<em>"I have seen this misunderstanding on several threads; Woodbury kids do NOT go to Northwood HS; they go to Irvine HS. One big reason I can't see myself ever buying in WB."
</em>The disparity between the quality of the "upper echelon" high schools (Northwood and Uni) vs the "lower echelon" schools (Irvine High and Woodbridge) is way overblown. Let's get straight to the point - most people here want their kids to attend a high school that gives them the best chance to matriculate to an "elite" college. And people think that if they buy in an area that feeds into Uni or Northwood, their kid will have a better chance to matriculate to Harvard than if they bought in an area that feeds into Irvine or Woodbridge. I'm here to say that it isn't the school that will determine which college your kid will attend. It's your kid.
Let's examine each of the factors that supposedly differentiate the quality between these schools. Safety, Quality of Teachers, Curriculum, Quality of Facilities, Competitiveness of Student Body.
1. Safety
All those schools have relatively safe environments so let's eliminate safety as a factor that differentiates those schools.
2. Quality of Teachers
I know for a fact that when Northwood High School started out, many of their honors and AP teachers were drawn from Irvine High's roster. In effect, when Northwood started out, the teaching talent base was equal with Irvine High. I don't know about how Irvine's and Northwood's talent base changed in recent years, but I don't think it's way out of line to assume that they are roughly equal.
3. Curriculum
Now we're starting to get somewhere. What college your kid will attend will be determine by the following criteria: SAT scores, GPA, the number of AP courses he/she takes, and his/her special talent (all-state/country sport, all-state/country instrument, publishing a substantial scientific thesis, Intel/Westinghouse STS, being a pilot, starting a non-profit ... etc - I'm not joking here - I had friends that did one or more of those things). What the school can do here is to offer a bunch of AP courses. It's up to your kid to take as many as they can and ace all of them and their corresponding AP tests. When I was in one of the "lower echelon" Irvine schools (10 or so years ago) I took 8 or 9 AP courses and all of the honors courses.
4. Quality of Facilities
This is where Northwood has a big advantage over all the other high schools, including Uni. Sure,having new facilities is nice, but the bottom line is how nice the buildings look, how much RAM is in the library computers will NOT affect your kid's academic numbers.
5. Competitiveness of the Student Body.
Ok. This is where Uni and Northwood derives their upper echelon status. They matriculate larger numbers of students to the elite colleges. But, if you look more closely, you'll also find that Uni and Northwood have more Asian students proportionally compared to Irvine and Woodbridge. I would argue that the reason why Uni and Northwood send more students to the elite colleges is not because of the competitive advantages offered by the schools, but of the inherent quality of the student body. My friends and I graduated at the top of our class in Irvine (from Irvine, Uni, and Woodbridge). I had friends from each of the high schools (Irvine, Uni, Woodbridge) matriculate into the schools such as Harvard, Caltech, Yale, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley. At the top of the class of each of the high schools, you couldn't really see a difference in the quality of the student. We all had 1500+ SAT scores, 4.0+ GPAs, etc.
While you can argue that the competitiveness of the student body would help your kid (more motivation to succeed, smarter peers), it could also hurt your kid if he/she can't handle the increased competition.
It ain't the school. It's your kid.
