If you are not willing to take responsibility for your children's education, they will most likely be uneducated. The schools and libraries and internets and such are resources. YOU are responsibile for their education and should you ever forget it, whatever school system you are in will look like the worst one ever.

CAFKIA

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It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.
  - William G. McAdoo

Blount County currently sanctions teaching intelligent design alongside evolution, and a new WalMart sprang up like weed near the beef-jerky plant about a month ago.

RJ69...I totally agree with CAFKIA. The success of your children's education will reflect the time invested by the parent or care giver. My children are in private school, but I do have friends whose children are attending Maryville schools and they are very impressed. I also have friends whose children attend Knox County schools that are doing extremely well. Again, it's all about being involved with the kids. Also, why do you care how close you live to a Walmart??? They have great school supplies, cheap! They hire old people, people with disability and give lots of money away to the community. You say MPC & political enablers didn't listen to the local residents.....based on the mass number of cars in the Walmart parking lot in Hall's (I don't go that way often as I live West, but I do vist the Hospice facility once a month)...my guess is your local official's did listen to the the community.

It's an interesting question. We'll be making a similar decision in a couple of years when our oldest starts schools.

I'm from Maryville and liked the schools. My wife is from Knoxville. She knows Maryville has good schools, but would prefer to live in Knoxville.

The decision is complicated by the fact that we jobs in Knoxville. Are better schools worth a longer commute and therefore less time with our family? It's going to be a tough decision.

www.lesjones.com

Not interested in Farragut / West Knox

I hope it's because of housing prices or work commute time, because those are the only non-snobbery explanations to avoiding that area of town. Incidentally, the area where I live.

But then housing can be found all over the scale in West Knox and still go to a good school, and if you are willing to live in Oak Ridge or Maryville, work commute must not be a factor. So what is it, exactly?

A longer commute means more time on the road and in the car. Logic tells me that the more time spent in automotive endeavor, the more likely you are to be involved in an accident. Is your child's education more important than your being there to see your child grow up? Is the school choice more important than your child growing up?

There have been a number of wrecks in the past couple of years that left some parents without children and some children without at least one parent. I maintain that these events are less likely the fewer miles that need to be driven. Is there some reason that others do not consider that when evaluating all the other issues pertaining to school choice?

Personally, I think your kid will be better off in a densely urban area 2 or 3 well sidewalked blocks away from the school they attend and ideally, close to your place of employ. But then, I'm a Gawdless liberal.

CAFKIA

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It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.
  - William G. McAdoo

I personally went to Maryville schools, and I think they are worthy of their reputation. I was very prepared for college. For that reason I live in the city of Maryville now so my children (Lord willing) will be able those schools.

I work in Knoxville now, but the 20 minute commute is not bad at all.

Craig Thomas
(link...)

One of the advantages of the parts of Maryville where I'd prefer to live (College Hills and Oak Park) is that they are densely urban and close to schools and parks and amenities like the library and Maryville College.

I'm not sure the "more time in car = more chance of an accident" theory holds water. Most accidents supposedly happen within five miles of a person's house, or something. My daily commute on Pellissippi seems extremely low risk compared to urban driving.

www.lesjones.com

...YOU are responsibile for their education ...

I agree with this sentiment. There can be nothing more important than parental involvement, not just in sports as is so common.

"There can be nothing more important than parental involvement, not just in sports as is so common."

Parental involvement is important, but nothing more important? I disagree. If that was true we could just send kids to any school anywhere and it wouldn't make a difference, right? I just don't believe that.

shortstuff:

"Think about those carbon footprints as you travel..."

I don't expect that to enter into our decisions at all. I'm not going to sacrifice my kids' education to appease the global warming gods.

www.lesjones.com

I may have worded that a little incorrectly. However, I think a student can get a good education in most any school in Knox or Blount County, if their parents are involved. Well, and maybe the kid not being a little sh** could be important.

Blount county has "ID" issues.
Maryville has the rebel flag thing going.

But in the end, there is the big factor of quality of life in any community. That is beyond the walls of any school.

Blount County is just not as diverse as the OR area.

That I agree with. :-)

www.lesjones.com

Well, I've read every comment, and, personally, I don't think anyone has answered RJ69's question the way it should have been answered, so here goes...

RJ, it's been a goal of this nation for over 200 years to extend equal educational opportunity to every child here. It shouldn't matter where that child lives, what kind of house his parents can afford, or whether his mom or dad has the time or money to volunteer in his school.

Unfortunately, every time one of us tries to "buy into" a perceived better opportunity for our own child by circumventing a responsibility to better schools for every child, we exacerbate disparities between school communities and we set back the time that goal of equal educational opportunity will be realized.

