Thanks to everyone for your help ! 
Posted on 11/26/2002 6:46:50 PM PST by MeekOneGOP
FReeper moving to D/FW area needs input on area Churches & Schools
Not for myself, but for FReeper getmeouttaPalmBeachCounty_FL, whose spouse is military and being reassigned. Their family will relocate to the Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas area and wishes to establish themselves. Since I am not a wealth of information regarding the schools and churches, I suggested that I could try to help by posting a "vanity" article to seek help from the good FReepers in the D/FW area that were familiar with the schools and churches and could provide helpful input.
Here is a note I received from getmeouttaPalmBeachCounty_FL regarding her needs, etc...
I would love any information on Christian and/or Catholic schools that are known for their strong emphasis in Biblical teaching. Churches of the same mindset, as well; very community & fellowship oriented (as dh is gone a lot, and I could definitely use some like-minded friends, and even some help with my children at times).
After finding these two things, I would then like info on home builders, family-oriented neighborhoods, wonderful parks, etc...
If I had to move tomorrow, what I have found so far leads me to the west-southwestern part of Plano, north Carrollton area, I suppose. So far, what I have read about, I am really interested in Carrollton Christian Academy. I would love some personal experiences regarding this area and/or school, if anyone has had them.
I really appreciate your help! We are facing the possible activation of dh's military status, and would like to move within the next 6 months in order to take advantage of low interest rates. I keep elaborating, but I'll spare you.
Folks can private mail me, or arrange this however you see best.
Thank you so much!
Thanks to everyone for your help !
Places to not live: Euless, South Ft Worth, South Dallas, Oak Cliff, West Ft Worth is ok just not near anything, Irving, Richardson, Dallas (except maybe north east)
Have them give me a freep mail if they want any more information.
May I suggest Denton County. Denton probably has more republicans than most counties in Texas.
North Carrollton http://www.ci.carrollton.tx.us is nice and the town is well established so some of the concerns a rapidly growing town faces Carrollton has already overcome. In North Carrollton is the Prince of Peace School http://www.popcs.net And, we have friends that attend Covenant Church in Carrollton and they have a school associated with the church. http://www.starsaha.org
Another town lots of folks overlook is The Colony. It is pretty much the size it will be (residentially) and this insures the hometown feel will remain. The town has a good mix of housing prices which allows people of all positions in life to interact. They also are right on Lake Lewisville and have two golf courses. http://www.ci.the-colony.tx.us
I believe based on the extreme rate of growth and knowing folks who live there and are now regretful they moved there I would avoid Frisco. Frisco has grown so fast they have lost their small town feel. They are struggling with building the infrastructure to keep up with the growth. Recently passed an enormous bond to keep up with growth (to include work force housing). Also, the traffic into Frisco is dreadful at the end of the day and trying to get out in the morning is not the way to start one's morning. There is also a 'keeping up with the Jones' attitude among some of those who reside in Frisco.
Highland Village is nice.
Just remain in Denton County.
God's Speed!
Indeed I do, first let me say;
Welcome to the real American spirit TEXAS, not just a state, but a state of mind!
With few exceptions, your going to love the people, places, and things in this state.
I lived in an area about 40 miles north of Dallas, if that is your destination.. Freep me!!
I agree completely with not living in Useless, I mean Euless, but totally disagree with your opinion of South Fort Worth.
First off, for all you foreigners out there (i.e. anyplace outside of Texas), Fort Worth is where the West began, and Dallas is where the East...peters out!
The South West side of Tarrant County (Fort Worth) is a great place to live---and DRIVE in. Unlike driving ANYWHERE in crowded Dallas or in the hectic North East part of Tarrant County, the traffic is MUCH LESS on the South West side of town---except the Hulen St. area...and they're building a Krispy Kreme shop just North of Hulen at Grandbury Rd.
BELIEVE ME...you will get to work in just a FRACTION of the time in SW Fort Worth than pretty much ANYWHERE else in the DFW area. And the drivers and shoppers are MUCH friendlier in SW Fort Worth than ANYWHERE else in the DFW area.
I've been to MANY different Churches: Disciples of Christ, Catholic, Baptist, Morman, Methodist, Presbyterian (sp?), and Episcopal. I've even been to Jewish services and Messianic Jewish services (the Messianic Jewish services are actually kind of neat).
The best Church I've EVER found is SOUTHCLIFF BAPTIST CHURCH, located at I-20 at Granbury Rd---BAR NONE!!! I think there are something like 30 different types of ministries, e.g. for disabled kids (and respite nights for their parents 2x/month), unplanned pregnancy help, shut-ins, foreign and domestic missionaries, etc.
There is a a beautiful sounding FULL ORCHESTRA pretty much every Sunday---not canned music. There are some of the best singers I've heard in a Church. There is a FELLOWSHIP among the Church Members that I have longed for all my life...If you need help, the Members are right there for you!
