French bilingual school in New Jersey

[tldog92]

Hello,

We are French (from Paris), and we will probably move this summer to New Jersey (office in Bridgewater). I have 3 kids (2, 6 and 8) and i am looking for french bilingual school but it is not so easy via internet. I found on the french consulat site the Lycee francais Manhattan or Larchmond and a Franco-American school in princenton (but not for my kids too young). All these schools seems for me quite far from the office (40 to 60 mi). If someone know where are located in New Jersey some french bilingual schools and ideally close from a nice place to live it will be very nice, we are a little be lost at the moment.

We would like to live not too far from Manhattan (Horoken seems nice but no school), so if you can help us it will be very kind.

Thanks a lot in advance.

T.

[Bevdeforges]

Hi, and bienvenue to the forum! (I'm an American living in France.)

Bilingual French schools in the US are generally private schools, and chances are they are fairly limited in availability. You may want to check out the following website: New Jersey/NJ Private Schools - Private School Review where you can take a look at lists of private schools in New Jersey by county. But I suspect that the French Consulate probably has a fairly comprehensive list of those schools offering a bilingual program in the New York City area.

It may be possible to find after-school French classes for your children, or some sort of play groups in the area for French speaking children, but you won't be able to find them until you're on site.

Personally, I wouldn't decide on a place to live until you get there and have a chance to see the area. Even within the same town, there can be nice areas and not so nice areas. The real estate agents usually have lots of information about the schools in each town, both public and private (as the quality of the schools directly affects the cost of housing). Also, the school district boundaries don't always coincide with the town limits - and private schools may have school buses or other transport arrangements that cover certain areas and not others.

It's normal for the employer to pay for a few weeks of living in a hotel or "suites hotel" (i.e. with a kitchen unit) or residence hotel (basically a furnished apartment with maid service). That will give you a chance to look around the area a bit, decide where you would be comfortable living and ask questions about where other people live who work at your office.

In the NYC area, you also have to consider your public transport options (especially as gasoline prices rise!), traffic patterns, proximity to shopping, schools, health care, etc. and other considerations when deciding where to live.
Cheers,
Bev

[synthia]

You also need to be there to assess the traffic. If you are going to drive your children to school, for instance, you should try the drive during the appropriate times. You should do the same before deciding where to live, too.

Someone I worked with, in another state, laughed at all our warnings when we told her the commute to her new house would be almost insupportable. She had only driven there in the evening and on weekends. Her first morning in the new house, she discovered she was, as warned, nearly an hour and a half away, not twenty minutes as she thought.

Live very close to work, if at all possible.