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San Francisco is building many high-rise residential towers right now - the City is the place to live, until the kids need to go to school. But there are a gro

San Francisco is building many high-rise residential towers right now - the City is the place to live, until the kids need to go to school. But there are a growing number of good private options, and even a ray of hope on the public side. One of the worst Public schools in town (William Cobb Elementary) is being transformed into an AMI certified Montessori school with complete replacement of the staff. I have no clue how this is happening here politically, but it sure is encouraging. A nice side effect to the certification requirement is that all the old teachers don't qualify :) The new direction started with a pre-school program with the support of the top international Montessori school in Marin. The Cobb Montessori program now has a 5 year track record with glowing reviews from parents. We are enrolling our 4.5 year old there now. I never dreamed of having our child in public school until I found this one.

geebee 18y ago
There is definitely a ray of hope on the public side. A lot of the parents I know are extremely committed to staying in the city. But you sure do need to be committed. The numbers just don't look good for SF. If you rely on private schools, you are looking at about $17K/yr for the K-8, followed by $25k/yr for the high schools. The numbers boggle the mind. I have one kid and another on the way. That means that tuition would run me between $34K-$50k a year. It's not tax deductible, so this actually translates into about $50-$70 in salary. I know some two income families that could swing it without too much pain, but unfortunately, I'm not in one of them. But even if you can afford it, imagine if you moved to a good school district in the suburbs and invested that money instead. The education is "free" - and in a way, you make money on it. You have to pay taxes to support it, sure, but you'd have to pay them in SF anyway. And because houses in good school districts tend to hold value or appreciate more rapidly than others, the tax becomes, in a strange way, an investment (ie., you're essentially buying a share in a school district when you buy the house). Living in SF must be very important to these folks, because I wouldn't be surprised if they're walking away from well over a million in lost revenue over a lifetime. Lastly, SF's school district is in particular trouble because of the deals it cut with the unions in more prosperous times. I read about this in the chronicle a couple of years ago (sorry, no link). Anyone who worked for five years for SF Unified (in almost any capacity) gets subsidized health care in retirement. In other words, someone who worked as a janitor from age 19-24 before moving on to other things is on the pension and health care plan. Because it's a relatively old school district (newer suburbs simply don't have retirees to support, because they didn't exist 30 years ago), this problem is compounded. SF will spend a huge amount of its school budget simply supporting its pension and health plan obligations. In a way, it's almost a relief that so many childless people live in SF - because of these obligations, we may need a much larger tax base to educate the same number of students as a suburban district.

geebee 18y ago

There is definitely a ray of hope on the public side. A lot of the parents I know are extremely committed to staying in the city. But you sure do need to be committed. The numbers just don't look good for SF. If you rely on private schools, you are looking at about $17K/yr for the K-8, followed by $25k/yr for the high schools. The numbers boggle the mind. I have one kid and another on the way. That means that tuition would run me between $34K-$50k a year. It's not tax deductible, so this actually translates into about $50-$70 in salary. I know some two income families that could swing it without too much pain, but unfortunately, I'm not in one of them. But even if you can afford it, imagine if you moved to a good school district in the suburbs and invested that money instead. The education is "free" - and in a way, you make money on it. You have to pay taxes to support it, sure, but you'd have to pay them in SF anyway. And because houses in good school districts tend to hold value or appreciate more rapidly than others, the tax becomes, in a strange way, an investment (ie., you're essentially buying a share in a school district when you buy the house). Living in SF must be very important to these folks, because I wouldn't be surprised if they're walking away from well over a million in lost revenue over a lifetime. Lastly, SF's school district is in particular trouble because of the deals it cut with the unions in more prosperous times. I read about this in the chronicle a couple of years ago (sorry, no link). Anyone who worked for five years for SF Unified (in almost any capacity) gets subsidized health care in retirement. In other words, someone who worked as a janitor from age 19-24 before moving on to other things is on the pension and health care plan. Because it's a relatively old school district (newer suburbs simply don't have retirees to support, because they didn't exist 30 years ago), this problem is compounded. SF will spend a huge amount of its school budget simply supporting its pension and health plan obligations. In a way, it's almost a relief that so many childless people live in SF - because of these obligations, we may need a much larger tax base to educate the same number of students as a suburban district.