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It certainly could result in some improvement.
I just haven't managed to find that area yet.
Small Southern town, big southern city, small Northeast town or big Northeast city.
Where next?
Now...some people told me that my experiences may have been strongly shaped by the fact that we have been gravitating towards areas with "good school districts".
I used to be naive about this, but I eventually learned the complex meaning behind this code.
But I don't mean to get off topic...
I hate to sound like a cliche, but I would avoid big cities, and stick with mid to small populations in areas that value modesty.
Much of the midwest and some parts of the south are good, as is my part of New England. I don't like areas that are thought of as "hip.", and housing can be very cheap, even for very nice houses.
Good school districts is usually overplayed in my experience. As long as an area is decent the schools should at least be OK, and if the parent is involved he/she can truly help the children to do well.
Brazil is a very family-oriented country even in the big cities. I love the fact that there is no real generation gap like it is in the states and you see entire families from newborn babies to elderly grandparents doing activities together.
I think that the US is one of the worse places for family especially out here in California where most people are from some other state. The US in general emphasizes the pursuit of money over family. I find it rather depressing.
I am not saying Brazil is a perfect place. They have their share of family/community/social problems but at the end of the day I still find more warmth and affection between people than I do in the States. In LatinAmerican people tend to live life with more passion and gusto than they do in the States - at least imo.
Good school districts is usually overplayed in my experience. As long as an area is decent the schools should at least be OK, and if the parent is involved he/she can truly help the children to do well.
I think you are right about good school districts being overplayed, but not because decent school districts are OK, but rather because all schools nowadays are hardly OK, having lost the quality and substance of education in the past.
In better school district, there is a lot of drilling and pushing - usually coming from parents - but I do not see significant contributions from the school itself. Curriculum is watered down and teachers don't put in that "heart and soul" that cultivates love of learning beyond pragmatic considerations.
This is the kind of thing I was looking for in stellar school districts and I can say, in all honesty, that I did not find them.
Ah that´s why these countries have one of the lowest birth rates of the world.
What do low birth rates have to do with anything? They certainly don't indicate a lack of family-orientation at the cultural level. Some people prefer quality to quantity.
Families in those countries have few children but that hardly means they don't have strong families.
Ah that´s why these countries have one of the lowest birth rates of the world.
Curiously I read something that said the two kind of do relate. Women in those nations find the obligations of family life, as they understand it, to be too much. So they avoid it. Unmarried men stay with their parents and like it. That was one interesting thing about this foreign exchange student from Spain who stayed with us for a year. He said there a guy living with his parents is seen as having a "good deal." Possibly a bit of fun is said at his expense, but it sounded more like the ribbing a guy here would receive if he married a rich woman. Staying with your parents was seen as low-cost and good security, if maybe parasitic, but not pathetic as we see it.
So both sides are maybe avoiding marriage and kids. It's kind of the strain between family-orientation and the desires of modernity. (Meaning like career outside the home, luxuries, freedom preferred over virtue, etc)
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