Private, Catholic education has been dying in Pennsylvania for a long time.

The Catholic Church would not subsidize their members for schooling. PA public schools let Catholic kids out for “selective education”.

The most robust Catholic schools are urban/semi-urban. The charter schools are crazy and incompetent.

If you want Catholic education, that’s mostly urban/semi-urban.

Catholic school. Have you been following the news at all?

With regards to?

I should add-school safety is our top priority. The shootings in america are nuts. We have lived in america 10 years, things like this just dont happen in Canada.

Not many good Catholic schools in the rural areas. Try Potter County Wellsboro or Coudersport.

You are unaware of the pedophelia rampant in the catholic church? You aren’t concerned that your own children could become victims as well?

Check out Wayne County. Honesdale and surrounds.

Im not sending them to a seminary. Im weary of the public education system. In Canada public and catholic schools are equally funded by taxpayers. Private schools are few and far between. Only difference in catholic schools in canada is uniforms in high school, and you have a religion class once a day. This is what we are used to/expect.

We want small class sizes, and a very safe school. Don't know if that exists in america..

Wayne and Pike look very nice!

Not without looking very, very closely,

Over and over again, for me, The catholics I’ve met are the meanest people I’ve met so not a good choice imho

My aunt's catholic high school had a shooting in Central PA in the early 2000s. They happen in catholic schools as well.

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St John Neuman in Williamsport is respectable, but very small. The north part of Lycoming County may have enough "mountain" for you.

What region are you talking about? Most of the state is mountainous, including cities like Pittsburgh. You seem to be talking about the northern part of the state, which is the most rural, but even then PA Wilds has difference with the Endless Mountains. I would say finding a place with a lot of land and not many people is easy, as is finding a catholic school, but finding an area with both will be more difficult. I'd say Centre County/Happy Valley or the Southern Alleghenies might be your best best if you want to avoid oil and gas and live in a rural mountainous area.

Also bullying in Catholic schools, there's more ways that kids get hurt than guns

Thanks for the suggestion. I am talking about the north east part, found a few very nice homes in bradford county-towanda and sayre. Im not necessarily against oil and gas..i work in the powertrain industry, but always hear about contaminated wells with fracking. On the other hand, if the well didnt go bad within a few months of a drill site, it will probably be fine..? This may be one of those things like school shootings…its not a problem till it is a problem.

See, it was opposite where i grew up. The public high schools always had fights, drugs, cops..not too often at my catholic school…

Its not that we require a “catholic” private school. Small class sizes, security, good education are what we are after.

Im aware were trying to have our cake and eat it too..

I'm in Tioga County and anyone who wants to send their kids to Catholic school up here is hauling them to Elmira NY every day. That's the only Catholic high school in the area.

Nope. We don't have Catholic schools.

Let me be clear I’m not trying to downplay it at all but incidences like that the availability heuristic makes it feel more likely than it really is. Sort of like plane crashes. The chances of any particular school having an incident is astronomically low.

Dude don’t listen to these people. Nobody is saying it isn’t an issue but largely do to anti-Catholic bias in America they make it seem a lot bigger than it actually is. We’ve seen incidences and cover ups in all institutions. Police, medical services, sports, and other religious denominations.

The Laurel Highlands are beautiful. It's in the south western part of pa & is about an hour south of Pittsburgh. I live in the woods but if I drive out to the main road you can usually see the city. My point being we have some amazing views. People travel here for the fall foliage, as well as the ski resorts. The area I live in is rural, the towns that are near by are small with a lot of farms. There's at least a few catholic schools I can think of. This area is Westmoreland County, a little further up the mountain is Somerset County.

Potter and Tioga are beautiful places to visit but they are really out there in the sticks. Long drives to Williamsport or Elmira for things you can find or access in the bigger towns likes Wellsboro or Mansfield.

Thanks will look there too!

What do people in Tioga do like for work? I’m guessing commuting to Williamsport is somewhat common? I used to spent a lot of time there as a kid and teenager in the 90’s a family friend had a cabin. It was maybe a mile off 414 in Morris Twp IIRC.

