Originally posted by daver
Ok, I have a stupid (I hope it really isn't) question. The CA schools seem to be very popular. Why is that? I have not looked at them alot because I would not consider going there, nothing against CA just dont want my kids (6 and 8) to go to public school there and cant afford private school.
Is it the sun and the beach? If only 2 schools in the top 15 are on that side of the country why are they so popular.
I certainly do not mean to offend anyone who went to public school in CA there are just some things that are acceptable there that deviate from my moral norms.
I hope I did not open a can of worms with this one, I just wanted to know what I am missing.
Well, if you look at rankings, UC schools kick ass. Also CA is a great place to live -- pretty mild weather all year (varies a lot by region though), good food (very multi-ethnic in urban areas), high standard of living for professionals.
The sun and the beach? There are 30+ million people in CA. Very few visit the beach regularly. Most go to the beach as often as people from the midwest. I mean, I live pretty close to the coast, but it takes an hour to get to a beach (the entire coastline is not sand, you know). Who is going to drive for two hours to get sand in your shoes? And if you want
constant sun, live in Arizona. CA does have mostly sunny days in the summer, but it also has a lot of cloudy and rainy days in the winter. That's the nature of our "Mediterranean" climate -- dry summer, wet winters.
CA public schools are probably better than they seem. Yes, they rank low
on average compared to other parts of the nation. We also have one of the largest immigrant and non-English and English-as-a-second-language speaking population of students in the nation -- I'm not sure how that influences the test scores. Some cities have outstanding public schools. I know my city does, as does Palo Alto (the city Stanford is located in), which is the next city to the south of mine. Palo Alto's two public high schools are better academically than most private high schools. They both ranked in US News and World Reports top 100 high schools in the nation. The quality of the schools depends on the community -- the wealthier the community, the more money there is for the schools -- just like almost anywhere else in the country. So of course there are some terrible schools in CA. There are poor communities here just like anywhere else.
I really am not sure what you mean by "there are just some things that are acceptable there that deviate from my moral norms." I'm not sure exactly what you are referring to. CA is an enormous state, with a very large population. Making generalizations about CA is like making generalizations about New England, or the South, of the Midwest. Some may be true, but most are gross misstatements. CA has some very, very liberal areas, and some very, very conservative ones. I am not going to say that CA is just like the rest of the US. Like any area, it has its own flavor and feeling. But what is seen on national news or in popular entertainment is not a accurate image of what CA really is. I mean, if I tried to guess what New York is like based on Friends, Will & Grace, and NYPD Blue, I'd have a pretty messed up idea of what New York was like. Similarly, if I tried to guess what Indiana was like based on what I knew about Indiana University and Bobby Knight, I'd also be wrong.
