Bad experience with Lake Zurich School District (CUSD 95) (Chicago: lawyer, houses)

[GaryHow]

Bad experience with Lake Zurich School District 95 (CUSD 95)

Recently we were thinking about moving to Lake Zurich and decided to enquire about the schools by calling the school district officials because my 3-year old needs to enroll in a pre-k class for special needs children. I called to ask _____if I can meet her and look at the class room setup. To my surprise, she started to imply and say that I cannot go shopping for schools and since she do not know who I am and this world is full of bad people therefore she cannot let me into the school. Why is she telling me this? Does she assume that I am a bad person? Or go shopping for schools? I just want to my child to go to a good school as any parents would do. I don't want to hear any ramblings about shopping and the bad world. I am just a parent requesting to visit the school and I expect her to act professionally to represent the school district. Just tell me "Sorry I cannot grant your request because it is a school policy" and I would appreciate that response. She does not represent the district well.

[At1WithNature]

Well, I'm sorry you had to experience this. She is not very professional, is she? At least your child won't get stuck going there. In a way, it's a good thing this happened. You will be better off in the long run for it. Imagine if you made a poor choice and chose that school?

[chet everett]

I don't think this is uncommon at all. While I completely understand the desire of parents to try to assess the differences in the various schools the existing staff has an obligation to keep the students safe and in the case of the special needs kids to maintain any anonymity as much as possible.

In my experience a handful of districts do a nice job of preparing something for "prospective new students and their parents" that they work with the PTA and maybe the Chamber of Commerce on, but most really default to "please rely on the resource on our website".

I actually do know some co-workers that are very pleased with the performance of the elemenarty school(s) of D95 and the results of the Illinois assesments has places several schools in the "honor roll" category: Illinois Honor Roll - Academic Excellence Awards 2009 List

[efb]

What about the situation where you are moving and trying to decide between 2 or more houses. School absolutely is a factor in the decision. Lists of statistics are fine, but the reality is that sometimes you need to experience a place to know if it is a good fit. Houses cost way too much to make the wrong decision.

[chet everett]

I agree, and believe that some better methods ought to be promoted, but that is not very common. The websites that rely on parents and kids randomly offering their subjective opinions are worse than no help.

When I would work with prospective buyers I would have no reservations about supplying the object data about schools, and I would generally caution buyers that the data reflects a lot of factors, including the fact that schools serving folks with high incomes pretty much always have higher performance than schools serving folks further down the income ladder.

[middle-aged mom]

I often work with inbound relocation families who will spend 2-3 days interviewing potential public schools for their children. We are talking about 15-20 hours per family here x??? A few will go back for a second or third interview.

And invariably they eventually run into an admisistrator who draws the line and either will not allow them to visit or they simply do not have the time and recources to devote to being interviewed and conducting tours.

Some schools have the financial resources to tend to this stuff and some do not. It's up to the local tax payers how they want their money to be spent.

[GaryHow]

Originally Posted by middle-aged mom

I often work with inbound relocation families who will spend 2-3 days interviewing potential public schools for their children. We are talking about 15-20 hours per family here x??? A few will go back for a second or third interview.

And invariably they eventually run into an admisistrator who draws the line and either will not allow them to visit or they simply do not have the time and recources to devote to being interviewed and conducting tours.

Some schools have the financial resources to tend to this stuff and some do not. It's up to the local tax payers how they want their money to be spent.

The main point here was during my call to CUSD 95, the school official did not act in a professional and respectful manner. Her lack of respect for parents can really ruin the school district's reputation. My disappointment was not with the rejection of my request but with the bad attitude of the school official.

[cubssoxfan]

Sorry you had such a bad experience. I know teachers in the district who are highly competent and friends whose children go their and are very pleased with the quality of their education. Try to look around this individual since the teacher quality has more of a daily impact. Principals are somewhat transient so this one may be gone. Go around this individual by contacting the district or going to the school in person. Are you on a mailing list for registration?

[Melzie5]

That sounds extremely unprofessional, actually it sounds like a scared kid telling someone their parents told them not to talk to strangers. I remember when I transfered from private to public schools in 4th grade, and my parents and I toured the school months before I even registered. There are weirdos out there but any school that can't deal with a tour is ridiculous! I'm not sure it comes down to financial resources either, Lake Zurich likes to pride themselves on being a better school district with more resources, yet a small blue collar town can afford a school tour before they can? I don't think so. My advice, shop around to more school districts, there are plenty in that area. And depending on the grade level, there might be more than one school and you could possibly choose which school to send your child to as long as it's in the same district. Maybe try going over her head? Best of luck!

[Dannyvee2]

As a Person who is relocating to the Chicagoland area... There is one part I am not sure you all saw this person has a Child with special needs as do I. There are things my child requires in a classroom to not be a disruption and achieve educational goals. With these simple things in place and a teachers willingness to try them my child remains in the top 95%. But without some simple and undisruptive additions to the classroom that we provide with our own money my child would be a total disruption. Without interviewing the teacher and visiting the classroom we would be playing Russian roulette with our child’s education I am unwilling to do this and I would urge a no compromise approach to education. We pay these peoples salaries they can take 20 or 30 minutes out of there day to assist us yes I understand they cannot do this for every parent but let’s be honest the vast majority of parents probably don’t even know the name of there childs Teacher much less care to inspect the classroom.
If I allowed people like the person who Gary spoke to dictate where my child was to be placed they would have put her in a special needs class (believe me they tried) instead her mother fought tooth nail and lawyer to ensure my child with Autism was given the same opportunity her pears had. Because my wife is part Lioness my child has excelled in school and is considered by her teachers to be a asset to the class. We Pay Their Salary if you are rude or insubordinate to your boss what would he or she do?