I'm wondering what decent grammar schools there are (religiously affiliated or not) for University City residents' kids who either a) don't live in the catchment, or b) live in the catchment but for some reason are not able to register their kids there. Any thoughts? Thanks!

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kimimila

It's not a neighborhood school, but I've heard really good things about Independence Charter School near Washington Square. I've also met a few of their teachers and they seemed like well-informed educators. I'm not sure what the enrollment process is like, but I'm sure there is a website that would tell you.

Before Penn Alexander, Powell was the highly regarded school in University City. Its still good, by city standards, but Penn Alexander has certainly stolen most of the limelight. I'm not sure what the catchment is, other than that it covers Powelton Village and West Powelton.

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- George -

http://www.barackobama.com

Yes, Powell is the best aside from Alexander. I'm not sure that there's really a catchment area for schools other than Alexander and those within the newly designated Center City school district. I think maybe the closer you live to the school the more likely you are to get in, space permitting?

I also know some people who send their kids to Spruce Hill Christian at 42nd & Baltimore. I don't know much about the school, but they seem pretty happy with it.

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Thanks for your helpful responses! In the meantime, I found a few websites that provide lists of public and charter schools, as well as ratings/rankings in a variety of categories:

www.greatschools.net
www.schoolmatch.com
www.psk12.com
www.schoolmatters.com

Granted, the ratings have to be put in context and taken with a grain of salt, and these sites do not include private or parochial schools, but it's a great place to start to at least know what public and charter schools are out there to consider.

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kimimila

Did you come to any final decisions yourself? Just curious.

Some people really love Francis De Sales. Among urban Catholic schools, they're a model (friends from New York who work in parochial schools were often sent there to observe.) Many of the students are not Catholic, and the people who run it are sensitive to that, within the context of it being a church school. Lots of immigrant children--more than half of the student body, I believe.

Thanks for the great info on St. Francis De Sales! That's one school that I haven't learned much about yet, but that we'd definitely like to include as a possibility.

In response to seand, we haven't come to any decisions yet. We're doing long range planning because we're going to move from our current apartment to a house within University City. Although grammar school is a few years down the road, we are trying to assess schooling options now to decide whether we going to be looking at houses in or in-and-beyond the catchment area.

We actually learned today that Philly charter schools are both free and open to all residents of the city. We're going to check these options out, as well as Samuel Powel that someone mentioned, and we're going to take a look at the parochial/church-affiliated schools in the area, namely St. Francis and Spruce Hill Christian.

One concern is whether 4 or 5 years down the road, even if we did live in the catchment, Sadie Alexander would be oversubscribed and there wouldn't be enough room for all the kids in the area anyway. (Does anyone know if this is just rumor or our own skepticism, or if it is a likelihood?) In that case, we'd really be kicking ourselves for insisting on a catchment area house. Also, is it fair to say that Sadie Alexander is necessarily better than what charter schools or other school have to offer? We just don't know yet because we don't have enough info.

Regarding private schools (Penn Charter, etc.), they look like great educational opportunities but we just don't have the $$$ or the desire to be putting out college tuition dollars on kindergarten.

Any thoughts on any of these topics are most welcome! Thanks for the good ideas.

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kimimila

It will be interesting to see what happens with the Sadie-Alexander enrollment. My guess is that there will be pressure for expansion to meet the needs of the catchment, but that's obviously not a guarantee.

From talking to people who've been in the neighborhood a while with kids, my sense is that 5-10 years ago, Powell was the obvious place for people who couldn't afford or didn't like the super-expensive Friends schools. Now, Sadie-Alexander is clearly #1, but I've known several parents who picked Francis de Sales (a few on our block, just beyond the catchment) or charter schools over Powell. If you look around, there've been a bunch of articles about the budget cutbacks there. On the other hand, many parents really love the principal and some of the teachers up there.