Lexington neighborhoods (Boston, Lowell, Andover: rental, how much, school district)

[jzaa]

We are looking to relocate to Lexington MA because of the school system however we are unfamiliar with the town in general. Are there certain areas that we would want to avoid (i.e less desirable to live in) and if so why? Do certain parts of town have different reputations, good or bad? Are all of the elementary schools good academically? I am more concerned with the academics than the actual physical building although that is important too.

[Skwidy]

No areas to really "avoid" and all elementary schools are generally in the same range. In any given year any one of the schools might have "better" MCAS scores than the others, (but how much better is a 98 vs a 97 or a 96, where they all seem to score annually). Your kids will be offered a great education at any of the schools (they still have to step and do the work though, i.e. you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink). And keep this in mind, that they all feed into the middle schools and those into the high school, so town-wide, the agenda is to make sure that when they get to LHS, they're all prepared academically. And recently there's been a bigger push to prepare kids emotionally too because let's face it, there's a lot of stress on these kids to perform...some of it internal, some of it external. Anyway, the teachers and administrators at each school are very passionate and dedicated and are all backed by a strong PTA at each school. Education is a big deal in town. And not just for the kids. Lots of professors (including the recent Nobel winner in Economics!!), Ph.D's etc live here. So ultimately, I truly believe that you can't go "wrong" with any one of the schools.

[michellemoon]

We are currently relocating to Boston from San Diego. We visited and loved Lexington, so we were wondering if it was a family friendly town. We have 3 kids ages 5, 11 and 14 so we will have a child at each school!! So education is important. Other people have suggested the cities of Andover or Westford so we were wondering how they compare to Lexington. My husband will be working in Lowell so the commute should be good. Thanks so much for any thoughts!

[ogre]

Lexington, Andover, and Westford are all affluent suburban family kinds of towns. Lexington has a fairly substantial downtown for a suburban town its size. Westford is out in a generally exurban, semi-rural kind of area.

[Beantown_mama]

You should check out the individuals schools enrollment because my understanding is that there is some overcrowding in the Lexington School District:
New rental developments cause spike in Lexington school enrollment - The Boston Globe
http://lps.lexingtonma.org/Current/OSCapitalNeeds29Oct09.pdf (broken link)