Cookeville, Crossville, Knoxville OH My! (Oak Ridge: school districts, college, live in)

[Purplemom]

Hi, my name is Lisa and I am from South Florida. My family moved to Crossville a few years ago and my husband and I plan on joining them as soon as we can. Our friends are moving this summer. We have and 18 year old son who is in college and 5 year old boy who is due to start kindergarten in August. We are also adopting a daughter from China but that will take a couple of years. Of the people we know, we are the only ones who need to worry about education.
Does anyone know anything about the gifted program in these areas. I have been researching as much as I can. We will most likely be in Florida for kindergarten. Here the gifted program is a seperate class and the qualifing number to get into the class is 130. I spoke with that dept. in Crossville and I guess they stay in a regular class but get pulled out for different activites. Their qualifing number is 118. (That may not mean anything )
The Knoxville school system sounds good but we want to be away from a big city. I have read quite a bit about Cookeville schools but it is hard to find much info on the gifted programs. Oak Ridge sounded good until I read the "scary stuff". They are not completely ruled out though.
My other concern is extracurricular activites. He already has a list of things he wants to do/learn. We want to be close to our family but with one and at some point two young children, would Crossville not offer enough opportunites? Thank you for any information!!

[Eat]

Originally Posted by Purplemom

. Oak Ridge sounded good until I read the "scary stuff". They are not completely ruled out though.

Oak Ridge has very good schools, but you must live within the city limits for your children to attend them, if I understand correctly. Housing there is on the high side for the area, so you might want to check that out first.

And don't worry too much about the "scary stuff." A lot of very smart people live there, despite the attempts by some to scare off prospective residents.

[kickitfarms]

i currently live in north georgia and was planning to move to crossville to be with my dad. i am looking for these items to make my move perfect. at least 2 acres( i have a mini farm), a jewish synogogue( i am jewish) and easy access to georgia since i will still have work in cedartown, rome calhoun..( my job has me travel) and easy access to s. carolina( my kid goes to college there). perhaps the out areas of chattanooga are more appropriate or maybe the kingston area? can any one help with advise?

[dcambie]

Hi Lisa,

if you need decent schools in the area, I think you are stuck with SOME parts of Knoxville (but choose wisely) and Oak Ridge. However, even for those school districts, keep in mind that TAG (talented and gifted) programs start in third grade only. Apparently, kids are not encouraged to become smart until then and if they do... tough.
We choose West Knoxville because it was closer to the lifestyle we had in Northern CA, just better (no traffic for our standards). Everything considered, we love it so far, despite the shortcomings of the public school system

I can share our experience and impression of the area, a year after our move. Just PM me.

Good luck.