Quote:
Originally Posted by ngela Slater
I would love to hear from someone with non LDS children in school-and how they are treated! Thanks
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Just discovered this forum, too late for the original poster, but didn't yet have child in school yet, so might not have been helpful.
I have lived in the same house in Lehi for 8 years, a non-LDS transplant from the East coast. My husband and I are fairly shy, so we don't know a lot of our neighbors, but I do know they are predominantly LDS because I saw the ward map (they really do have a map in the local church identifying every home, annotated for who is a member!). Just a few anecdotes - I'll try not to offer any interpretation beyond the telling.
1) Several years ago the water in Lehi tested positive for E.Coli and a boil order went out. I found out about it when the radio announced that it had been rescinded. When I called the city and asked why residents weren't informed the reply was "You should have been informed in church. Didn't they announce it?"
2) My husband and I were not married when we first moved in. We married a year later in the yard and our neighbor, who is an official in LDS the church, not only came to the wedding he brought me to it in his horse and buggy as a gift. After the ceremony he generously gave rides to every guest who wanted one.
3) There is an extremely high student to teacher ratio here in Utah - in fact it is the highest out of 50 states and D.C. This is not because it is a booming area, it has always been this way. Mormons have children. 5, 6, 7 is very common. Schools are grossly underfunded and have crowded conditions. There have been discussions for years of ways to alleviate this, but never progress.
4) We walk our oldest to Kindergarten. On the way there I hear all the mothers and children greeting each other. Presumably they all know each other from church. It is difficult for my daughter to make friends because they all seem to have best friends already. There are one or two who aren't already "attached", but one of these has a completely different set of rules from us (they often play in the road, for one). The other comes to school by bus, so I haven't found a way to meet her parents.
5) I have never in 8 years of living here, been invited to any non-church neighborhood party. After they realized that we were not going to be doing the monthly offering (took over a year for that realization to sink in), we stopped being invited to any ward activities as well. I had to smile at another poster who mentioned being invited to several ward parties but was waiting for a non-church affiliated one. My experience is that you will have a very long wait.
6) Perhaps it is because my neighborhood is old and established rather than new and HOA'd, but only 2 neighbors have ever introduced themselves to us. For any others the effort has all been on us, and as I said we are shy. I've shoveled snow for an elderly neighbor without ever learning his name.
If we didn't have family in the area, I wouldn't live here. I love the mountains, hiking, camping, proximity to National Parks, and all the countryside has to offer. But there are other places in the country I can get that with less of the baggage. I'm a little tired of being mistaken for a grandmother merely because I was in my 30's when my children were born. I'd like to have a close friend in the same state as me (other than my husband) with whom I can really share and not have fundamental differences in religion, politics and values. I can handle one or two of those, but would like just one neighbor without all three different.
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Will my daugghters be ok??
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