<p>We are relocating to the chicao area. Could anyone out there give us any helpful info on the chicago suburbs of good schools, neighborhoods etc</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>In general, the northern and western suburbs have some of the best school districts in Illinois. But they may also be highly competitive. Naperville has made Money Magazine’s list of best places to live; it’s about 40 minutes west of the city. </p>
<p>Here’s a couple of articles from our local magazine with tons of data and other info: High Schools: [How</a> Your High School Stacks Up - Chicago Magazine - October 2007 - Chicago](<a href=“http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/October-2007/How-Your-High-School-Stacks-Up/]How”>How Your High School Stacks Up – Chicago Magazine) Elementary schools:[The</a> A+ Team - Chicago Magazine - October 2006 - Chicago](<a href=“http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/October-2006/The-A-Team/]The”>The A+ Team – Chicago Magazine)</p>
<p>How old are your kids? Generally, the school district is based on the high school…so even if you have middle-schoolers, you really want to look at the high school. You’ll want to find the state reports that compare test scores as one factor (obviously that’s not the only factor). Also, a key factor in Illinois is the amount spent per student. Generally, the more affluent the area, the better the high school, but this isn’t always the case.</p>
<p>Once you zero in on a few districts, I’d advise doing some internet searching regarding any past (or current) referendums – make sure that you’re moving into a district that strongly supports the school…there are some districts who can’t get referendums passed to build new schools/run current ones.</p>
<p>Most of my experience in the Chicago area (lived there for many years, but have been gone for a while) was in the Northwest suburban area. We had chosen to live in the Stevenson H.S. school district and planned to stay till our kids were out of high school. Surprise! Life had other plans for us, so we didn’t have actual high school experience there. You won’t find a high school that is free of drug or alcohol issues, unfortunately…that’s a fact of life these days.</p>
<p>You’ll find that the housing prices in the suburbs vary widely…and a lot depends on how far you want to commute to work (and how? driving or trains?) </p>
<p>Now I’ll shut up and defer to others who are currently there. Teriwtt and others live in the Chicago area, so they can provide more current info. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Good point on checking local news about referendums - right now there’s a group in our town that is trying to move the middle school out of the center of the village to free up the prime real estate. We’ve been in the same town for 20 years all the way from birth (DS, not me) to college and have been more than satisfied with the schools- you can pm me for specifics. But we might not be able to afford a house here today!</p>
<p>New Trier is probably the gold standard. Evanston is very good and more diverse. Glenbard West is very good too. Naperville is good.</p>
<p>Naperville probably has the most, and the most diverse, housing stock. The high schools are extremely good, as are most of the varsity sports teams, if that is important to you.
Winnetka is very expensive, and is the home of New Trier high school. Old homes, right on the lake.
Stevenson High School is further west of the north shore, a more rural feeling area.
The western suburbs have more of a closer to the city, old suburb feel – places like Hinsdale, Western Springs, LaGrange. Can be very expensive.
There are now more options in the city itself with very, very good magnet high schools like Northside Prep and Whitney Young.
Can’t really say too much more without knowing where you will be working, whether you want to be near commuter rail, and a ballpark figure on what you want to spend on housing. PM me if you’d like.</p>
<p>Also forgot to add the Fox Valley has become very popular. St. Charles, in particular, has lots of homes and very good high schools. Much farther from the Loop, however.</p>
<p>I graduated from a District 214 high school (NW suburbs) many [many] decades ago and felt I received a stellar education. I haven’t been back in quite awhile, but a quick look at the charts provided by Marilyn makes me think they’re still doing a decent job. Not the cheapest area to live but certainly less pricey than anything nearer the lake.</p>
<p>New Trier is in a sense the gold standard, but that is in large part due to the wealth that lives in many parts of the district. </p>
<p>The school with the strongest middle class is in my view Deerfield High School. A greatschools.net 10/10 school and truly one of the best schools in the nation - the middle of the class often goes to Wisconsin and Michigan. </p>
<p>Disclaimer - I went there 30 years ago and was fortunate enough to win an individual state championship in sports and be on a multiple state champion team. The school challenged me to be exceedingly tough athletically and at the same time do very well in school. The town has some modest homes (the one I lived in with my brother and single mother), and it prepared me incredibly well for a top 10 USNWR undergrad and grad education. I cannot say enough good about the school. In my class of 700, every single student went on to college (but not all graduated) - still - gives you an idea of what the school is like. </p>
