[Porphy]

Hi looks like we're moving to the Halifax (or surrounding i.e. Sackville etc) area this summer! We lived there for a few years several years ago but now we have a little girl who is all set to start school in the fall. We have a FABULOUS french immersion school where we are now that we love and have been involved with through her daycare and preschool. The kindergarten room has been recently redone with diff height desks, quiet spaces and all sorts of cool things. There are smartboards in every room...I"m going to miss it.

ANYHOW, I'd like to find a great french immersion school in the Halifax area! As we are starting our house hunting now I'd like to pick the right area to house hunt in. Any suggestions?

 

[Bluegoat]

Here's a link with the different French Immersion schools in HRM, and the feeder schools. I'm afraid I have no info on the individual schools, other than LeMarchant St Thomas is popular. There are a lot of very well off families there.

http://www.hrsb.ns.ca/content/id/1015.html

 

[Alison]

In Halifax, you go to the French Immersion school that your local English school is assigned to (so, for example, if you're in the catchment for Saint Mary's or for Inglis, then you go to Lemarchant St Thomas if you want French Immersion). In Dartmouth, all French immersion kids P-6 go to Shannon Park. I wouldn't want to send my kids there--nothing wrong with the education, but it's a huge school, and I wouldn't want to live in the areas closest to it--it's between an industrial park and empty military housing, more or less. In the former county (Bedford, Sackville, Tantallon etc), there is generally at least one school in each area that does French Immersion, but it varies. When I first started working in Tantallon, they didn't have French Immersion other than junior high. Then they started in primary and are now, I think, up to grade 4 or 5 (unless I've lost count of the years, which is possible, since I don't work there anymore!).

Honestly, probably nothing in the public school system here is going to look like your fabulous French Immersion school, some of the private schools might offer French immersion options, I don't know, since that wasn't in our budget!

In the end, I opted to put The Boy into English, not French immersion, and he's going to a very small neighbourhood school, attached to his daycare and a senior's centre. I love it, and I'm happy that we made that choice, although I do still regret the French immersion sometimes.