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I am born and raised in Ottawa. To answer your questions:
The average cost in renting a one bedroom apartment in a decent area is $800-900 per month. For a two bedroom you are looking at $900-$1100 I actually find it quite costly to live here. You can get apartments cheaper but parent to parent.. you do not want this as you will be living in Vanier or Heatherington which are rough areas. I also find you can get alot more in Quebec esthetically wise, I wish landlords would upgrade and renovate apartments more in Ottawa and not charge an arm and a leg. I've seen beautiful apartments in Gatineau for $700.00 a month for a 2 bedroom but in Ottawa you would pay $1100.00 for that same apartment.
Daycare is another thing, in Quebec you have the luxury of $7 a day daycare not in Ontario it ranges from $20-$45 a day depending if you need before/after care or full days.
As for schools PLEASE PLEASE put your son in a french immersion school and not in an english school as Ottawa is a bilingual city and it will benefit him in the future. Schools are the same here in Montreal, nicer neighborhood, nicer schools, crappy area, horrible schools.
Thank you for your answer!
Thats what I saw by looking at apartment listings in Ottawa... that's why, overall, I was thinking about Gatineau. Its close to Ottawa, but we could still benefit from the Quebec system. And I did find a lot more of well maintained, cheaper, better located apartment in Gatineau than I did in Ottawa. It would cost us a lot more to live in Ottawa, without what we now get from the Quebec gouvernment. Not really interesting as we would have the same kind of jobs we do now...
The daycare part is another issue to me... Is that true that even afterschool daycare would cost that much??
I wanted to put my son in an english school at first because he only speaks french and I would love for him to speak english. But I guess being close to Ottawa would make things easier for the learning part in some ways (maybe not)... In Montreal, it really depend on where you're located (West or East). As we live in the eastern part, we never need to speak english.
Well, as I said, its a lot to considere. I certainly do not want to change for worst or for a similar situation. I would love to find better than what I'm in now... We'll see!
- most of the very central part of of Hull (ÃŽle-de-Hull, Vieux-Hull), although there are some nice streets near the Museum of Civilization (Laurier, Notre-Dame-de l'ÃŽle)
Better paid jobs than? Or a whealthier working class?
I think the jobs do pay a bit more, and also income taxes are less. But I don't think it really makes up for the difference in costs with Quebec. Ontario is a very expensive place to raise a child (it seems like the government there sees it as a "luxury choice" more than "the future of society"), and there may be some truth to the Quebec government's statement that Quebec is probably one of the best places in North America to have a family thanks to good public programs. In addition to the daycare program, Quebec also has this which you do not have in Ontario: RRQ - Paiment de Soutien aux enfants
My observation about Ontario is that a lot of people either have fewer kids (just one instead of two, or two instead of three), or if they have more than one child one parent will simply stay at home with the kids instead of working because in any event almost all of their salary would go to child care. Especially in the years before school starts.
Of course, the fact that we have the $7 system as competition also means that private daycare in Gatineau is a lot cheaper than in Ottawa. It is not as cheap as $7 a day of course, but it is still roughly half the price of what it is in Ottawa.
It's funny that a guy whose handle is wanttobefree is telling another person what school they should put their kid in.
Yassakiwi, pay no mind. If the kid learns only English and is smart enough, he'll be fine. And nobody says he'll end up in the area anyway, or that French will be as aggressively pushed in the future. I recommend to kids they'd be better off learning a more globally relevant language like Spanish or Chinese.
Acajack, pretty sure kids have those basic skills you refer to by age 12-13. I think conventional school should be till Grade 7, 8 at a push; then the option to learn trades in what is now middle and high school, while reforming the child labour laws to open the job market to younger tradesmen.
It's funny that a guy whose handle is wanttobefree is telling another person what school they should put their kid in.
Yassakiwi, pay no mind. If the kid learns only English and is smart enough, he'll be fine. And nobody says he'll end up in the area anyway, or that French will be as aggressively pushed in the future. I recommend to kids they'd be better off learning a more globally relevant language like Spanish or Chinese.
We all have great ambitions for our kids and see them taking on the world but the reality is that in a prosperous place like Ottawa 90% of them will end up staying put for their careers. Even the ones who end up being very successful will likely obtain that success not too far from home.
And the reality is that if a young anglophone's career is going to be taking place in central Canada (say, Ontario), the most useful second language to know by far in this part of the world is French. Whether or not French will be "as aggressively pushed" in the future doesn't change the fact that a good-sized chunk of northeastern North America is French-speaking and will likely remain so for the foreseeable future. I know the school systems stateside do not generally reflect this but French should probably be pushed more strongly as well in places across the border from us like New England and upstate New York as well.
Personally, I speak French, English and Spanish and have always had pretty good jobs, including some work with people abroad, and only rarely have I had to use my Spanish professionally. I actually wish I could use it more - to prevent it from getting rusty.
In any event, Yassakiwi's child already speaks French...
Yassakiwi, pay no mind. If the kid learns only English and is smart enough, he'll be fine. And nobody says he'll end up in the area anyway, or that French will be as aggressively pushed in the future. I recommend to kids they'd be better off learning a more globally relevant language like Spanish or Chinese.
My son speaks only french. I wanted him to go to an english school so that he could learn english, but its not possible in Quebec.
It's funny that a guy whose handle is wanttobefree is telling another person what school they should put their kid in.
Yassakiwi, pay no mind. If the kid learns only English and is smart enough, he'll be fine. And nobody says he'll end up in the area anyway, or that French will be as aggressively pushed in the future. I recommend to kids they'd be better off learning a more globally relevant language like Spanish or Chinese.
Acajack, pretty sure kids have those basic skills you refer to by age 12-13. I think conventional school should be till Grade 7, 8 at a push; then the option to learn trades in what is now middle and high school, while reforming the child labour laws to open the job market to younger tradesmen.
WTF would his children use Chinese in Ottawa? Chinatown? I think you are being absolutely ridiculous with your suggestions! His children would use french if not on a daily but a weekly basis in Ottawa!
I clearly said 'globally relevant' languages, ie. on the possibility that the kid won't stay here when grown and be forced to use a language that is virtually irrelevant on the global scale and merely forcibly sustained in this area as a way to appease separatists.
On another note, if they want this pseudo-bilingualism to be taken seriously, they should test francophones in their own language as well as English. I have seen and read mockeries of the French language by francophones who because they identify as french, only had to be tested in English, in which they are more proficient than in their mother tongue (though still nothing to write home about).
This would be more fair, and end the advantage that self-identified Francophones have for jobs over Anglos.
We seem to have a divergent opinion on the value of the French language. And no, Acajack, northeastern Americans do not need to learn French. Rather, the francos here need to swallow their pride and serve the hated Yanks in the visitors' language in exchange for their tourist dollars (fair trade, I think).
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