Panhandle Annex and Stege Elementary in Richmond

We are considering putting an offer in on a house at the Panhandle Annex and the assigned school is Stege Elementary school, we've checked it out on Great schools but would love to hear about others experiences.

Does anyone have any experience with Stege elementary school? 

Does anyone live at the panhandle Annex and have any insight to the neighborhood, safety, etc?

Thanks all!

Jen

Parent Replies

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Yes,I have experience and no,I would not do it.Probably not allowed to say more.

 There is a new principal there and we are hopeful.  I think this review is very truthful. 

https://www.yelp.com/biz/stege-elementary-school-richmond

There are 5,662 elementary schools in California. Of those, Stege ranks 5,650. It is a difficult environment for children to learn in. It can be hard to get transfers to other schools, but WCCUSD has some charter schools so that might be a possibility if you decide to buy the house. 

You may also want to consider the West County Mandarin School in Richmond. It's a traditional public school that draws from the entire West Contra Costa Unified School District. Here's the PTA's website for the school: https://wcmspta.org/  There's also a facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/wccusdmandarinimmersion/

My son goes there, and we love it!

We live a block away from Stege and requested a transfer but didn’t get it. We were 2nd on the waitlist for Kensington Hilltop but still didn’t get a spot.  Beta Caliber Academy is a Richmond charter school I’ve heard some positive things about but don’t have personal experience.We ended up going private. 

I would love to see people from community volunteer at Stege.The Teachers there are overwhelmed and most do not stay for more than a year.Sadly there are children there with drug addicted parents,parents in jail,and many other traumatic situations that no child should face.Teachers have to spend a lot of time on classroom management.Having at least one other adult in each classroom,as often as possible would make a difference.

Stege serves a lot of very low-income children and families. One of our school board members recently raised the issue of turning the campus into a district-run charter or otherwise changing its structure dramatically, which as a parent in a different low-income school in the WCCUSD, I would support. Timing and overall support for that is not clear. However, if you buy a house in the Stege feeder zone while planning to not send your child there, that is bolstering the larger community dynamic around gentrification - taking advantage of the lower housing prices while buying your way out of the public services offered is very problematic even before you factor in any racial dynamic at work.