And the Paster is fantastic! I remember sermons from when we first attended (2 years ago or so). Check it out: http://www.southcliff.com. And if you're going to be in town on 12/04, 12/07, or 12/11, FReep Mail me and you can come to our FANTASTIC SINGING CHRISTMAS TREE program...I've got some extra tickets, but they go fast. God is definately present at that program!
And last, but not least, there is a political saying that "As goes Tarrant County, so goes Texas and so goes the Nation." I've found it to be true for years.
If you are looking for a private secular school, Fort Worth Country Day School http://www.fwcds.org/public.shtml and archrival Trinity Valley School http://www.trinityvalleyschool.org are VERY close, VERY good and VERY highly thought of.
I went to public schools and private schools and ended up graduating from FW Country Day. It sure made college MUCH, MUCH easier! In fact, I didn't appreciate FWCDS nearly as much until I went to college.
It states that: "Twenty-nine percent of the [FWCDS] Class of 2002 earned recognition in The National Merit Programs. This class includes two of the state’s 28 Semi-finalists in the Presidential Scholars Program. The average SAT of this exceptional class is 1300. Twenty percent of the class earned one or more top scores of 800 in a section of the SAT or SAT II Achievement Tests or a top score in one or more sections of the PSAT, totaling 27 perfect scores."
WOW!!! I'm impressed!
That's pretty a high roller area, for the most part. Some more affordable housing, but still in nice neighborhoods can be found in both the Plano and the Carrollton-Farmers Branch districts. Try to stay out of Dallas County, which puts you in the more northern reachs of Carrollton, and probably into Lewisville-Colony school district. Plano ISD has it's good and it's bad points. They have a strange high school/senior high school setup. 9-10 are high school, with 11-12 being Senior High School. That too has it's advantages and disadvantages. Several 2-3 high schools feed each Senior High School. I think the main reason they did it was to have a large group of older boys to pick a football team from, but it has some academic advantages too. It means that the Sr. Highs can offer a broader range of courses, including not only those for "brains" but also more for those not going to college, or not needing higher math and science courses, although they have those in abundence. The downside is that it's a very cliqish environment and one with lots of competition for it's own sake, as opposed to productive competition. My wife is a teacher educator and we moved away from their the year before our oldest would have gone into high school, so I guess that gives you her overall opinion of the Plano ISD. At first she, the daughter, thought she'd been cheated, as the district we moved into was not nearly as highly rated academcially. Now, after 4 years of college, 3 of law school, one of Americorps, plus 1 1/2 years working, she thinks we did the right thing.
The advice to find a smaller town away from the main metro area was a good, but it's practicallity depends on where one is going to have to work. Commuting from way out is no fun, and it takes up time you should be spending with your kids, I know because while I started commuting from nearly Oklahoma to McKinney (county seat of the county to the northeast of Dallas) 30-35 miles, I ended up commuting into Dallas (barely) 55 miles one way, with several years commuting in between to Plano were I'd started, about a mile from our former house. If you need to be in the Plano area, the east side of town seems to be more low key and still offers many nice, if somewhat less ostentatious, neighborhoods, with a nice park and both high schools and a Sr. high on that side. If one were working in the Plano area, I'd recommend McKinney, Frisco or at least Allen for a place to live. Frisco is just north of western Plano, while Allen is north of eastern Plano, with McKinney being north of Allen. Celina, well north of Frisco and west of McKinney is fairly well thought of for a far suburban/semi-rural district. Can't help you with Churchs, in part because you don't indicate what denomination or "flavor" of church you are interested in. Plenty of them in the area though. From the big Baptist ones, to smaller evangellical varieties as well as Catholic, both main stripes of Lutheran, Methodist, Episcopal, etc, etc. Even some synagoges, all three major types, and a very few mosques. I don't even know where any of the later are in that general quadrent of greater Dallas, but I do know where a couple of Synagoges(sic) are. I think there are a few Hindu temples in the general vicinity, one of them being in Carrollton, IIRC.
That was in the 80's, and has now been surpassed by another suburb. Plano does have the stigma of the most teenage heroin overdoses in the 90's, though.
I'll second that motion. My daughter now lives in SW Fort Worth, and she and her fiancee both love it. They call Forth Worth,"Austin for grown ups", with it's more laid back, but not party til you drop, atmosphere. Even though she works in downtown FW, she doesn't find the commute to be particularly gruesom, at least not at what seems to me like O_Dark_Thirty, but is really near the very begining of "Rush hour", such as it is in Cowtown. (That's a term of endearment BTW, not derision) I suspect the first poster meant "due south" Fort Worth, which is definitely not a good area, but it's not overly large, stay between SW and WNW from downtown, avoiding the first mile or two away from downtown,and it's a pretty nice area, as are the suburban/ex-urban towns in that general vicinity, including due those nearly due south of downtown but outside and separted from Ft.Worth itself.
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