Lake Braddock Vs. West Springfield (Burke, Annandale: houses, neighborhoods, to buy)

[DCNY]

Hello,

We are looking to buy a house in NOVA and two schools that I have for HS that are good are Lake Broddock and West Springfield.

I am finding houses in around 500K range in Lake Broddock (nice house ) and not as much choice in West Springfield.

Also the elementary schools that I like are Cherry Run for Burke region and Sangster for Springfield region.

What is the difference between Lake Broddock and West Springfield.

I am so worried that if I go with Lake Broddock, I will not like it as its too big school ? and not as good as West Spring field ?

Please advice. Thank You!

[claremarie]

Lake Braddock is huge. And it is a "secondary school", so grades 7-12 are at the same campus (though the 7-8 graders are housed separately from the high schoolers).
My sister's kids went to Lake Braddock, and based on their experiences there, I would hesitate to send a child with average to slightly above average academic skills to that school. They were both rather lost in the crowd. And despite the plethora of extracurricular activities available, it was harder for them to get a spot on a team or in the play because of the sheer number of other bodies competing for slots.
However, plenty of their classmates seemed to thrive there, especially those who were top students or athletes.

[JD984]

I think Claremarie raises a good point - and there are some students at Annandale who will be redistricted to Lake Braddock next fall, so there may be even more high schoolers at LBSS in the coming years.

Having said that, West Springfield isn't small, either (@ 2250 high school students vs. 2430 at Lake Braddock). People in the West Springfield district seem to like it a lot - the school itself is not in great physical condition, and it's still going to be quite a few years before it's renovated, but it has strong boosters.

For what it's worth, the standardized test scores at Lake Braddock have tended to be a bit higher in recent years than at West Springfield (at least the SAT scores); not really sure why. Lake Braddock serves a more diverse student population (at both extremes), whereas the areas that feed into WS are generally solid upper-middle class Fairfax neighborhoods.

Good luck.

[lovetoboat]

we moved here right before the school year started and my daughter is in 8th grade at LBSS. She absolutely loves it. I was very nervous for the reasons mentioned above (its size, lost in the crowd, typical B student). So far she has had an excellent experience. The kids are great (I'm sure there are those in the crowd that aren't but thankful she hasn't sought them out) and her teachers are fantastic. She even went as far as to tell family and friends she likes it better than her previous school in NY...which she loved.

She tells me she sees the HS kids in the hallways but they don't even pay attention to the MS kids (another fear of mine) and some of them even say hello to her and are nice.

I thought Sangster fed into LBSS..is this not correct? You may want to look into that.

Good luck and let me know if you have any questions.

[nwc07]

Sangster is a split feeder school--some kids go on to West Springfield and others go on to Lake Braddock.

I also am very happy with Lake Braddock except for the traffic problems during school events.

[DCNY]

Thank You All for your thoughts.. I hope LB will server well to my kids.. Thanks again!

[lovetoboat]

aaah...okay. Sangster has had some good parental reviews from people I've met. I tend to like those better than going surfing for school reviews as they don't always tell the whole story.

It's a great school and a great area. We really like it. Good luck!

[Lake Braddock]

LBSS

[johnsonkk]

What about south county high school? Still in Fairfax and has decent feeder schools. New school.