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NWR: School Districts, Westerville North vs Westerville South?

AprilH81AprilH81 member
First Anniversary First Comment First Answer 5 Love Its
in Ohio-Columbus

Anyone out there that is a teacher/has kids/knows a lot about the quality of school districts?

H and I are starting to prepare to buy a new house late spring/early summer and we intend for this to be our "forever" house. We know we can't know what the future holds, but we want to make sure this is a houe we can raise our kids in and see us well into retirement.

School districts are important to us, we want any kids we are blessed with to get a good education that prepares them for college.  We want the kids to be well behaved (generally speaking) and a diverse student population (we don't want all rich kids but we don't want our child to be the only native English speaker either). 

I hear good things about Westeville schools, but I hear some more sketchy things about Westerville South.  Is there any truth to this?  Is Westerville North that much better?

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Re: NWR: School Districts, Westerville North vs Westerville South?

  • saacjwsaacjw member
    5 Love Its First Anniversary Name Dropper First Comment
    So, I've been out of school for a bit now, but when I was in high school, Westerville South was a bit worse than North, but not too bad. You can check the Department of Ed's website for info on each individual school you're looking at. http://reportcard.education.ohio.gov/Pages/School-Search.aspx For the record, the Olentangy district is consistently ranked as one of the better districts in the state.

    I'd also check to see the district's history of passing levies, because it can be a good indication of how invested the area is in it's school district. 
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  • AprilH81AprilH81 member
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    Thank you @saacjw !  Did you attend either school?  What were your experiences like?
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  • caitlinmcacaitlinmca member
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    I'm not from Columbus, but my fiance is, and as saacjw said Olentangy district has always been one of the better school districts around.
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  • AprilH81AprilH81 member
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    caitlinmca said:
    I'm not from Columbus, but my fiance is, and as saacjw said Olentangy district has always been one of the better school districts around.

    Yeah, I would love to buy there or in the Dublin school district but it is too far from my sister and too far from H's work.  Plus I can't stomach almost $10,000 a year in property taxes.
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  • donethatdonethat member
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    I have friends who are graduates of, teachers with, or homeowners in about every suburban school district around ... and they all "love their school".  

    Westerville City Schools is a very well respected district, but there is a different makeup between Westerville South, North and Central (there are 3) high schools.  

    We have friends who LOVE Hilliard, Grandview, Bexley, Worthington, Dublin, Gahanna, Upper Arlington, etc...  I really don't think you can go wrong if you find a home you love with taxes you can live with. 
    If you believe in ratings and scores - here's a bunch of info for you to check out.   

    And, remember - ALL of these school districts (and their individual schools i.e. North vs South) have websites and facebooks ....  if you're into it, check those out - what are people posting?  What does parent involvement look like?  Etc...

    Good Luck! 

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  • AprilH81AprilH81 member
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    I didn't think about checking Facebook out, thanks @donethat ! I checked out the school scores and really I don't put a lot of faith in those. There wasn't a lot of different between the three Westerville High Schools which doesn't help any. lol The thinks I have heard lead me to believe that Westerville South is still "good" but more "sketchy" than North (and until today I didn't realize there was a Westerville Central). The main person I have heard this from doesn't always know what he is talking about, so I was trying to see if anyone else had heard similar things.
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  • donethatdonethat member
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    Checking out websites (for communciation?  for complaints?  for opportunites?) is a good resource.... and creeping on facebook is the modern private investigator, right?  
    Out of the 3 Westerville schools, South has the highest population of disadvantaged students, so that could be one thing your source is concerned about (as that would also correspond with the highest disadvantaged housing ... so certainly a consideration for house-buying)

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  • ohoymateohoymate member
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    I went to both Westerville North and Central, albeit quite a few years ago at this point.

    I would agree about South being the least desirable of the three, for a few reasons. It's an older building for one so the facilities are not as nice.

    North, at least when I was there, was quite a good mix in terms of the student population. The building is still older, but not quite as old as south, and has decent facilities.

    Central is very new. I was a part of the first class to graduate in 2006. Being so new, the building itself is absolutely wonderful. And even though it's new, I wouldn't classify it as only having 'rich kids', as Westerville busses in students from across the district and in from Columbus.


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  • SenecafSenecaf member
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    We went through his recently too. We settled in Gahanna and bought a house withing walking distanve to an elementery school. We have been very pleased so far. But its only year two as we just have a first grader and the other one goes to kindergarten next year. There is only one high school in our district though. And it's huge. I'm not sure how I feel about that but it's a long way off

    And as everyone else I've heard Westerville North is the "nice" school. For all the above reasons.
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  • AprilH81AprilH81 member
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    Thank you all for the help!  Gahanna is our third choice but it is a little further from family than I would ideally like to be, but it would shorten the drive "home" when we go visit our parents.
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  • saacjwsaacjw member
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    @AprilH81- I grew up in Delaware, so went to Delaware City Schools, but because of extra curricular actives and family friends, ended up hanging out with a lot of Westerville and Olentangy kids. Westerville South did have a rougher reputation, but only compared to the other Westerville schools. It was pretty similar to Delaware from what I remember and I can't say I was lacking anything. 
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  • misspuppychowmisspuppychow member
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    Dublin, Hilliard, and Olentangy are probably the best school districts.  Westerville schools are also very good.  North and Central are better than South.  We wanted 9/10 or 10/10 GreatSchools rating when we bought a home.
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