Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Long, long time listener (I've been poking around this site for at least 8 years now)... now it may be time to seek some advice!
I've long had my heart set on moving back south - I'm originally from Miami, FL, moved to Atlanta, attended high school and college there (go Jackets!), worked for a couple years, then moved to the big city, bright lights of NYC. After moving out to NJ for a very good and stable job, I've toyed with the idea off and on of relocating back down to the south. Wife & I have had many conversations, and ultimately we agree that the Raleigh / Durham / Chapel Hill area is the ideal place to be - close enough to both families (NJ & GA), better quality of life, and for me, hopefully a less stressful place to live. (I've long since gotten over the thrill of living in the NYC metro area - yes it's a fabulous place to live in your 20s... not so much in your 40s).
So... we've been to Cary quite a few times, visiting friends throughout the years. While I do appreciate the extreme amount of care and attention that has been given to each of the shopping centers there in the (what I consider to be) vain attempt at hiding them, I don't really think that style of urban planning and landscaping is enough of a draw for me to feel like we've "escaped" suburbia. Yes, I would love the greenways... but, another downside for us is the school system. With two elementary age children, I just don't see myself putting down roots somewhere where you have no idea from one year to the next a) what the school schedule will be b) what school you will / could be (re)assigned to c) how much more overcrowded things will become.
In a nutshell, Cary's out. Onward to... Chapel Hill!
I have a lead on a job that may actually come to fruition, and if so, will be located right smack in the middle of RTP (next to Oracle). From the look of things, CH to RTP commute isn't that bad, and can be done on back-roads if I-40 is not behaving on any given day. Although, I imagine, compared to here, traffic anywhere in the Triangle isn't going to feel as bad.
As for schools, I'm buying into the message that Chapel Hill schools are among the best, if not the best public schools in the RDU area. So we will most likely be targeting our search there for a house.
My first question - does this all sound reasonable? Am I making too many assumptions, maybe should re-think reconsider Cary?
If my thoughts on living in Chapel Hill are on target, then I'm hoping to find a nice house (not too big, but believe me, anything down there will be bigger than the house we live in right now), with land (1 - 2 acres), and hopefully a basement (yeah we've got a lot of crap to store down there). My main concern though is making sure we live somewhere with the right schools for our kids - one is special needs, but has been improving tremendously the last few years with various therapies for sensory processing issues. We need to make sure that he continues with the same level of therapies in NC, and would also probably need to get him re-evaluated to insure he still qualifies for IEPs / special needs programs in the schools (he's much improved, but still needs continuity of care).
Thinking incredibly long term... my other motivation, again along the education lines, is insuring that both kids have the ability to attend a great university without breaking the budget. In case you don't know, NJ state universities are among the most expensive in the country - I could not believe what some co-workers told me how much they paid for Rutgers... I think my parents paid 20% of that for my years at GT. So, yeah... NC schools hopefully for the win in the future!
So, assuming Chapel Hill is where we land, which neighborhoods should we focus on first? Ideally I'd like the kids to attend a K-8 school, maybe even within walking distance of the house. (we are literally a 2 minute walk from the one they attend now). Are all the CH schools K-5, 6-8, 9-12?
As for community, it definitely doesn't have to be planned - I'd actually prefer to be on the outskirts, more to the SE side, but want to make sure that the schools there are good.
Oh... and yes... since I am in IT, the recent Google Fiber announcement has been another huge draw... I can live without FiOS for a year or two knowing that it will be replaced by something even better.
I live in Cary and I like it, but most transplants seem to gravitate towards the new subdivisions in northwestern Cary, and of course that is the area of Cary closest to RTP. So, that is where you end up with "school issues". I would be leery too. We bought in an "older" (relatively speaking) area of Cary and our middle school is still going to be capped next year. Then again if you're thinking Chapel Hill you're probably already comfortable with the idea of an older house. What's your budget.
We have a couple of CH residents here who will probably be very helpful to you. Just make sure you know the difference between UNC and State before you get here, and that you believe God is Tarheel otherwise why would the sky be Carolina Blue
If you need to commute to RTP for work you want to be on the east (near NC 54/Raleigh Rd.) or north end of town (Weaver Dairy and Whitfield Rds.) where you can quickly get to an I40 exit. On the east end there's a new development, Meadowmont, which is very nice but relatively expensive and nit likely to have 1-2 acres unless you have well over $1 million to spend. Further along 54 you can get the 1-2 acres but there is also a price premium because you will be near UNC campus. So I would concentrate your search on the north end of town. Both areas are zoned for East Chapel Hill High, elementary and middle schools may differ based on where you choose but all are quite good.
I wouldn't rule out Cary. It too has very good schools (Green Hope HS?) and while strip malls are ubiquitous it has an ethnic diversity that Chapel Hill doesn't have. A great thing if you are a foodie. There's a greater range of housing choice (type, size, age) and price. Lastly, your commute to work is likely to be quicker.
