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Hello. First time poster here. We are trying to decide between moving within South Charlotte and moving across the border to Fort Mill (Regent Park area). We have 2 kids, and one is getting ready to start kindergarten next year, so schools is a major deciding point for us.
I've tried to do a lot of research on different schools, and have found some good places that rate the schools - but it's all within the district, or within the state. I see that Fort Mill schools are rated amongst the highest in the state, which is encouraging. BUT can anyone tell me how they rate relative to NC schools? I don't care if they're top in the state if the whole state has poor school standards. It seems that I've been seeing apples and oranges, and I want to get some apples and apples. Make sense?
Anyone able to tell me how the Ft. Mill schools compare to the CMS schools ?
Thanks, and have a great day!
Last edited by momof2reds; 02-03-2008 at 10:39 AM..
Like you, I am hoping to relocate to the Charlotte area this summer. The 2 major reasons I will choose Fort Mill over Meck County Schools are busing and growth. I want my kids to go to school in their neighborhood with kids from their neighborhood. The Charlotte schools bus kids to balance out quotas. In addition, the Charlotte schools are busting at the seems with portable classrooms everywhere. It is honestly like they didn't know the growth was going to happen. While Fort Mill will be facing growth challenges over the next decade, this small district will handle the growth much more effectively than the massive Meck. County School District.
My eldest daughter has gone to school in Charlotte and now in Fort Mill. Depends on what you're looking for, really. When we moved from Charlotte to Tega Cay (Gold Hill Elementary), we found that she was behind on some skills - especially in math. But I liked the way they structured the curriculum in Charlotte better - it was more of a holistic learning environment. And the way they dealt with literacy was wonderful - much better than she's had at GHES.
I can analogize the overall differences between her 2 schools to the key methods of teaching reading - CMS was more like the whole language approach, while GHES is more like phonics. GHES has a lot more drills, tests, and homework than her school in Charlotte did. But I don't believe that indicates a better learning environment, necessarily.
Keep in mind that there are hundreds of schools in Charlotte, and they're very different. A friend's daughter had 30-60 minutes of homework per night in kindergarten and a strict academic environment at a school that most people would look down on (because of the proportion of free and reduced lunch students). You can't generalize about a school system as large as CMS.
That said, we did move away from CMS, partially because we, too, wanted our kids to go to school with the neighbors. She's been very happy at both schools.
In general I find the people friendlier south of the border. It's more of a community down here than it was where we lived in South Charlotte.
megassel
Was I correct about the busing and community school thing? You made reference to your daughter going to school with kids in the neighborhood so I thought I might be right. I just hate the thought of driving past 3 other elementary schools to get to my kid's elementary school. I live in Las vegas now and our school district faces many of the same challenges that Meck. County faces, but I think we dealt with many of them a decade ago (when I didn't have kids). Regarding homework, many folks assess the strength of a school by the pounds and hours of homework that is piled on the students. As a former teacher, I am for quality rather than quantity.
I am possibly relocating to Rock Hill and would like to know about the elem schools there. I have a to be 4th grader & kindergarden child. Are there any schools "better" than others, good areas, bad areas, teachers easy to talk to etc. are the school standards high, do they work with the students & parents to help the child exel???
Misconceptions about the schools blow my mind. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools DOES NOT, I repeat DOES NOT, bus students to achieve any type of racial or other balance. The fact is, most CMS schools are sadly not very diverse. Regarding comparing standards in North Carolina and South Carolina schools---standards set by the state of South Carolina are much more stringent than those set by North Carolina. The SC PACT tests which, among other things, determine high school graduation, and are used to determine curriculums, are much more advanced than the exit exams used in NC. The same is true of end of course tests. SC is considered nationally to have among the most challenging testing programs, and unfortunately, curriculums are based on test content. It is true that standardized tests do not determine the quality of a school district (contrary to No Child Left Behind), however, The Fort Mill School District does consistantly perform at the very top of the pack in SC.
Does Meck County bus kids for any reason? My point was more about busing kids away from neighborhood schools and not about quotas. I thought they bused and I showed my ignorance by assuming it was for ethnic balancing. If they bus for any reason, they are a district I would stay away from.
Does Meck County bus kids for any reason? My point was more about busing kids away from neighborhood schools and not about quotas. I thought they bused and I showed my ignorance by assuming it was for ethnic balancing. If they bus for any reason, they are a district I would stay away from.
Students are bused to magnet schools/programs, which is probably where you got the idea of kids being bused past several schools to reach their own school. Of course, attendance at magnet schools is a choice of the parents and is not mandatory. There is one example in south Charlotte of the entire student body of one new elementary school, Elon Park, being bused some distance to another building for this school year. The real Elon Park Elementary School will open next year. Due to court decisions, CMS IS NOT ALLOWED to bus students to achieve any racial balance. Considering that several current Republican members of the school board were party to the original lawsuit which sadly resegregated the CMS schools, the remander of the board would not dare try to bus for racial balance. This is one reason school board members are always at each other's throats. You would have had to have lived in Charlotte for the last 40 years to really understand the huge changes that have occured in school assignment. From 1972 to 2002 the CMS schools (other than a few schools in the far north and south) were pretty much totally integrated and considered a model for the nation. Now CMS schools are back to being largely segregated (with a few notable exceptions). This has caused lots of hard feelings, to say the least.
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Family relocating, need elementary school info
