Schools in Delaware (Dover: house, buying, school districts)

[ingebarbee1]

my husband and i are considering relocating to delaware. however, it's incredibly important that we find the best possible public schools available. we are in a good school district in california and looking for something similar. please help...
thanks! any guidance would be really appreciated!

[virgode]

Where in Delaware are you considering?

[AntsInMyPantsDE]

I'm not originally from DE and moved here before we having kids and can really only speak for northern Delaware. I hope not to offend anyone, but I've not been very impressed with public schools here. We've talked about moving to border towns in PA when our kids get to be school-aged. That being said, there are a couple decent school districts that have some exceptional schools.

Red Clay and Brandywine school districts are what I'd consider to be the best. Appoquinmink is a bit futher south but up and coming. I'm really not impressed with Christina School District nor Colonial (nearest to where we live.)

[armx]

ANTS.....:

If your children are not school age yet - meaning you have no first hand experience, how do you pretel get the gumption to express a reliable opinion, which is what the OP is looking for ... isn't it akin to having an opinion about how delicious a food product is not without having tasted it .... to be able to offend anybody, the opinion has to have some gravitas, would you agree?

For my part, my children attended Christina School District, I have lived in the district for over twenty-five years. This school district has, traditionally, attracted the best teachers in the nation from all over the U.S. Common foible is that people, in general, fail to understand the statistical significance of the variance in the academic scores of the schools. For example, math score for fourth grade in one school is 568 and another school is 563 - from that data, there is practically no conclusion one can draw about which school is better but people who don't understand statistical significance think that the first school is better coz 568 is greater than 563. On the other hand, if the second school score was 533 there may be some merit to have that conclusion.

Currently, my son with wife who grew up in PA - and after having lived in PA and NH - has come back to live in the Christina School District and plans to send my grand-son to Christina School District - Charter school or elementary school. Mind you, since it was fashinable to say my DIL said that she is exploring private school option - and they can very easily afford it - she has investigated all schools and has come to conclusion that Christina School District is good for their son.

This is not to say that all public schools are equal but the school feeder patterns (children from which area are going to be attending a particular school) determine how the school performance will be. So prior to purchasing a home what needs to be done is to make sure that a minimal number of transient population is in the feeder pattern to where your children will be attending.

BTW, this may be more than the OP asked for!! (lol)

[Sandee1213]

We are moving to De. next week and my kids will be attending Appo school district. Before buying the house we did a lot of research on schools and everyone said Appo is the best in the area. I hate to say this, but locals even said to stay clear of Christina. We have now gone and visited Appo schools and love them so far. I will tell you more after the school year starts. They are all knew schools and the numbers are great.

[jskirwin]

I'm not a big fan of Delaware public schools. Spending ranks 8th in the nation yet our students rank in the middle-tier. The school districts are top-heavy with non-teaching personnel (e.g. my son received a commendation letter signed by not one but two positive behavior support team coordinators) and nepotism is rife. If it weren't for the fact that we plan to leave the area, I would have put our kid into private school - or moved across the border into PA where the schools are significantly better.

And for what it's worth, my son just finished the 6th grade in the Brandywine school district.

[jasonrDE]

Not sure what area you looking at but I went to Caesar Rodney outside of Dover and I loved it. The education was great and there were plenty of AP classes and advanced classes to choose from.

[armx]

jskirwin:

We hate to see anybody leave the state but you have been talking about leaving for a good while now; too bad you haven't had the opportunity to actually leave and feel better for yourself and your family. Most of us would rather have positive-feeling people amongst us than some disgruntled mid-westerners whose forte is complaining.