Gee, are describing all of Kensington? I am over in East Kenzo and while it has its bad elements, I really like it. Would I recommend raising a kid there? Maybe, depending on who I'm talking with but something has to give.

The more people coming in with children demanding quality education the faster the will to change and improve will become.

Defeatist attitudes are a part of the problem as are comments like yours. It's one thing to be brutally honest about something and quite another to just say something like what you've said.

Just my 2 cents

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716 N 3rd Street
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pretty much any friend I have that has kids and lives in philadelphia is raising children in east kensington, myself included.

I agree to a point however;\
Private school tuition for Pre-K is ~$13k (plus afterschool, plus summer if you area dual areer family). Catholic school is less. Private high school ~$24k at some places.

Multiple by 2 means a bunch of money.

The burbs have yards. 5 year old can go play in the back; can't really have a 5 year old walk by themselves to a park 4 blocks away. TOugh to always go with the 5 year old as the younger one nap durring the day at the house

Assuming your job is not in the city..wage tax

And the public schools are not very good; even the good ones, well..aren't (Going by the numbers)

All that being said, I am trying to stay; but wonder if it is best for me or the kids. It is a hard decisions and I no longer think poorly of those who leave or stay.

Dude, Kensington is an enormous area. No one is flocking to A and Ontario or any of the outer portions of Kensington. The areas that are developing are in inner Kensington (Fishtown, East Kensington and environs).

It's like you're saying don't live at 21st & Mt. Vernon cuz people are shooting up at 26th & Susquehanna.

I think we'll see an interesting cultural shift when gas continues upwards. There's a year and a half wait list on Priuses in Rochester, NY right now (my mom sells 'em...so it's my only source!). I'm going to venture that people not being able to afford long commutes and/or want to afford private schools for their children will be the catalyst to improving city schools. More parents that care and fight for change will be the only thing to undo the erosion of city schools that suburbanization/white flight originally caused.

I'm also going to guess that public transportation around here will also improve. It's an interesting time to live in a major metropolitan city.

But also, you cannot really over-idealize being raised in the burbs. There's nowhere in America a responsible parent should send a child a few blocks away alone these days, let alone unsupervised in a yard. Plenty of kids go missing in rural and suburban areas everyday and it's a very sad thing. I think raising a child in the city makes you less likely to lose sight of your children, more likely to supervise the friends they have, places they go. It's also much more likely your child will be in a diverse school and get a much more enriching social and cultural education.

Being a product of a great suburban school, I can tell you it's not a panacea. I don't judge people or parents that leave at all (it's easy to be someone who criticizes others when I have no children of my own) but sometimes think people view the suburbs as someplace that's totally perfect...that their kids won't stumble into daily drug use, that their friends will all be college bound and that big yards=higher SAT scores...doesn't work that way, unfortunately and there are definitely positives to urban living for children.

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Resident of Fishtown, Moderator of Fish/No. Libs/Kenzo forum, Real Estate Agent-Prudential Fox & Roach

We live in Kensington on Frankford Avenue and send our daughter to Frankford Friends. It is the best little school around! She gets lots of special attention, the teachers are approachable and there is LOTS of parental involvement. We enjoy the community of families that is attached to Frankford Friends. I highly recommend it!

In almost all the counties that are adjacent to Philly, the typical suburb is not a post wwII suburb, but rather most are Progressive Era towns scattered down the older roads. I can name several towns in PA and NJ that have an extremely high quality of life, and the majority of kids turn out fine and dandy.

That being said, both Philly and the burbs have their pros and cons. We are thinking of kids in the next 5 years, and we're not planning on moving. I see the kids playing all the time and they are not too bad at all, and it seems that they click into well-knit groups. I also think that the trend following WWII where everyone flocked out of Philly is slowly starting to reverse. People are realizing that the city is a great place to raise a family while keeping your expenses/taxes low and keeping your quality of life high. My fionce and I both agree that by the time our kids are ready for school, which we are planning to be around 8-10 years away, the Philly school system will be in much better shape.

Funny, I thought the exact same thing 8-10 years ago. I hope for your sake that the next 8-10 yrs works out better. And yes, Frankford Friends School is a wonderful alternative even if every public school were both safe and well run.