This is a fascinating article, Brian, and a whole other perspective on children and cities.
As a Realtor, I can tell you that in University City in the recent past, it was a lack of schools perceived as "good" which kept families with children from moving here - not a lack of other amenities for families. Also, when couples already living here decided to have families, they generally made plans to move when kindergarten time approached. Day care is excellent in our area; they would stay through the day care years and then move to the burbs. So, we had no children because we didn't have good schools - just the opposite of what the NY Times is saying about these other cities, where they don't have families because of the price of houses, because houses are too small, etc. The Alexander School has changed thinking about public school in UC, and now, families with children - even couples with no children YET, but planning ahead - are eager to live here - but as we've all seen, the school and other factors have caused our housing prices to rise, so the NY Times article might be giving us a preview of what could be the future for UC. Yet, we know from our past, that without a school called "good," families left, so it's hard to figure out what WOULD work to keep families in a city neighborhood.
Thinking about it from that point of view, if they are having skyrocketing house prices (translation: more people paying more city taxes), why can't they keep the schools open and have smaller classroom sizes? Surely that would be attractive to families.
I find it awfully hard, though, to believe that the schools in Seattle, Boston, Honolulu, Portland, Miami, Denver, Minneapolis, Austin and Atlanta are all "good" schools with a lack of students. If the education systems in all of these cities has figured out how to have "good" city schools, surely some of that knowledge would make its way to Philadelphia so we could improve ours?
These are just a couple of quick thoughts. Maybe we can have a good discussion on this topic.
Melani Lamond
