Homeschooling/unschooling in Portland

[Backyard Hens]

My husband is researching a job in Portland. We will only move there if he has a good job. We have a good situation and community where we are. The only reason to move is for a change in climate/politics and the fun of a new adventure.

If we do move, finding a homeschooling community, possibly one that leans towards unschooling, would be essential. How easy is that to find in the Portland area? Is one area better than another?

I would love a house on a large lot. I see plenty when I get on craigslist. (I've read about Portland's land use codes, which I think are great, I still want to live in an area with large lots.) However, are there active homeschooling groups in those areas?

The job he is looking at is downtown near the Hawthorne bridge. Right now he works 2 miles from home so we are not used to long commutes. 

I've read the other recent threads about moving to Portland, and learned some from them. However, there really wasn't much about homeschooling and that is key to where we would live.

[leahrain]

I am sorry, but cannot comment on homeschooling/unschooling. We send our daughter to Montessori school.  However, I can comment on the large lot question. We moved to Portland in August and spent 6 months diligently looking for a home on a large lot. I don't know what you consider large, but we wanted something over .33 acres. We even compromised and went down to .25 when we got desperate. We found very little. Most lot sizes out here are .14 acres. This is city living. If you want larger lot sizes, you have to move out to the suburbs, which means that you would not be living in Portland. We were unhappy with our choices as well with the overcast weather for the past 7 months, so we are moving again.

Best of luck to you. Hope someone answers your question!

Leah

[philomom]

I live in the Sw part of the city.. I do have a third of an acre.. this is considered "a big lot" in Portland. I moved into this corner of the Portland because the schools are so fabulous here. So, no I don't have any ideas about homeschooling here.

[Backyard Hens]

Thanks.

We have 5,000 square feet and I want a lot bigger than that. We don't necessarily have to live in Portland city, just within a 30 minute commute of downtown. 

I am concerned about the lack of sunshine. We live in Arizona and I don't know what it will be like to have so much overcastness (I just created that word.) However, it has long been a dream of my husband's to move to Oregon and I am supporting that. We will rent out our current house so we will always have a place to come back to.

What areas in the metropolitan area are ruralish, safe, lots of crunchy families, and within half an hour of downtown?

Thanks

[philomom]

It does rain nearly nine months out of twelve here. That's how it stays so green.

Most of the rural spots I know of are not liberal like Portland.. they get very churchy, conservative and have those Republican signs in the yard come election time.We had researched some of that before our move 5 years ago.

If you are wealthy, you might be able to pick up a double lot somewhere near town.

[Backyard Hens]

What about the Milwaukie area? I saw a place advertised for rent there. (We will probably rent our first year to figure out where we really want to live. And to make sure we like the constant cloudiness.)

[ancoda]

When we lived in the Portland area we were always in the suburbs, so I really can't say how big of a lot you could get to live on, but homeschooling is big in Portland. There are several homeschool groups on yahoo. 

It is getting late and I need to go to bed, but I will try to remember to come back and post links to some of the groups tommorow.

[karen1968]

I live in Milwaukie. While a lot of the people here are more conservative than Portland proper, it isn't ALL bad There are some large lots, and a lot that are being divided. But it's practically Portland, and only a 15 minute drive to the Hawthorne Bridge, unless traffic is really bad.

As to your homeschooling/unschooling question - there is a GREAT community here. There are a few Yahoo! groups, and the Life is Good unschooling conference is held just over the river in Vancouver, Washington and well attended by Portland families.

[foodmachine]

We are considering Milwaukie too. Is there any neighborhood that is more HS/US, green, veggie, organic, liberal, punkrock 'n' roll than any other??? Any with potential to be any of that? We have a five year plan.

[karen1968]

Ugh. I find Milwaukie in general to be far less hip, green, etc. than Portland. It is kind of hard sometimes. For example, we live on a great street with lots of kids, but three of the families take the kids out on the ATVs on weekends. One of them has a teen who rides the dirt bike up and down the street. The kids across the street asked me why I was out weeding - why didn't I just spray the weeds? That kind of thing. The people are nice, don't get me wrong! Just very...normal. :-)  There *is* a great Waldorf school here, right on the edge of "downtown" and I think the neighborhood over there is a bit more natural minded.

If you have a particular neighborhood or street in mind, I might be able to tell you more.

[XanaduMama]

We just moved to Portland last year. We're in SE, near Mt Tabor, and really love it--loads of crunchy families, plenty of homeschoolers (though we don't), and relatively affordable if you get a bit further out (we're around 64th Ave). I'm on a homeschooling email list, and it's very active--check out the Yahoo groups that a PP mentioned. I agree that the further you get outside of the city--the suburbs and the rural areas--the more conservative things tend to get. So it's a bit of a tradeoff--you might have to lose some of the space to get some of the crunchy/progressive stuff. Lots of people around here do a lot with their urban homesteads: chickens, veggie gardens, etc.

The winter was actually less painful than I'd imagined, though it definitely gets old after a while. The spring was much harder--this year was wetter and colder than usual--but the summers more than make up for it.

[foodmachine]

I really appreciate your answers. Thanks! DH has veto'd Milwaukie, so we are looking at SE Portland. Mt Tabor, Woodstock, Creston-Kenilworth. Do Mt Scott-Arleta and Brent-Darlington fit the bill less? We will need a 570 sq ft recording space (sound-proofed of course) and neighbors that are cool with that.

I'm doing 6 months of snow shoveling right now, so we may be ok with the winters. Both snow and rain lose their appeal after a few months. I'm a native NY'er. I like 3 month seasons, but I'm not moving back to NY.

School is must here, so we'll do our best for awhile since so many things are great. I may never get to HS/US thing depending on how life unfolds, but I like Portland for lots of reasons anyway. I'm off-topic now but I like the look of Pacific Crest Community School if we end up "in school".

[karen1968]

The hardest part about the winters here isn't really the rain - it's the constant cloudiness. We have very few sunny days from Nov-June. We had some great sun the past couple of weeks, but right now it's cloudy. It HAS been an unusually cool/wet late spring and early summer, though.

The sunny days we DO have in winter are spectacular, though. Brilliant blue skies and a white mountain or two in the distance - makes for great photos ;-)

[MLinPDX]

5,000 sq ft isn't really that big, my lot in the Woodstock neighborhood is over 7,000.  Many places East of 82nd Ave. have bigger lots, some much bigger.  Still only 20 minutes to downtown or Hawthorne.  Much of the Eastside is homeschooling/unschooling friendly, as are local businesses that offer homeschool classes during weekdays.  We've done science at OMSI, art and ice skating, all during the day.

I've only lived in the SE part of Portland, but most of within city limits seems pretty crunchy/lefty.  The suburbs are different.  Although there is some gang activity and random gunshots, most of the city is pretty safe most of the time.  There really isn't anywhere I wouldn't consider going if I had some reason to.

I'm originally from Seattle, so I find the 'so much clouds, what about the sun' comments kind of funny.  We've had about 10 days now of high 70's, low 80's mostly sunny weather, with 10 more days of if forecast.  I was actually thinking fondly of wearing t-shirts and jeans again when it cools down.  Yes it's often cloudy and rainy three seasons of the year, but the rain is often just intermittent drizzle that barely gets you wet, the temperature is still comfortable, and it rarely freezes or snows.  We don't have tornadoes, blizzards, sand storms, dust storms, or wildfires threatening the city.  You don't need air conditioning and if you have a small house you can get by with just a wood stove for heat.

I love Portland.

-- ML