Magnet Madness

Sarah's mom just stopped by. I did some research on potential magnet schools for Sarah--ones with decent-to-excellent test scores within the six-mile limit for transportation. The four I found were, in order of reputation/test scores: Murray, Sheridan, Saucedo and Gunsaulus. Sarah's mom is most interested in Sheridan because it's the second closest, she knows about where it is off the top of her head, and it has good test scores. I managed to tell her it would be good to apply to all four of them at this point because she can always say no later if she gets it. She's getting the point that Sarah may not get into Orozco.

She is really worried about high school for Sarah. "This neighborhood isn't the greatest, and neither are the high schools," she said. "Richards isn't very good, is it?" [all quotations are very loosely translated from Spanish]

"No, it's not."

"I need to know more about high schools."

"Jones College Prep is very good. It's downtown, so it's not hard to get to. Whitney Young is another good one."

"Better than Juarez?" [Juarez is where her older kids went. At least one of them was in the top 10 percent there.]

"Yes," I told her. "All the students in these schools have to take an exam to get in, so they are all very intelligent."

"Oh."

"I think Sarah has the mind to go to a school like that, but I'm afraid if she stays where she is they won't prepare her well enough to go there."

"Yes! I want her to be well prepared, and I don't think they are giving her enough homework." [She used a word I didn't recognize here--often people say tarea/chores for homework, but homework or assignments or challenging stuff do seemed to be the point from the context].

So I only have two Options applications in the house and no printer. I'm going downtown tomorrow and will run off some more copies of the form. We'll fill them out over the weekend and get them in the mail Monday. Applications must be postmarked by Friday December 19.