Neighborhood help, please (Jacksonville, Lakeside, Brent: house, transfer, safe neighborhood)

[jax4me?]

My husband and I are thinking of accepting a transfer offer through our company to Jacksonville. I've tried searching the forum, but I didn't find any posts that exactly related to us. We'll both be working downtown. We have two children and a safe neighborhood with good public schools is the most important thing for us. However, we don't want a super long commute downtown either (hopefully no more than 30-ish minutes). I've seen that the cool downtown neighborhoods don't seem to have good schools and the areas with good schools (like Mandarin) seem a bit far from downtown. Please help!

[fsu813]

Not sure which "cool, downtown" neighborhoods you are referring too.....probably Riverside, Springfield, Avondale & San Marco. Possibly another.

Keep in mind that which school your kids are zoned for doesn't nessecarily matter. Duval county has A LOT of "magnet" schools which draw kids from all parts of town. Magnet schools have higher academic standards and are generally considered "better" than a normal public school (though it depends on which public school, really). If your kid makes the grade then they can enroll in a magnet school, no matter where you live.

The public schools in Riverside / Avondale are just fine. they are not the best of the best, but they certainly aren't considered bad or undesirable schools. Generally good schools. The highschool in that area is the only questionable one really (Robert E Lee) though again, it's not a bad school by any means.

San Marco has very good public schools generally, especially elementary & middle.

Springfield has a mix. The "normal" public schools in Springfield aren't very good. However they have 2 great magnet schools (1 elementary & 1 middle school) that draw kids form all over and feed into the 2 best academic magnet highschools (Stanton, which is not far way, & Paxon).

Hopefully that helps. I'm sure you know there are TONS of families in these areas and no, they don't mostly go to private schools.

Antedotal: My 3 brothers & I were raised in Riverside (in the 90's it wasn't nearly as nice as it is now) and went to a combination of these afore mentioned schools (Central Riverside, Kirby Smith, Darnell Cookman, Robert E Lee, Stanton, & Paxon) and i'd say we turned out pretty good. I work in the medical field, one brother is a fireman, one is getting his MBA, and one is currently a sophomore in college.

[HoldMeBack]

Well, I live on Doctors Inlet and everyone around me works downtown. From my house you can walk to the elementary school, Montclair, and the middle school is about three minutes away, Lakeside Junior High. The area around here is the older part of Orange Park. I have been here for over ten years and it's fantastic. We can walk down to the dock every day to go fishing, yet be on 295 to go wherever in about 6 minutes. A lot of professional people live around here by the water, and they have lived here forever or grew up here.

[JagFan27]

I live in Mandarin and drive through the downtown area to get to my job. It takes my 30 minutes to get to my job, so it would take less time if I worked downtown.

[fsu813]

Top 10 Public Highschools in America: Stanton is #4, Paxon is #6.

See the link:
Top Public High Schools

[FLPL75]

You could look into the 9A/Baymeadows area there are quite a few nice neighborhoods
Hampton Glen, South Chase,Hampton Park, East Hampton, Deerwood(really nice)
The elementary & middle schools are both Grade "A" and there is anew high school opening in 2010.

You will be about 5 mins from JTB and can be downtown in 20 25 mins
My husband leaves at 6 and is in his office downtown 20 mins later.

[joninclay]

I'd echo HoldMeBack, Karla, and JagFan.

[Joe 4520832257]

Mandarin is the closest good public school district to downtown. Sorry. You'll either have to deal with the commute, or live in an in-town neighborhood and send your kids to a magnet school or private school. However, I agree with some of the other comments. The commute from Mandarin to Downtown only has to be about 20-25 minutes, depending on where in the neighborhood you live.

Originally Posted by fsu813

Top 10 Public Highschools in America: Stanton is #4, Paxon is #6.

See the link:
Top Public High Schools

I agree that these are great options; however, I have to point out that those Newsweek "rankings" are meaningless. All they are measuring is the absolute number of AP/IB tests taken. It doesn't even measure how well the students did on the tests, never mind whether the schools are any good. It just means that they force more kids to take IB tests than most other schools.

There is a more credible ranking done by US news where they are both in the top 100. Stanton is somewhere in the middle, and Paxon is near the end.

All that being said - yes, they are good schools. I wish more suburban parents who claimed to care about the "best education" for their children would actually live in the city and have their children test-in to these schools. Stanton is the best public college prep school in the First Coast. But I think the reality is that - in the back of their minds - most parents are too worried that come 9th grade, their little geniuses wouldn't actually pass the tests to get into the IB program in the first place. And, in all honesty, I guess it's understandable that they want to avoid the risk.

[fsu813]

oh my gosh. (ha). the fear mongering going on is ridiculous, and somewhat inaccurate.

To the OP,

take a day and visit the schools for yourself. talk to some of the teachers. talk to some of the families that have thier kids their. heck, call Pratt Dannals the Superintendent. he'll return your call with in a few days.

if you just relied on this board i wouldn't blame if to think that any school within 10 miles of downtown is a gang & drug ridden mess with horrible teachers ! run !!!!! (ha)

Schools in those "cool" downtown neighborhoods (2008 ratings)....

Elementary ----
Central Riverside: A
Hendricks Elementray: A
Fishweir: A
Brentwood: B
West Riverside: C
Jackson: C

Middle ----
Kirby-Smith: A
Cookman: A
Johnson: A
Gilbert: C
Landon: C

High ----
Stanton: A
Paxon: A
Anderson: A
Lee : D
Jackson: F


As everyone can see there's a shortage of quality schools for kids in those neighborhoods......or not. 9 A's, 1 B, 4 C's, 1 D, 1 F.

if i missed any that are in those neighborhoods, fill me in. don't think i did.

[JagFan27]

Originally Posted by Joe 4520832257

Mandarin is the closest good public school district to downtown. Sorry. You'll either have to deal with the commute, or live in an in-town neighborhood and send your kids to a magnet school or private school. However, I agree with some of the other comments. The commute from Mandarin to Downtown only has to be about 20-25 minutes, depending on where in the neighborhood you live.



I agree that these are great options; however, I have to point out that those Newsweek "rankings" are meaningless. All they are measuring is the absolute number of AP/IB tests taken. It doesn't even measure how well the students did on the tests, never mind whether the schools are any good. It just means that they force more kids to take IB tests than most other schools.

There is a more credible ranking done by US news where they are both in the top 100. Stanton is somewhere in the middle, and Paxon is near the end.

All that being said - yes, they are good schools. I wish more suburban parents who claimed to care about the "best education" for their children would actually live in the city and have their children test-in to these schools. Stanton is the best public college prep school in the First Coast. But I think the reality is that - in the back of their minds - most parents are too worried that come 9th grade, their little geniuses wouldn't actually pass the tests to get into the IB program in the first place. And, in all honesty, I guess it's understandable that they want to avoid the risk.

There is no test that students take to become accepted into the IB program. Students are invited to apply based on their 8th grade FCAT scores. After applying, the grades from the first semester 8th grade year are taken into consideration, along with teacher evaluations. Stanton and Paxon also have another curriculum which is the Honors/AP curriculum. FCAT scores and AP pass rates are almost the same (with Paxon increasing their FCAT scores more than Stanton this year and having higher pass rates on some AP exams), so both schools can be considered the best, not just Stanton.