborhoo...eattle-WA.html
http://www.city-data.com/neighborhoo...eattle-WA.html

Example:





This is why I was so confused. I know enough to realize that Queen Anne is a very nice neighborhood with some highly ranked public schools. For example, Coe Elementary has a community rating of 5 stars out of 5 with a 9/10 testing rate on Great Schools. Hamilton International Middle School is a 10/10. There must be another reason why so many are sending their kids to private ones. Since we don't have friends who are parents, I'm completely confused by this and even wondered if it was just a regional cultural difference (ie. everyone here does it and that is just how it is).

So far the explanations point to more administrative/structural frustrations. Interesting! I wonder if things will straighten out anytime soon...
Here's what I'm coming up with:
The total population of Queen Anne is about 36,000. about 15% of that number are school age children, so about 5400. The total combined enrollment of the students at Coe, John Hay, and McClure Middle School is about 1400. This number does not include the Queen Anne kids going to high schools, since QA doesn't have one, they go to Ballard HS. Since the K-6 total is 1400, and that's seven grades, assume 200 per grade, and add 800 for the HS kids =2200.
2200/5400 is still low, but it's more like 60% going to private schools, not 93%. I still think the data is incorrect. The other factor would be the presence of Seattle Country Day School, a rather prestigious private school. People live in Queen Anne so they can be close to that school. It's not that Coe and John Hay are bad at all, it's that Seattle Country Day is pretty elite.
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