Please Help! Moving to NO area! (New Orleans, Metairie: 2015, homes, transfer)

[squiresgal]

My husband is a Marine. We were planning/hoping to move from NC to VA summer of 2016. We were planning on retiring in VA!

As a last minute shocker my husband got orders to NO! Definitely not in the plan! I was trying to move closer to my mom, whose health is failing. My husband will have to report to NO in December and we will follow in the late spring after school is out in NC.

I need to know where the best places to live are with the best schools. I have heard nothing except how bad the schools are in Louisiana and how I should expect to have to pay for private school!!! My son will be entering high school and he is academically gifted! Are any schools that serve the academically gifted? I don't want him to be bored silly and not challenged. I have even contemplated home schooling him. I have read that Mandeville is a good place to live? I will also have my oldest son with me. He will be a college transfer student looking to go to a University for Computer Science. We had everything ironed out for moving to VA and now we are starting completely over!

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[slgis]

As a Marine, your husband will be working on the West Bank in Federal City, which is just south of Algiers Point. There are quite a few people who work for MARFORRES & live in Mandeville and Slidell. However, he will hate the commute! Another option worth looking at is Belle Chase. There is an academy down there for children of military families (I believe) which might fit the bill. If I were you, I'd be looking at Belle Chase....

[Metairie]

I personally would not want my kid in public school on the west bank which is possibly where he will report. I'd suggest living in Mandeville and him making the long compute if schools are truly your priority and you want public. The schools in Metairie (small suburb that may get suggested) are crap compared to a lot of NC schools. I am in Charlotte now, and the public schools here are sooooooo much better than the best are of the greater New Orleans area but not including Mandeville. I lived in New Orleans and Metairie many many years prior to this year.
On a grown up note, New Orleans is much more care free for the adults, which I prefer. People in NOLA are very easygoing and causal compared to Charlotte. Theres also much more for grown ups to do in NOLA. Good luck, feel free to DM questions.

[ptt]

Benjamin franklin high is one of the best in the country. But i am not sure if it is far from where you are going to live. There is a deadline for 2015/2016 application in Jan.

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[norb123]

Originally Posted by Metairie

I personally would not want my kid in public school on the west bank which is possibly where he will report. I'd suggest living in Mandeville and him making the long compute if schools are truly your priority and you want public. The schools in Metairie (small suburb that may get suggested) are crap compared to a lot of NC schools. I am in Charlotte now, and the public schools here are sooooooo much better than the best are of the greater New Orleans area but not including Mandeville. I lived in New Orleans and Metairie many many years prior to this year.
On a grown up note, New Orleans is much more care free for the adults, which I prefer. People in NOLA are very easygoing and causal compared to Charlotte. Theres also much more for grown ups to do in NOLA. Good luck, feel free to DM questions.

I have always heard that North Carolina had great public schools, but I think New Orleans schools have made some huge strides in the last 10 years. There are still plenty of bad ones, but there are several here now that I would feel comfortable sending my child to, and I'm pretty picky about her education. It seems like education is more of a priority than it used to be, and I think it's going to improve more over the next few years.

[squiresgal]

Originally Posted by norb123

I have always heard that North Carolina had great public schools, but I think New Orleans schools have made some huge strides in the last 10 years. There are still plenty of bad ones, but there are several here now that I would feel comfortable sending my child to, and I'm pretty picky about her education. It seems like education is more of a priority than it used to be, and I think it's going to improve more over the next few years.

NC public schools are debatable. We live suburban area outside the largest Marine Corps Base on the East Coast, and so far I have found the public schools to be over crowded and lacking. The teachers here are paid horribly low, and there is a big turnover from year to year. So every year there is a big influx of first year teachers, who come here to get the experience and then move on. My son scores consistently high on the state testing and considered academically gifted. So quality of education is extremely important to us. My husband would commute as far as he needs to. We have considered private school, however financially that will be difficult for us. I have also considered homeschooling, though I hate for him to miss out on all of the fun parts of High School, homecoming, prom, band, etc.

[squiresgal]

Originally Posted by slgis

As a Marine, your husband will be working on the West Bank in Federal City, which is just south of Algiers Point. There are quite a few people who work for MARFORRES & live in Mandeville and Slidell. However, he will hate the commute! Another option worth looking at is Belle Chase. There is an academy down there for children of military families (I believe) which might fit the bill. If I were you, I'd be looking at Belle Chase....

Thanks for the info! He would commute as far as needed if it meant our son was in a good school.

I guess the good think is that he will have to report there in March, so he will have a chance to look around the area and find a good place to live and scope out some schools. My son and I will follow after the school year ends here in NC.

[rburnett]

A commute from the Northshore all the way to the westbank will be utter misery and I would avoid it if at all possible. If the distance isn't deterrent enough, regular traffic due to wrecks and weather closures is a given on I10 or the causeway bridges crossing the lake. Then you'll have to deal with the normal rush hour Metairie or New Orleans East traffic which is pretty consistent. On top of that, you have to cross the river downtown on the most trafficked bridge in the state. This bridge has major slowdowns every single day. You're looking at at least a 1hr commute on a GREAT day.

Unfortunately, there are very few great public high schools in or close to New Orleans. Ben Franklin HS and Lusher are some of the top schools in the state, but are extremely difficult to get into and you will have to live in the city limits. There are some good high schools in the surrounding parishes. Hayne's in Metairie is excellent as are Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Taylor on the westbank. Belle Chasse HS in Plaquemines parish has a good high school and would be a super easy commute to Algiers.

See attached school rankings data. These are all the public High Schools in order of performance.

[slgis]

rburnett is right. The traffic is a nightmare. If there is an accident, it can literally take 2 hours to cross the bridge - we're talking just a couple of miles. A lot of the people I know that work for the USMC on the West Bank arrive at work at 5:30 AM and leave around 2:30 or 3:00 to avoid the traffic. However, this only applies to those that live on the North Shore. Those that live on the West Bank and south of I-10, normally don't do this.

On a positive note, New Orleans is a very cool city with a lot to see and do. With a kid, I could see it being challenging, but living on the North Shore isn't necessary. A lot of military families live in Plaquemines Parish due to the Naval Air Station there, so I would think that it would be a good fit - a lot of nice homes in a suburban setting, which is difficult to find in New Orleans itself.