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You may find what you’re looking for in the area around Jim Thorpe, which is on the edge of the Poconos. Catholic education is still pretty strong in that area with Marian Catholic High School.

No neighbors in view?

Move to Alaska.

Plenty of 10-50 acre parcels where i am and the properties i saw in PA where you dont see anyone in view..

I have seen some nice homes in poconos area!

Care to explain further? What do you mean by not very family? What do you mean by not nice?

Indeed we will be taking our rv to potential areas for a week trip early summer to scout locations.

I don't know what relevance parcel size in your current location has to do with your desire to find big acreage in PA. And you want a log cabin on top of a mountain with big acreage. My impression is that those properties are either state owned or already taken.

Not sure how anyone on top of a mountain can avoid seeing the landscape, including the people who live there.

20+ with mixed clear and wooded is ok for us. Enough that you dont see neighbors looking out your kitchen window. Fine seeing a property in the low lands thats 2 miles away..

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Lol please don’t come here, for several reasons

Constructive comment. Why?

Because you’re chasing something that doesn’t exist. That’s the nice version of what I would like to say.

Do you think what i am chasing exists, somewhere? And where is “here”? Id like to hear your full take and experiences to this concluding thought.

We currently live half hour from Flint. People hear that and think we live in a wasteland, where in reality it couldnt be further from the truth.

No, I don’t and I think your comments make you sound pretty naive. You can be weary of the public school system here all you want but a) catholic schools aren’t somehow magically immune to these issues, in fact I would argue they have the same issues plus others, and b) such a school that is 100% safe just doesn’t exist. “Here” being the entirety of Pennsylvania.

“I’m aware we are trying to have our cake and eat it too” - so I guess you’re at least a little self-aware after all.

If you read my opening remarks, youll see that we are from canada, and the american school system is foreign to us, being that our oldest is just going to start this september. All i have to go on is anecdotal evidence from people we know that have similar age children, which are only a handful. And what you read in the internet has to be taken with a large scoop of salt as everyone has an opinion, from all areas and walks of life..

I ask about “here” as im sure life and education/environment in philly is different than a valley in bradford.
I mentioned we are near flint. Life in flint and quality of education is a polar opposite of what its like in my little town, 30 miles away.

Yes I am naive to life in PA. I have never been, just drove through the mountain regions of southern NY, looked beautiful. And the homes, land in PA look gorgeous as well.

Lol why am i getting down voted for this and anytime i bring up catholic religion?

Yes, on a statistic level i agree. America also has 11x the population of canada so the chance of literally any event (robbery, murder, car accident) is 11x higher.

Some commute to Williamsport or New York, a lot of people I know work at the hospital and local care homes. I work for the county itself at 911 and if that is your bent we are hiring.

>youll see that we are from canada

To be frank, Many of us would are dying to have an easy path to Canada, or just out of the US. Every election cycle I need to make sure my family is prepped to flee PA to a blue state, and possibly the country if it goes really south.

My advice, go back to Canada, it's going to get worse before it gets better here.

>lol why am i getting down voted for this and anytime i bring up catholic religion?

A few reasons. The catholic church is corrupt to its core. We know nothing from scripture is true, at best its legend is greatly exaggerated, just from archeological evidence. The abuse and issues that are rampant in the Catholic church.

That's probably not it though, this is very, very deep evangelical territory. Evangelicals don't consider Catholics Christians and often view them as poorly as other religions.

If the real estate market and job prospects werent a wasteland...we would.
The average home price in toronto now is well over a million dollars and you need 200k income to qualify for a mortgage.
Sure toronto is a prosperous city...but houses are still near a million bucks 6 hours away where the major employer is tim hortons and a home hardware.
The same kind of jobs (of which there are 1/20th that are here) pay roughly 30% less while getting taxed more than 15%+ more than here., and sales and carbon tax is another 20% on much of the commodities you buy, gasoline, natural gas, oil.

Home prices and salaries were totally normal and inline 10 years ago. I don't understand how anyone survives there now as a new resident or new home buyer...

No one is surviving here either. Sure, you can move out to the boonies with terrible schools like you are asking about and get property and a house for dirt cheap, but unless you work remotely, good luck affording anything.