So, if we want to be part of the solution, and if we want to teach our kids the same ethic, we'll just tie on a blindfold, throw a dart at a map of East Tennessee, and roll up our sleeves to start work for that community's schools.

Yeah, it's an ethic that may cause us to have to supplement what's available to our children in a given school community in the here-and-now, but if we're committed to supporting our children's education, we're doing that anyway. So, why not take the action that will support *every* child's education? Future generations will thank us.

Let's keep our eyes on the prize, and let's make sure our own children understand the goal, too. They'll likely be parents one day.

(Go ahead, pile on me now...)

I think Oak Ridge has things to offer a young family and some things to consider before moving here.

School wise, you will find some of the best teachers and such here in this district. Willowbrook Elem is a great school with a great staff and wonderful teachers. All three of mine loved going there.

There is Glendale and Linden, both of whom get good overall marks as well.

My kids didn't like Robertsville middle as much and were glad to be gone from there when the went to the high school.

My kids really loved OR high. My son was involved in the Masquers program and I believed it keep him out of a lot of trouble and gave him a excellent work ethic and such.

My daughter was in the Collage prep program and she believes it has helped her out a lot in attending MTSU where she keeps a 3.7 average and keeps a collage scholarship. I have had many kids tell me that OR high prep courses helped a lot in collage and they see kids coming from private schools that don't do as well. YMMV.

OR high does not have as good of a more trades side of classes as they should. A school of OR size should have a auto shop class but they don't.

My younger foster son however did not do as well there. OR high does not have a lot of Patience for underachievers. While they tried with him, he just couldn't adjust to the level of work and homework involved. When we moved he transferred to Clinton high school where he is doing better, but even he admits that Clinton high isn't nearly as hard.

I like Oak Ridge over all. Crime is very low, there are a lot of things going on between the playhouse, civic center, and such. Its a Grey town however, as lots of folks are retiring from the various labs and such. And it seems that most of the town council is Real Estate agents.

Taxes are high here, as is the water bills and such. You do kinda pay for living here.

Overall, you could do a lot worse. I think the schools are top notch and getting a diploma from OR high means something when it comes to collage applications. And as my daughter found out, being in the top 50 of grads really does help with scholar ships and such.

Pick a school, any school. I and my siblings went to inner city schools (read: Black). We were largely raised in a single parent home due to the death of my father early on. We were poor. I, with but an A.S. degree, am the least formally educated one in my family. There are multiple advanced degrees amongst my siblings but, except for me, everyone has at least a Bachelors. Some went to school on scholarships, others on the G.I. Bill. Some just worked through it. If the school you go to were anymore than fractionally as important as parental involvement, we should probably all be in prison or something. Instead, we contribute as active, involved citizens. Believe what you will but, understand that I am working from personal experience here and convincing me that what happened to me and my siblings didn't really happen is going to be a pretty big job. But what the hell, try if you must.

CAFKIA

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It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.
  - William G. McAdoo

We don't have kids in Alcoa, Maryville, or any other schools.

But I have been to a couple of events at Maryville High, and was thoroughly impressed with the programs and the students and the teachers.

Well, one teacher in particular, who organized both the project/program/events we attended. He got in hot water a while back for showing Fahrenheit 911 (after school) to his English class. He took some heat, but he's still there three years later. So I give them credit for that. And Maryville city schools are highly regarded.

But then there's the whole Rebel Flag thing. But curiously, the racial tensions of late seem to be worse in county schools, where the percentage of minorities is minuscule compared to city schools or Alcoa.

So that's not much and it's not based on much but there's my 2 cents as a Blount Co. resident.

for the input. I was looking for a wide range of information & opinion, and that's what I got!

A couple of issues to clarify.....

* I wholeheartedly agree that parents are primarily responsible for the quality of their children's education, and am confident my kids will do well wherever they are - however, all things being equal, I would prefer they be in schools that have a more diverse and rigorous curricula, as well as demonstrably better outcomes.

* My aversion to WalMart has more to do with practical concerns of this particular development than how I feel about the company. Where I live now will soon be directly impacted by store lighting, increased traffic, and possibly shoppers cutting through my development. Even with all of the land available in North Knox County, MPC felt the need to re-zone a residential area to commerical. Houses were demolished for this retail project.

* I'm leaving West Knox out of the mix not out of snobbery; for various reasons that area is just not our cup of tea. I know plenty of people that live there that wouldn't live anywhere else.

* Tamara, your post had some good points, but I think equality of public education involves many different factors than simply sending kids to school by random selection. I do agree that quality schools everywhere is a worthwhile goal. In any case, a topic worthy of additional discussion!

This has always been why I would not move to Oak Ridge.

Close to the Smokies or close to massive radioactive contamination?

Tough choice.