Is This a Good School?

Forest Hills School district is one of the best around, blue ribbon schools. The schools are fine for a normal child without any learning disabilities, but have trouble helping special needs.

I know absolutely nothing about the school, but I wanted to point something out to you ....the teachers that you ran in to in the school were there on their own time. Teachers are not paid for their time at school during the summer setting up their classrooms or meeting with eachother to prepare for the year. Chances are if all of the 3rd grade teachers were in one room they were having a meeting to prepare for the year and you were interupting them. Although it is not nice that they were rude about it, but it is something you might want to keep in consideration.

I don't know if that is a good school, either, but here are some thoughts. My mom has been an elementary school teacher for years, and here are a few things I've picked up on:

The teachers are definitely there on their own time before school starts, and they have tons of things to do before the first day of school. They have to get their classrooms ready, clean everything, put up bulletin boards, run off a million copies, go through curriculum, meet with other teachers, put their schedule together and make out their lesson plans, put kids' names on everything (while their class list keeps getting changed), make up fliers for kids to bring home, do a lot of shopping (out of their pocket) to get their room ready, figure out a seating arrangement, and attend meetings, among other things. It is unfortunate that they were rude, but they were probably just busy. Many schools have an open house day where you and your child can go meet the teacher, see the room, and ask questions. If they don't have an open house, and don't send you information ahead of time, you could always call the teacher after school starts to make an appointment to meet with them to address any questions you might have.

Hi C.! Welcome to the neighborhood! I live in the Summit Estates neighborhood and my son is going to attend the Early Childhood program at Summit Elementary this fall - both of my nephews also attend there K and 1st grades. I've heard nothing but good stuff about them. As far as IHM - I don't really know much about the school, my previous neighbor's children attended there, but I didn't know them that well. We have attended church there on occasion and it's just really big! I'm a sahm too and my daughter is 17 mos old - interested in any playdates? Hope you find what you're looking for!

H. M

That's such a shame you experienced that. I know very little about Catholic schools in that area anymore, but I taught 20 years ago at McNick High School. I taught w the Arch-Diocese of Cincy for 20 yrs total. I'm a non-Catholic, and I don't mean to offend anyone's religion, but even as a worker, I just never did get what people saw in the Catholic schools besides the religion classes....or to get their kid(s) out of Cincinnati Public. Anderson / Forrest Hills is reputed to be a fine school district. They have many choices and opportunities to offer kids in the way of electives and extra-curricculars. You can't usually get that in a Catholic school. Good and bad, rude and nice teachers are everywhere. (True for all professional areas) Do look into the options of your nice, suburban school district, which we all in Hamilton County pay for dearly with our tax dollars whether we send our children there or not. P.

I've heard nothing but good things about both schools. The Forest Hills School District has an "excellent" rating by the state of Ohio. If money is an issue, I would send my kids to Summit. That way you won't have to pay the 3,000 for tuition at I.H.M.!