Thursday, May 31, 2012

Amazing the way it all works out..

So as I have been posting on here, the search for a public (aka free) school for Amanda this year has been a long and arduous journey.  But finally this week, I can say it's OVER!  We finally have a school!

To recap, starting last November, we applied to a magnet school (you can only apply to one), then we toured the local schools in March, followed by applying to two local charter schools, and a school for advanced studies (last minute find thanks to the librarian at our local library).  As of the end of March, I was super frustrated and believed:
  1. Magnet schools were impossible to get into, with nearly 1,000 applicants for only 80 spots, a complicated points/lottery system, and limited campuses.
  2. Charter schools were impossible to get into, with lots of applicants (they couldn't tell me exactly how many) and a complicated lottery system that was supposedly random, but still gave priority to certain people.
  3. GATE and SAS programs were impossible to get into because it's hard to identify a child as 'gifted' in Kindergarten, so most schools don't even offer it until 2nd grade (so why even try?).
  4. Getting a permit OUT of LAUSD is impossible, especially since we don't work anywhere near the school districts we were considering, and we don't qualify for any of the other reasons.
  5. Getting a permit to go anywhere but our local school is impossible, as we don't qualify for any of the applicable reasons.
Yet, as of last week, we were accepted at a magnet school, a charter school, a local school not our own, AND an SAS program.  I also discovered Mike works within another (good) school district I didn't even know existed (Culver City), so we could have viably applied to get out of LAUSD if we really wanted to.

I love choices :)

In the end, we chose Playa del Rey Elementary School School for Advanced Studies (SAS) for lots of good reasons I hope we'll be happy with.  I spent yesterday calling the rest of the schools to decline their invitations to attend, which felt both scary and relieving at the same time.  I guess we'll never know for SURE if we made the right decision, but I hope we don't end up regretting it.  I am super happy to have made that decision and have it behind us though.

In other news, the same time we were getting acceptance calls, I got a call from preschool on Thursday that they had to call 911 on Kevin.  He apparently was riding those 'flinstone' like cars and ran it headlong into another kid.  It threw him from the car, did a flip and landed on his head.  Luckily I was home that day (getting our house checked so we can get solar panels installed), so I drove over and rode in the ambulance with him.  Talk about scary!  But he was fine in the end.  ER doc gave us the all clear and told me what to watch for that night.  I leave you with a picture of him strapped to the pappoosa just after we arrived at the ER.

1 comment:

Erica said...

Yay for school working out!