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Well, BHES is far better than MKES for whatever that's worth. Both funnel into Fox Lane middle/high so if your kids are past elementary school age that's irrelevant. Fox Lane is a very good school.
There are "diverse' neighborhoods in both towns but mostly hispanics. Though the demographic is predominantly white, I don't think you'll experience any racially-driven antipathy in either community (or anywhere else in northern Westchester for that matter).
The other thing to consider is that Bedford Hills does not have as much of a "downtown" area and there's a lot less that you can get to on foot. Kisco almost feels like a miniature city, Bedford Hills.....doesn't. Make no mistake, you'll need one car (probably 2) either way, but it may influence your decision.
We are an interracial family. My husband is black and I am white. We have two mixed children. We would love racial diversity and also SE diversity.
Don't know what SE diversity is, but in any event, I don't think there is any place in Westchester County that will treat you or your kids differently because one parent is black and one is white, and the kids are a mix of same.
But if you are concerned with the skin color of your kids' classmates, and of those in town, there are choices for you. Mt Kisco and Bedford Hills are in the same school district (as someone else noted as well) so they are essentially the same community, especially if you have kids. So from a racial diversity and political leaning point of view, they will be the same. For elementary school, your kids may see a more racially diverse environment at Mt. Kisco, but this will be mainly Spanish-speaking kids from recent immigrant families.
Not to greatly expand your search, but Nyack screams out at me when I read your posts on this thread. Very democratic and progressive area, and the schools have a lot of over all diversity - economic, racial, religious, etc. It will be more diverse from an African-American standpoint that the district you are currently looking at. The schools are good, and are very strong, I think, in the arts. They also have very nice brand new athletic facilities. It is in Rockland, though, and not on the NJ transit line (which enters Rockland at Pearl River), so commuting to Manhattan, if that is needed, would have to be with a bus or car. As the bird flies, it is close to Manhattan, but Westchester offers a better commute per mile outside the city than Rockland does.
I don't necessarily associate either Bedford or Mount Kisco with anything close to socioeconomic diversity. Both are very wealthy towns, even by Westchester standards.
Where I live (Dobbs Ferry) is considered 'blue collar' but I'd argue that it's still mostly affluent, driven by lack of affordable housing/rental options. For true diversity in this sense, I'd probably suggest somwhere like White Plains, Nyack, Peekskill, Sleepy Hollow, Ossining, Mount Vernon or Yonkers. Otherwise, 'socioeconomic' diversity is mostly just going to be a buzzword in the rest of these towns.
There's an inverse relationship between high scoring school districts and socioeconomically diverse school districts; because the so-called 'good' school districts tend to be bastions of wealth (Scarsdale, Chappaqua, etc) in which affordable housing is all but nonexistant. So it's a matter of having your cake and eating it too, I guess, at least in Westchester.
what is with this obsession with racial diversity? Would you not move to a town or city because its 80% white or 80% black? Are we just talking racial diversity or ethnic diversity. Because Westchester's whites are extremely diverse (WASPS,Italians, Jews, Irish etc..)
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