Location: Chapel Hill, NC, formerly NoVA and Phila
9,777 posts, read 15,788,843 times
Reputation: 10886
I think you are on the right track looking at Chapel Hill. I think Cary or Apex would be just as good, but as you said, there may be less stable school assignments. Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School District has a good reputation in the state. They generally have the highest SAT scores across the state. However, CH schools are being affected by the state's legislature as much as any school district in the state is - teachers are under paid, there are budget cuts, class size is growing, etc.
While CH-C is a much smaller school system than the mostly-county-sized systems in the state, it does not feel personal or small to me. I moved here from a large, county-sized school system in Virginia and was looking forward to moving to a small school district like one I had growing up with in Pennsylvania. I thought a smaller school system would mean more flexibility, be more personal, and feel more community-oriented. However, I have not found that to be the case. I think they are very, very rigid in their rules (no bending on who gets into advanced classes, for example - you don't get a 95%, you're not in). When I call the schools - either the middle school or the school district office, I ALWAYS get a machine. ALWAYS! It is quite frustrating. And with the area being very transient with people moving in and out quite frequently and so many teachers leaving for better pay, I don't feel the stable community that I expected (the one commonality I have found is that most everyone is pro UNC).
Having said that, I do like certain things about the school system - primarily in the elementary school. There are teaching assistants in the classroom from kindergarten through 3rd grades. Class size at the lower grades is quite small. My 2nd and 4th graders have 22 kids each in their classrooms and this has been consistent in the 4 school years that we have been here. Class size is a bit bigger in the upper grades but more like 26 kids. We haven't seen 30+ kids in any classroom. Several schools have gardens which I love as well as lots of outdoor play space. And the school system tries hard to serve nutritional meals to the kids and be environmentally responsible. There are also some nice tie-ins with UNC as guest speakers, STEM night, some arts programs, and other programs available to the kids.
On the other hand, the school system seems to me to be a system of haves and have nots. There is a large population of wealthy, VERY educated families here. And there is a large minority of low-income, less-educated families. Spend any amount of time in a school and you can discern the difference in students pretty easily. There is more mixing of the students at the lower levels, but once you hit middle school, the "have" students tend to be in more challenging classes and the "have nots" in less challenging ones. If your child ends up in one of the less challenging classes as my child did, it can be less than optimal. I fought tooth and nail to get her removed from a disruptive class and it fell on deaf ears.
Considering the two very different populations that feed into the school system, CH-C Schools appears to do a very good job with their upper end students. If you have a smart-as-a-whip student who scores in the top 2%, he can go to a segregated program just for students like him. And he will get a very good, challenging education. (I'm not knocking this; I think it's great).
On the other end, if your student is Latino, African American, or Karen (a Burmese refugee group) - yes these minority groups are spelled out - he will get special status in the school. His parents will have special monthly meetings (where dinner is served) to discuss issues facing their students. If you are poor and live in an apartment complex that gets a bus to school, for special nighttime activities like Back-to-School Night, STEM night, Talent Show night, etc, the school will send out buses to pick up parents to attend those events, which I think is very beneficial to them, but also uses a lot of resources.
However, if your student is not a rising star set to cure cancer or not a poor family living in an apartment or African American, Latino, or Karen, the school really won't give a hoot about you. If you aren't set to possibly go to Harvard helping to give CH-C schools a great reputation, and you aren't scoring low enough on standardized test scores to ruin their average, little resources will be spent on you. In other words, I don't think the school district is that great for the middle-of-the-road white, upper-middle class student.
In summary, we moved here from a very well-regarded, very large school system in the DC area where class size was often 30+ kids. Like every school district across the nation, it was not without its problems. HOWEVER, I never felt like my better-than-average-but-not-superstar student was less important than the superstar students or struggling students. I never felt like my child wasn't given extra resources because of her race. I always felt like the school district was willing to challenge her if she was up to the challenge - even if she didn't get the coveted 95% test score they were after. They were more willing to look at the student's whole picture - her grades, her teacher's recommendations, her motivation, in addition to her test scores. Despite it being a school district of over 100K students, they were more flexible than the much smaller Chapel Hill Carrboro School District. AND, when I called the school or the district, a real live person picked up the phone. every. single. time.
So, yes, while Chapel Hill Carrboro School District may very well be one of the best this state offers, it is not necessarily going to be similar or on par with your school district in New Jersey. It may very well meet your students' needs or it may not. I'm not very familiar with their special education program, so check it out carefully.
As far as grades served in each school, I believe they are all the traditional elementary is k-5, middle is 6-8, and high is 9-12. One sort of exception to that is McDougle Elementary and McDougle Middle are right next to each other on the same campus, so that might interest you.
Please note that all of the above has been MY experience with Chapel Hill Carrboro City Schools in the past 3 years over 4 different schools years with 3 different children. The schools my kids have attended are are Scroggs Elementary which I have generally been pretty happy with and Culbreth Middle School which has been a huge disappointment to me. I have neighbors and friends who have vastly different experiences than mine both good and bad. Hope that helps.
I have neighbors and friends who have vastly different experiences than mine both good and bad. Hope that helps.
