Chattahoochee HS vs. Northview HS? (Alpharetta, Duluth: home, top schools, colleges)

[3boymama]

Does anyone know if there's much of a difference between CHS and NHS, especially in terms of college acceptances? I thought they were pretty comparable, but recently I was talking to a student from NHS and she said that she knew of a few people who were accepted Cornell and Brown, their valedictorian this year was accepted to Harvard and a student who ranked third in the class was accepted to Northwestern. When I asked her if she heard if anyone from CHS was accepted to any ivy league schools this year she said she didn't. Granted she is a NHS student, but I, too, have yet to hear of any graduate from CHS getting accepted to an ivy league, so it made me wonder. In terms of getting into an ivy league school or a top tier school up north, do more graduates from NHS get in as opposed to CHS?

Also, I also heard recently that there are some high schools who offer a "zero period" before school starts to help raise their students' GPAs. Is this true and how would that work? I noticed that NHS offers a "zero period" but CHS doesn't.

If anyone could give me some input I would really appreciate it. I currently live in the CHS school district and am considering moving into the NHS school district if it would help improve my son's chances of getting into a better school.

Thanks!

[arjay57]

I wonder why it is that so many schools in other states blow away even our top schools on the SAT?

[rcsteiner]

Originally Posted by arjay57

I wonder why it is that so many schools in other states blow away even our top schools on the SAT?

If you're talking average scores, it might be because you sometimes aren't comparing apples and apples.

In some states, all students (or almost all students) take those tests. In other states, only those who know for sure they are college-bound will take them. Different pools of students.

Also, in some areas of the country, the ACT is the preferred test for local institutions, so the only SAT scores you'll see are those students who are trying to get into more a elite school in some other area of the country. I never took the SAT, for example. Didn't have to ... my ACT score was good enough to take me anywhere I wanted to go.

I get the impression that a greater percentage of students take those tests here in Georgia, possibly because of the HOPE scholarship.

[lorilove]

Be careful when you take general statistics and compare them to Northview HS. Northview is 34% Asian student population vs. Chattahoochee 19% (and a state average of 3%)

The Asian culture and emphasis on on education drives some of those statistics.

[mrpanda]

I hit a conversation with a Asian Northview student at a Korean chicken joint in Johns Creek (The Korean KFC. He tells me that there are now more Asians than white students now in Northview. He also told me that UGA is becoming more popular among his Asian friends which I like hear

No wonder Northview HS sends 50 students to Georiga Tech while Lambert only can send 15. There are hardly any Asians in Lambert. C'mon guys.. tell your parents to move to Lambert.

Originally Posted by lorilove

Be careful when you take general statistics and compare them to Northview HS. Northview is 34% Asian student population vs. Chattahoochee 19% (and a state average of 3%)

The Asian culture and emphasis on on education drives some of those statistics.

[Tarzanman]

I had a job interacting with kids in an athletic recreational program that came from both schools. A bunch of my students were the first-ever students to inhabit Northview after it was built.

Long story short, I would say that the kids from Northview seemed to have it together intellectually a little bit more... but only by a few degrees.

I went to public schools in NYC, Fairfax county, VA and Knox county, TN. I would lump Northview and Hooch just above Knox County and lagging waaaay behind the curriculum in Fairfax county.

From my (unscientific, and relatively uninformed) observations, I would say that besides making it tougher to get into in-state colleges, HOPE seems to have caused a bit of grade inflation. Being surprised that some of my high school aged gals did not retain things that I had (in some cases) learned in middle school was a slightly-more-than-occasional occurrence.

In any case, Chattahoochee seems to have languished some as the more newly built schools (Northview, Alpharetta, Johns Creek) have matured. Johns Creek becoming its own city (these are people who used to refer to themselves as living in Alpharetta) and outshining Alpharetta as an address seems to have been the catalyst.


Regarding asians at Northview: I had not heard about asians being the 'ethnic majority', but, that school is probably the closest Fulton county HS to the city of Duluth, which is home to a lot of asians (particularly folks of Korean descent). There is actually a Super H-Mart in the shopping center that abuts Northview HS campus, so there is no shortage of asians living in the area.