<p>My entire family was from the western suburbs (York, Glenbard, Naperville schools) and they are all good schools - but my mother very much wanted to get her kids in what she thought were the best - and up to Deerfield we went.</p>
<p>Naperville, IMSA, New Trier, Stevenson, and Northside Prep are generally considered the strongest, academically.</p>
<p>I graduated from Deerfield last year, and I would have to say that it is an excellent school. New Trier and Stevenson are also both excellent. One difference is that New Trier and Stevenson are both much larger than Deerfield; the former two have between 4000 and 5000 students, while the later has around 1700. I don’t think that you can say that being larger is better than being smaller, or visa-versa: both sizes have their advantages. I should point out that all of these areas are fairly expensive (not as expensive as, say, Lake Forest, but still well above average).</p>
<p>Of course, there are many other good schools in the area. Most suburbs in the North Shore have pretty good systems in general. There are several quality schools in the city itself, although I am not as familiar with them. IMSA is of course top notch, but that is in Aurora and is a boarding school, and would not influence where you plan to live.</p>
<p>I am personally biased towards Deerfield, since I did attend there and was quite satisfied. Of course, I did have my grievances, but I was far from the typical student, and most of my gripes are probably irrelevant. The point is that the quality of education is very good. If you have detailed questions, you can pm me.</p>
<p>In addition to the schools already mentioned, other excellent high schools in the North and Northwest suburbs are Glenbrook North, Glenbrook South, and Highland Park. Really, you can’t go wrong in these suburban areas; the public high schools are almost uniformly excellent. The major differences are in size and in the makeup of the feeder communities themselves (although, as already mentioned, all are at least reasonably affluent).</p>
<p>Add Fremd High School to the Northwest suburbs location. Very good school</p>
<p>There are a lot of great school districts around Chicago.</p>
<p>I have one D at New Trier and another who graduated from there a few years ago. The school is very large and competitive–but I am amazed at the opportunities at the school and what they have learned. New Trier High School pulls from New Trier Township–Winnetka, Wilmette, Glencoe, Northfield, Kenilworth and a small part of Glenview and Northbrook.</p>
<p>The elementary schools can be different in each town. My D’s school had a “whole child” philosophy. While other schools may be more traditional.</p>
<p>I have friends with kids at ETHS and Evanston schools–and they are very happy. I know that Naperville has great schools --I don’t know anyone in that school system–because Naperville is quite a ways away from me.</p>
<p>Any particular activities your kids are interested in? If they like Debate Glenbrook North would be a good one to check out (probably one of the best in the nation), Downers Grove South for speech, Homewood Flossmoor for drama, etc. Obviously individual talent plays a big part, but if your kids have a talent the coaching resources at schools with a record of success in these areas might be able to take them to the point they can put something on their application. check the [Illinois</a> High School Association](<a href=“IHSA: Illinois High School Association”>IHSA: Illinois High School Association) website for a list of titles for your given sport/activity.</p>
<p>In terms of academics, make sure there’s a balance. If your primary concern is college admissions, keep in mind that it’s difficult to excel (i.e. class rank) at a highly competitive school, while at the same time it undoubtedly does create a better learning environment. Luckily, there’s a lot of information available to you. Illinois requires all schools to put out a school report card, with a standardized format that keeps track of demographics, academics, teacher training, etc. But what’s really good is that all students in Illinois are required to take the ACT, giving us a pretty valuable data point standardized across all schools.</p>
<p>That being said, here are some average ACT scores across some of the more prominent schools that others have mentioned or come to mind from 2005 (a little old, I know, you can investigate further, but I used the link Marilyn provided, since it provides all the numbers in a nice format). Obviously there’s so many problems with standardized testing blah blah blah Averages are misleading blah blah blah. Take it for what it’s worth:</p>
<p>Downers Grove North: 23.1
Downers Grove South: 21.9
Gelnbard East: 21
Glenbard North: 21.3
Glenbard South: 24.1
Glenbard West: 23.2
Fremd: 23.9
Hinsdale Central: 25.8
Hinsdale South: 22.2
Hoffman Estates: 21
Glenbrook North: 25.4
Glenbrook South: 24.1
Homewood Flossmoor: 21.6
Libertyville: 24.7
Maine East: 20.9
Maine North: 24.2
Maine South: 21.6
Naperville Central: 24.1
Naperville North: 24.6
Neuqua Valley: 23.8
New Trier:26.8
Stevenson: 25.6
Wheaton North: 23.3
Wheaton Warrenville South: 23.1
Waubonsie Valley: 22.6</p>
<p>We lived for a few years in NW Indiana, around Munster. So that’s just west of Gary and Hammond, IN.</p>