This is the only way we are considering the move. I have a good remote job, can work it as long as its within US territory.
the PA geography looks much more pleasing to us than MI boonies (and MI land tax is outrageous!) We are somewhat bound by proximity to family...otherwise we'd be in some real mountains out west.
NY state is very nice too but..to hell with their taxes on taxes and front plates on cars.

If I had the means, I'd take NY over PA any day. College provided for kids? Most won't ever save that much on taxes.

If you are *really* concerned with schools, Northern Baltimore County is a superb public school area, it's an expensive, but wonderful area, and can likely fit your needs. I can't think of anywhere in rural PA that even comes close.

Thank you for your input.
What do you mean by "College provided for kids?"

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As it stands, with several limitations, kids in New York state get full tuition covered by the state, up to 125k. Hell, most adults can take advantage of it too.

That alone covers the increased taxes for most individuals.

https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/taking-action/attorney-general-shapiro-details-findings-of-2-year-grand-jury-investigation-into-child-sex-abuse-by-catholic-priests-in-six-pennsylvania-dioceses/

This. Schools arent terrible either.

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You and everyone else

Did you now follow the Canadian news on mass graves of native children near Catholic Churches? As a person who grew up Catholic and now abhors this institution I can’t fathom why anyone would think anything Catholic is ok.

That you know of

Iamsaucerkraut obviously hasn’t spent time looking at land for sale or they’d know it’s very possibly to get what you’re after in PA. Not cheap but possible

OP looking for no shootings - Bishop Neuman had one in the early 2000s.

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I think you need to do a Tioga AMA for all of the Southern Pa people!

I don't know if I'm the best candidate for that... We moved up here from Chester County in 2005. I'm originally from SE PA with a long detour in South Jersey. I can tell you what I like better up here... And what I find frustrating, I guess.

It’s not tantrums. There’s staggering amount of documentation regarding abuse and yet people think it’s a tantrum. ‘not every priest is a pedophile’ is always the usual counter argument and that’s actually true. The problem is when you have an organization going above and beyond to cover all this stuff up for CENTURIES. Abuse of children, genocide of tribal peoples in America, Africa, Australia, corruption and just the cheer amount of money that has been used to pay for churches, mega cathedrals, TV ads and abuse settlements. All the money that could’ve been put towards something meaningful. But yes. It’s Reddit throwing tantrums. Open your eyes. In my personal experience I had an education through Catholic schools. I wasn’t abused but i was bombarded with some BS regarding gay people, sex before marriage and saving yourself as a woman for your husband. What a load of crap that turned out to be.

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do tell

lol why is this getting downvoted now?? You mad i want to be away from people? unreal. Im a loud person working on cars and fabricating late into the night. I don't want to piss off Jim and Bob.|smh

Just because it wasn’t your experience it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen to other people. It’s like saying that ‘hurricanes aren’t that bad, my house is still standing’ when hundreds of others suffer the aftermath of one.

Just bc you, some random person, had a great experience, does not mean that that is everyones experience, and this article shows that you got lucky. Also just bc you didnt see it occur doesnt mean it didnt. Get real

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Yes you did. “And nothing like that occured here” Direct quote from you. You dont know that. You cant guarentee that.

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In the parent comment to my comment you said “and nothing like that occurred here” thats when you said it didnt happen to other people. Just so u/jotkave has receipts

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6 months of cold. 6 months of heat and humidity. Damp and moldy

You’re making that statement as to mean that because it wasn’t your experience it can’t that of others. Or why else would you say that? Either way I’m not going to waste my time on this anymore. Go be a Christian but at least don’t feel like you have to hide behind whatever this account of yours is.

So? You obviously still stand behind it.

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Nah youre dirty deleting.

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> found a few very nice homes in bradford county-towanda and sayre.

 
They're cheap for a reason. You get what you pay for.

Going to second this, my dad's family relocated from New Jersey to Bradford County in the 1970s and I grew up visiting that area frequently. The people are, uh, clannish to say the least.

This one was definitely not cheap..

As you claimed you never said that. Who’s the one lacking any kind of comprehension? Just because you deleted it now doesn’t mean that our comments right after you said it weren’t valid. So salty for a person who’s no longer Catholic. Got sip some tears of repent.

