Quote:
Originally Posted by acj412
Hi, my wife and I are looking to move into the NJ suburbs within the next year or so. She works in Ridgewood, I'll be starting a new job with two locations in Newark and Livingston. Both of us have jobs that require us to get up pretty early, so minimizing the commute for us would be nice. Although we may rent to start off with, when we buy school districts are very important to us. Any suggestions? From the NJ Monthly school rankings, it seems like the northern suburbs have a lot of great schools, and some of the districts around Newark have good schools, but the ones between are not all as good.
Any suggestions?
Thanks in advance...
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Much of this depends on your budget, but:
Group 1: Between Ridgewood and Newark, the winner for best school system would seem to be Glen Ridge, though it's very expensive, and finding rentals there can be hard (it's almost all single family homes.) Montclair, it's bohemian neighbor, does have more rentals (it's still expensive), and though it's school system isn't considered "Top 5" material like Glen Ridge, the public school system there is fantastic. Both of these would be closer to Newark than Ridgewood. Cedar Grove, Nutley, and Verona could also be good options that are less expensive, though parts of Verona could be very far west to reach Ridgewood (I'm trying to keep you along the Parkway or 21).
Group 2: Closer to Ridgewood is Glen Rock, Fair Lawn, and Saddle Brook (Glen Rock more "Upper Class", the other two more "Middle Class"), all great little towns with good school systems. Both are only a few minutes to Ridgewood, and you could easily head down to Newark via 21 or the Parkway, but your commute to downtown Newark going to be much longer than hers (30 mins).
Clifton is smack in the middle (and is what seperates Group 1 from Group 2). It's a large town with many different sections, but I don't know much about their school system. Little Falls and Rutherford would also both fall in the middle and could be great choices. Again, most of this would depend on your budget.
Please keep in mind that New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country, and with the exception of a few rough neighborhoods, the "bad" schools here would be considered "good" in most other places.
So if people here try to tell you to avoid fantastic school districts like Montclair and Fair Lawn because NJ Monthly doesn't rank them with ultra, ultra wealthy towns like Millburn, Glen Ridge, and Ridgewood, try and take it with a grain of salt. They're still amongst the best in the state, and your kids can do exceptionally well in most Northern NJ public schools.
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