Irvine Public schools and Private school. (Cerritos, Cypress: neighborhood, middle school, university)

[IrvineResident]

Hi,
I am a resident of Irvine. I am looking for montessori private schools for my daughter, but i hear peopele mentioning that irvine public schools are good too. Can some one give input on this. I am not able to decide public or private. I have checked all the montessori schools in irvine they are all full.
Is it worth considering private schools in other cities like lake forest?
Also, there are only 2 private schools in irvine that offer till 3rd grade, but the other nearby cities have many private schools that offer till 8 grade. I am surprised that Irvine has no private schools till grade 8.

Your suggestions will really help/guide me in taking the right decision.

[bhcompy]

more or less that entire area has very good public schools. California School Performance Maps

[Charles]

Greatschools allows you to search for schools based on a radius from an address. The returns are both public and private schools.

[OC Investor2]

Irvine Public schools are outstanding.

Unless you have a specific reason for not wanting to put your child in a public school - i.e religious reasons, child is very gifted, has specail needs, may need more educational services then a public school would provide, etc. - there really is no reason to go to a private school.

As someone else suggested, check out great schools.

[IrvineResident]

Based on what i heard is that good private schools have more challenging curricullum? I am looking only for strong academics. That is the only reason i am thinking of going private, not for any religious or gifted reasons.
But since Irvine schools are good are they at par with good private schools.

[MisterDuke]

Irvine public schools are very good, and that can be verified through standardized testing. Private schools have a reputation for being more challenging, but how would anyone know the quality of a particular school? For the most part, they don't participate in standardized testing, and if they do, they don't make the results public. Is that really worth paying an extra $10k a year?

[bhcompy]

all schools will have advanced classes or college prep classes that provide "stronger" academics. different schools offer different things, but they are available. the top academic public high schools in the area are Oxford in Cypress(which is #1 or #2 in the state) and Whitney in Cerritos. Both schools are test-in and have advanced curriculums. Unfortunately, they are a bit of a way from Irvine and I don't know what kind of mobility your family has.

Local to you, University High School in Irvine is very well thought of. It ranks high nationally on a few different lists(from wiki: 156th overall in this years Newsweek ratings, 76th in '07 for US News)

[Coldjensens]

Many Private schools offer smaller class sizes and more teacher attention; specialized teaching such as Christian based education or arts oriented, etc. Otherwise the academics are basically the same. Public schools expose your child to a broader spectrum of her community and usually offer more variety in classes, clubs, etc. Teachers seem to be more incluned to actually listen to parents in private schools. most public school teachers seem to ignore parents (it seems like they think that they know your child better than you do, maybe they are just to busy to listen). Private schools are expensive.

Living in Irvine it makes more sense to use public schools and apply the extra money to ffurther your childs educational and environmental experiences. For academics, Score is useful in the summer. Or you can take your child to the places that they learn about. Why just read about Boston - go there.

[relocations'tress]

In my humble opinion -

We moved to Irvine 4 month ago. from non-english speaking european country. 3 kids. 3ed grade and middle school. We went to public schools. My kids are gifted in different subjects. One of them tested to be higly gifted. Moving in the last trimester was difficult.

If we had to choose again I would do the same.

against public school -

1. Your child is one little detail in a big system. The kids in mid. school came prepared, with a nice level in English but surely not "native" level. They were treated in school as if they were "natives", and the stress was incredible. Homework took forever..... No one read their files to know the reasons for their difficulties. BUT after the first phone call from the schools' computer telling me my daughter didn't hand in her homework, I called the councelor, she aranged a meeting with all the teachers and the principal, me and my daughter, and they all did their best to lower her stress level. I was very happy with the way things were taken care off, BUT every two weeks I had to remind the teachers....

I blieve that in private school things would have gone easier.....


In favore of public schools -

1. diversity of population. I am against "special" classes. I believe kids should learn to find friends of all kinds. The population in private schools is more "elitist" and much smaller (per grade level), you always have to kip up to "their" standatds, which are not always parallel to your values.

2. economical. With the money saved you can have your kids into the best music (critical in our case), science, math programs available, and to take them arround the country and arround the world, having family quality-time and in-place education. (learning the Grand-Canyon in geography class is nothing like seeing the place, same with Washington D.C., art tour in NYC and every other place).

3. level. (I know it might sound bizare but....) - IUSD is known to be in top level of public schools. I chose to live in a neighborhood that goes to the secondd best high school and not to the best, after searching a lot and finding that in the "best" HS (University HS) kids are under enormous compatitive stress. eventually in public schools of Irvine you can arrive to the same level as private schools, and also with out that stress, under the condition that you keep close watch on them, the way they do their homework and the readings they do at home. You have to be INVOLVED. I am anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

As I noted before - we are only one trimester into it, I hope not to be discouraged in the coming year. AND one must remember that there is a great budget-cut in IUSD this year. I hope that the solid foundations that they have built through the years will help them pass those difficult times.

Hope I helped your brain-storming.

Good luck.