It's very easy to get methamphetamines in the Laurel Highlands, too, and selling them is one of the few career options there.

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Then you're getting ripped off. There's absolutely nothing up there. The land is essentially worthless.

Have you ever heard of auto correct? You’re right. We’re all wrong. Maybe you should go to confession this weekend. Can’t take communion with a mouth full of lies.

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> The most robust Catholic schools are urban/semi-urban.
 

The most robust anything, anywhere, is urban/semi-urban. Goods and services go where the customers are.
 
If you're choosing to live in a place like Bradford County, you're choosing to do without some things. It's a game of trade-offs. My grandmother owned a beautiful plot of land up there but when she died we sold it, because I'd never live there.

For someone who doesn’t believe you’re pretty butt hurt about people criticizing that filthy institution.

In my experience, people who want to "live away from other people" or "move to small town areas that share my values" are usually racists or weirdos.
 
This is America and you have every right to be a racist or a weirdo cultist, but people will judge you accordingly.

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No one owes the OP answers.

guess you know some weird people then.
Kind of hard to keep and work on heavy equipment and also have a hobby farm in the suburbs..

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Except it ain't, you can drive twenty minutes out of Pittsburgh and find working farms. https://traxfarms.com/

Ask a public question, get a public answer. That's life. You've got a right to raise your kids any way you'd like, and I've got a right to speak my mind.
 

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You certainly are.

ok...so why didnt you just say that in the first place instead of making some weird comments.that is what I am ooking for.20+ acres, limited restriction land, mountain views.But ill tell you...I havent seen anything like that currently for sale 20 mins outside of pittsburgh thats 1m or less.

The proximity to NYC keeps housing values elevated up there. I know a few people who live in NEPA and work in NYC. Their jobs provide them with hotels or apartments during the week.

See this is the insight I am looking for. Opinions of people from these areas. This is constructive feedback in my opinion.

Nah youre the one still here insisting that you had a great experience at some nameless catholic school and then insisted no one at that school ever got molested there. If you didnt still stand behind it, youd stop commentingn promoting catholic instituions.

I'm talking Bradford County because I have specific experience with it. It isn't very close to NYC.

Ahh.. my bad

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Nah im having a great day. If you recongise that you wouldnt continue to promote them. Imagine you told OP to send his kid to this specific school and then while theyre at that school, they get molested. Still confident your experience, that happened however many years ago, matters?

PA is a big state. But OP is looking in a limited area - just a few counties.

But you are correct: only you have ever spent time looking at land for sale.

>You are unaware of the pedophelia rampant in the catholic church?

Don't be an uninformed bigot. Today's Catholic Church is not the unaccountable Catholic Church of yesterday.

The one Catholic you've met is not representative of all Catholics.

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School violence does not happen in Canada? That's a lie.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/student-violence-data-reporting-1.5331967

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MastriaNO fans populate reddit. They hate Catholics. But you'll find plenty of Mastro worshipers in northern PA. Just put the sign out in your yard and they'll welcome you with open arms. They'll like you even better if you talk shit on the public schools.

School shootings i said. Everyone everywhere gets an ass whooping.We just had Oxford shooting last year, now MSU. Downvote all you want, school shootings are very, very rare in Canada.

>Doesn't really matter what you think.

Yet, here he is, criticizing you for your thoughts.

>The catholic church is corrupt to its core.

Bigots are bigots to the core.

Maybe you should reconsider PA. Try northern New England.

If your kids are smart and they grow up in NY, they have a good chance of getting into Cornell - NY's land grant school that is also an Ivy League school. A number of SUNY schools are top notch as well.

thank you for the insight.

Yeah the Cambria / Blair / Bedford / Somerset area is what OP is describing. About 2 hrs to most of Pittsburgh, on average, with Altoona and Johnstown in there for your Walmart-level needs. I don't necessarily recommend it but it does tick all your boxes, OP.

They arent that great, either.

And what exactly do you think the job prospects and real estate market are doing pretty much everywhere in the US right now? You sound incredibly clueless.

