Littleton, Parker, Highlands Ranch, Colorado??

[clausjo]

Hi all, I'm being transferred to the Denver area and have been told that these cities are all very nice with good schools. My husband and I will be going to Denver to look for schools, neighborhoods, etc. mid-September. Any opinions on these cities or any others would be very helpful. I don't want to be too far from my office, which is in Englewood, especially since we're south Floridians that will be moving to Denver in November!

[Mousefever]

Welcome to the sprawling metro Denver neighborhood! I'm located in the NW area (Arvada), so I don't know that much about schools in the area you are talking about. My stepson and wife in Littleton live about 10 - 15 minutes away from Englewood. There are plenty of nice neighborhoods in Littleton with homes built in the 1980's and 1990's and even more recently. The brand new homes would probably be in Highlands Ranch and Parker areas, but I admit I know very little about Parker.

Littleton is the closest area to Englewood of the 3 and Parker is the farthest away. I have a cousin in Highlands Ranch and her daughter graduated from Thunder Ridge High School. The schools in Highlands Ranch are very good for the most part. The school system is Douglas County Schools. I'm not as familiar with the other school systems in that area. One nice thing about Colorado is that there is a lot of school choice. You can "open enroll" your child at a different school within the school system if there is room. There are many charter schools as well.

The snow might be a little scary to you, coming from Florida, but here are the positives. CDOT is very good at taking care of the roads because we're used to the snow. The sun here is very strong (bring your sunscreen) so snow melts pretty quickly after a snowstorm. The snowiest month here is March, so again, the snow melts pretty quickly.

Good luck to you as you make your decisions!

Amy

[pink]

Hey there! I lived in Highlands Ranch for about 6 years (that was about 8 years ago) so I did go to public school in Highlands Ranch. I have to tell you the schools are beautiful BUT if you have children with learning disabilities or children who have trouble learning (ie: need summer school and what not) there is a bit of an issue. In 7th grade I failed math there (as most of the teachers were young and new and I was terrible in the subject) and instead of holding me back or trying to help me they just send me on to the 8th grade. The same thing happened in 3rd grade (they gave us a teacher that literally never taught us anything and would let us just fool around all day- no joke) so therefore I never learned my timestables and the school also didn't seem to care. So if you have children, watch out for them and make sure you get great teachers. As for schooling, the elementary schools all went by a track system meaning that they didn't have the traditional summer breaks and went to school all year round. From my experience the best track was B track (unless they changed up the schedule now) and the work track was D track (has the worst periods of time off).

I hope this helps.

Colorado is great because the scenery is beautiful, the mountains are not too far away and a great escape and the houses are cheaper than most other parts of the country.

A few more things:
-The high altitude. If you're from Florida I would recommend taking it easy when you first move there. There is definitley little to no humidity there- it is very dry.
- The weather. Colorado is not that cold. Like the pp said the worst months for snow are really March and April. November is cold but it is not unbearable (I was just there last November). The weather is strange there for the most part, one day it can be 60 and sunny and the next day snowy and then it will melt in 2 hours haha.

Have fun. Moving anywhere new is always an adventure!