No, judging schools by tests alone is retarded. So is ignoring tests. BTW, from that link you can glean more data, to include percentage of english language learners, percentage of free lunches, education level of parents and a bunch of other stuff that by itself doesn’t tell an entire story, but together, it is what we call data. You can’t get everything from data, but it’s a tool you shouldn’t ignore.
Like a lot of parents, I didn’t buy a house and then ask what the school boundaries were. I shopped the school first, then got a boundary map and then went house shopping. My parents did the same thing, I like to credit my ability to creatively write as one of the fringe benfits of their careful planning, it wasn’t the absolute best school, but it was in the top 10% of the county I grew up in, in retrospect, it was worth it. Unfortunately, that school couldn’t stop me from using too many commas and writing run-on sentences, perhaps their scores were low in punctuation, nobody’s perfect.
I felt obligated to do the same, I’m proud of the education my kids have gotten, I’m proud of the little adults they are turning into, I like most of what I see as far as the experience they are having. Most of that is attributed to things other than their school, but it plays a part. They are both smarter than I am and honestly, not only is their school better than mine, it’s one of the best I’ve seen and I have a closer view of schools than most people. So i’m not about to accept the tag of “just O.K.” without an argument. Now there are lots of schools in this valley, probably a hundred schools, at least six traditional high schools in tem/mur alone, so there are bound to be variances, your results may vary.
My point wasn’t that they are the absolute best, just that what you get for the cost, it is a bargain. I can’t think of another place where you can get a house for under 300k and get upper tier schools, within driving distance. You can pay 900k and get a better school in poway, or you can pay 500k and get a worse school in Vista or Escondido, but the quality of the schools and the life here, to me, and maybe only to me, represent value.