Yeah, my experiences in our elementary have pretty much been vastly different. I find my kid's school very personable and incredibly community-oriented. My kid's teachers and administrators, guidance counselors, librarian, etc, all know me and are very friendly and communicative. Just got a personal email from the guidance counselor yesterday asking me about my kid's school plans for middle school next year. I don't call with concerns, but I do call for the occasional absence and always get a real live person, usually her teacher, occasionally the receptionist. I've only called the district office once or twice, but spoke to a real live person then.
The friends I have who have kids in middle school have all been pretty positive, which is pretty good in and of itself since those were definitely the worst years for me. I know folks who moved their kids out of private school to go to Culbreth, the school michgc's kid attends and they report that their kids love it and they are very happy with it. My neighbors have been pretty positive about our middle school, Smith, too, and I got a great vibe from the teachers and principal there.
All that said, our older daughter (8th grade) goes to a smaller charter school instead of our local middle. The smaller school just seemed to be a better fit for her. She has some anxiety issues and the big middle felt overwhelming for her. Our younger daughter will be 6th grade next year and we're not sure which way she's going yet. I think both her choices are great, though, and I think she could do well in either environment.
I don't discount michgc's experiences, though. So much depends on the teachers your child has and the cohort she/he is with.
As far as Chapel Hill vs Cary, I think you might really want to think about the vibe of each town — I think they're pretty different and have different appeal. Chapel Hill is the quintessential college town and while it has probably outgrown village status it still thinks of itself that way. Cary is the safe, clean family-oriented suburban town, and very much tied to the larger Raleigh metro area.
You're not going to find a house on 1-2 acres w/in walking distance of a school in Chapel Hill, so rework that idea. You can definitely get w/in walking distance, but an older home will have the larger lot size and that might be .5 acres (pretty large). A newer home w/in walking distance would have a much smaller lot. You can find newer homes with larger lot sizes, but they just won't be that close to the schools.
All public schools in CHC are K-5, 6-8, 9-12, but like michgc said McDougle Elementary and McDougle Middle are right next to each other. In addition to those two, Estes Hill Elementary/Phillips Middle are adjacent campuses as are Seawell Elementary/Smith Middle, and Chapel Hill High is right around the corner.
She is right. No walking distance schools will have lots size you are looking for. Did you mention budget? You do know CH property is very expensive with high property taxes. You need to find the school you want and then ask about walking designation which means no bus service but also you won't be reassigned as long as you live within walking distance.
We bought with that in mind for mcDougle primary and middle schools. Our kids walk or ride bikes and love it. About a mile each way (and of course uphill both coming and going).
Any of the neighborhoods around the Seawell School Road/Homestead Road area would be walkable for Seawell Elementary, Smith Middle, and Chapel Hill High. Those neighborhoods will have bigger, woodier lots than you'd find in the two other big walkable communities with their own elementary schools (Meadowmont and Southern Village to Rashkis and Scroggs respectively).
However, if your student is not a rising star set to cure cancer or not a poor family living in an apartment or African American, Latino, or Karen, the school really won't give a hoot about you. If you aren't set to possibly go to Harvard helping to give CH-C schools a great reputation, and you aren't scoring low enough on standardized test scores to ruin their average, little resources will be spent on you. In other words, I don't think the school district is that great for the middle-of-the-road white, upper-middle class student.
I could not agree with this more, especially with respect to the high schools.
Going back to the original post, did you really just distill your choices down to either Cary or Chapel Hill? The school situation in Wake County isn't as unsettled as you probably think with areas in and near "new" Cary being far and away the worst. Having lived in North Raleigh for the past eight years I can tell you that there are many other options to consider. I too once narrowed my search to Chapel Hill and Cary when our research first started but mostly because they seemed the safest choices.
There's a degree of pretense found in Chapel Hill that's unmistakable and very much like the class separation you likely experience in the New York Metro area (a point I think some earlier posts unintentionally conveyed); maybe that appeals to you but it made my wife and I a bit queasy. There are many wonderful people living in Chapel Hill for all the right reasons but there are a sizable number that live there because they perceive it as being a "better class of people"; I happily left that elitist attitude behind when I left Long Island.
And for the record, living north of I-540 and right off Creedmoor Road, I have a twenty minute drive into RTP each day.
There's a degree of pretense found in Chapel Hill that's unmistakable and very much like the class separation you likely experience in the New York Metro area (a point I think some earlier posts unintentionally conveyed); maybe that appeals to you but it made my wife and I a bit queasy. There are many wonderful people living in Chapel Hill for all the right reasons but there are a sizable number that live there because they perceive it as being a "better class of people"; I happily left that elitist attitude behind when I left Long Island.
/QUOTE]
I'm wondering how you pick this attitude up? Is it in social settings? A general air?
I don't pick this up at all and I see all "classes" of people in Chapel HIll. We have rich, poor, mansion dwellers, homeless, educated, illiterate and every ethnicity imaginable. We chose to return here exactly because of all these desirable characteristics. The one type of people we haven't run into here which we tried to escape when we left Georgia is the overtly fundamentalist right wingers yet I'm sure they are in the mix.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