Believe me no one is obssessed with you. You keep saying you had a good experience over and over again. Thats a recommendation. No one is putting words in your mouth, we are taking them directly from your previous comments.

You clearly havent spent time looking for work in my field and don't pay attention to the canadian real estate market. Thats fine, i wouldnt expect you to.Real estate all over US is coming down, sales are still happening for solid pricing. I know this due to sales in my zip code. I see this as I watch prospective properties in areas I like. When they cut the price to a level Id feel comfortable with, others agree and listing goes pending. There is also a ridiculous amount of engineering work in MI, along with now-remote. The pay is also ever increasing in my field.

Canadian real estate prices are not coming down. Will they? maybe, i dont have a crystal ball. They have continued to go up until about December 2022. Now they are stagnant. Yet, somehow..people are still buying. i don't know where they get the money from.I mentioned earlier, the job prospects in my field in Canada are 1/20th of the availability as they are here. Cross border remote work is extremely rare due to taxation and business structures so that option is out for me.

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See thats where our differences lie. I never said anything about any schools other than providing a source that says the catholic churches in PA have a proven history of molestation. Im not making recommendations or standing up for a specific school system. You are.

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Then move back to Canada. You want a utopia that doesn’t exist in America. It doesn’t in Canada either but whatever you wanna tell yourself.

Yeah but op isnt going to find a good school is the mountains. All of the states top schools are urban or suburban, and idk if there are any topp 100 SDs in the mountains. Philly, pitt, lancaster, a couple around harrisburg.

Stay away from isolated communities

There are pedophiles in all groups of people. Look at all the teachers being arrested in public schools across the Country.

Public school teachers are not only grooming children, they are raping them . Every day there is another story about a public school teacher molesting a student.

Are Southern Columbia or Lewisburg considered mountain districts? Top 50.

Fundamentalist preachers are indoctrinating, grooming and raping parishioners and the children of parishioners.

Whatever "grooming" means, the fundies are doing it, too.

Compare the number of pedophiles in the Catholic church to the ones in public schools and get back to me.
 
The Catholic church deliberately and intentionally shielded pedophiles by moving them to different schools and dioceses for decades in the US.

As a former Catholic, I've got no horse in this race, but are you aware of all the sex scandals that are happening with protestant "Youth Pastors" hooking up with teenagers in their Youth Groups?

It's also rampant in a lot of the higher-control religions like JW, Mennonites, Amish, etc. It's everywhere.

Yeah dude why would I spend time looking for work in your field when I don’t even know what field that is? Must be one that doesn’t require understanding of basic punctuation or grammar, apparently. Catholic school graduate? High quality education, clearly.

I see there are some issues in Canada I was unaware of, but you seem to be pretty uninformed about issues happening in the country where you currently live. Good luck I guess.

Im typing on my phone, dont care about grammar on a message board. Every single place on earth has its own issues, pick which are the least of the evils you are willing to deal with.

Idk if theyre considered in the mountains but only Lewisbrug is top 50 at #42. Southern columbia is ranked #209.

I'm just east of Jim Thorpe.

Some are nice, many others not so much. Some neighborhoods are nice and others are dumps.

Do your homework carefully if moving to the Poconos.

I get it. YOU are anti Catholic, pro Government schools. BTW those crimes mostly happened decades ago and more of them have been defrocked. Crimes against children in our public schools are happening NOW every day.

> pro Government schools.
 

Here's the keyword to let you know this guy is a nut, the right wing nutjobs call public schools "government schools."
 
> Crimes against children in our public schools are happening NOW every day.

 
The Catholic church systematically enabled child molestation and covered it up.

And the left is ANTI CATHOLIC everything.

Public schools ARE Government schools and anything and everything run by the government is inept .

Child molestation - okay as long as it isn't the goddamn gubbermint doing it.

Different surveys; different metrics.

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Niche.com is considered the authority. Their scores are based on Academics, Teachers, Clubs & Activities, Diversity, College Prep, and Administration. Its why theyre the go to. What list are you using?

All the best on your search.

Honestly a PA AMA for each region would be kinda fun, I have no clue was Eastern PA is like

More like 20 or 30. Looks like a pattern to me.