<p>I didn’t like it very much, however. There were miles of core poverty in South Chicago that separated NW Indiana from “the Loop” downtown. But lots of people from Indiana took that train in, raising the family out in suburban NW Indiana, where housing costs were more affordable than in the North and West suburbs of Illinois. </p>
<p>I bet the commute times to the Loop were similar, too.</p>
<p>I LOVED Chicago whenever we could get in, which wasn’t often enough for me. Personally, I didn’t enjoy NW Indiana at all, but H’s job was bad there, so that colored it a lot. </p>
<p>D was born at Michael Reese Hospital in downtown Chicago, so that was really the best thing about those 3 years for me! </p>
<p>It’s 20 years later now, and you may have different impressions of NW Indiana so I’m just putting it out there for you. I was told that the h.s. in that area are competitive, but our family was too young then for me to really know or care.</p>
<p>I just took the data from Chicago Magazine that Marilyn provided and put it into Excel in a more user friendly way, so your able to sort by column, etc. If anyone wants a copy, PM me. Here are the top 10 public schools in terms of avg. ACT score, not counting magnet schools:</p>
<p>New Trier: 26.8
Hinsdale Central: 25.8
Stevenson: 25.6
Deerfield: 25.5
Glenbrook North: 25.4
Lake Forest: 25.4
Highland Park: 25.2
Libertyville: 24.7
Naperville North: 24.6
Maine South: 24.2</p>
<p>OK, take this for what it’s worth. Most of the schools people have listed (New Trier, Stevenson, Lake Forest, Naperville) are in suburbs that have very high housing costs. This question can’t really be addressed without knowing what your housing allowance will be.</p>
<p>And most importantly, it ALL depends on the priorities you have for your child’s educational experience. You will find at most of those schools, the competitiveness of the students is implicitly indicative of the competitiveness of the parents. So you have to decide how much stress you want your child to be under to succeed, and be around people whose parents are spending every penny possible to assure their child’s success (by the way, I know teachers/administrators in all four districts I mentioned, so I hear this from them).</p>
<p>Also, what are your child’s interests? That, too, makes a huge difference; some schools obviously boast about specific programs. However, last fall Stevenson High School put on the musical The Pajama Game; I didn’t attend, but everyone who I knew did thought it was one of the worst high school productions they’d ever seen. I was truly shocked, because with Stevenson’s size, I assumed their talent would run much deeper than schools smaller than them (which is just about every other high school around). But talk about athletics, and it’s always a winning game at Stevenson. However, if your child is only average to above average in a particular sport (or activity), you have to realize the chances of making something (sports team, etc.) are greatly reduced by the amount of kids who have D1 college potential. </p>
<p>About a year ago, when I was getting my nails done in a neighboring suburb to mine, I joined in on a conversation with two other women (who didn’t know each other, either) whose children had attended Stevenson. They spoke of how they specifically chose to move into that school district because of the school’s reputation. Now that their kids have graduated, they have regrets, and advise people not to put their kids through the stress that is Stevenson. It’s a great place if you’re in the top 5% of whatever you do, but for the other 95%, it’s a different story… you’re just an average Joe Schmo.</p>
<p>Another consideration, there’s one co-ed Catholic high school in our county, and many parents wouldn’t even think of sending their kids to a public school. However, our high school, which is just down the road, offers more AP and honors classes than the parochial high school, and our school also offers many more extracurricular activities. It’s kind of the joke of the community that parents who send their kids there think they’re protecting them from the temptations of public high schools, but what the kids say after they graduate is that there are probably more drugs at their school, because the kids have access to more resources (money) to buy them than some of the poorer kids at the local public schools.</p>
<p>Sorry this is long, but if you give us some kind of idea as far as a housing standard, that would help.</p>
<p>It really comes down to the issue that you pretty much “get what you pay for”…a very direct connection between quality of schools and cost of housing. Years ago we were looking at new housing, considering building one of the tract houses. From the same builder, a house in the Stevenson school district was $30K higher than one in a middle-of-the-pack western suburb…and this was a house that was around $300K at the time.</p>
<p>You won’t lose home value if you go to any of the lists that made the “top” of the list…</p>
<p>I don’t know where you are coming from, but another note is that there are far fewer private schools in the Chicago area than in other parts of the country where I’ve lived. And most of the ones that are private are parochial.</p>
<p>I wish I could say more about our school district but just read the anonymity thread :eek: so if you’re interested please PM me!</p>