We have children who are in elementary school. When we were house hunting, we considered 4S & SR. We picked SR for the following reasons:
– The elementary schools in 4S seem much more crowded. That’s because the houses in 4S are newer & have younger residents.
The houses in SR near Dingeman & EBS are built from 1995-2001. Most of the folks who live near Dingeman & EBS have children who have already moved on to Marshall Middle or SRHS.
– To me, 4S feel more like a “rat race”. In the morning, it seem like everybody use Camino Del Norte to get on to the 15S. In the afternoon, you are stuck in traffic on the 15N from 56 to Camino Del Norte.
As for your concern regarding children from Mira Mesa who attend SR schools via the Choice program: the parents who drive their children to SR everyday from MM tend to be the more devoted parents.
I would not be surprised if average test scores of the Choice students from MM are higher than the average test scores of the SR residents.