Keglin Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 Hi everyone,I have just been doing some research on Belconnen and Gungalin and it is so hard to zone in on areas that you have not even been to. Which of these 2 areas (or others) would you recommend? When we finally get there we don't want to put the girls in schools and then have to move them around and unsettle them more so we want to find out as much as we can before we get there. Thank youKeglin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IamInACT Posted February 6, 2011 Report Share Posted February 6, 2011 I live in Gungahlin. It is newest Suburb. We really love it here, as with most suburbs it is close to Civic... I would also agree that try and decide on a school and then the area. how old are your girls.There is Harrison, Amaroo and Gold Creek Schools which will go up to year ten and they have just built a year 11 and 12 College in the Gungahlin town Centre. We have just started our son at Brindabella Christian College. Remember if you want to send you kids to a Chatholic/Private/Christian School you will need to put there name on a waiting list so chhoose now and get them on those waiting lists. You can check out the schools and they accademic credentials on http://www.myschool.edu.au/ ... RegardsT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CandiceM Posted February 7, 2011 Report Share Posted February 7, 2011 I would definitely choose Gungahlin. We lived there for a year. I also think that overall, Gungahlin has better transport links to the city, the south and Fyshwick. Even though Belconnen is closer to the South and the city, getting to Fyshwick can be a bit of a nightmare. The houses in Gungahlin also tend to be newer, and fitted with all the mod cons, even if they are a bit on the smaller side. Both have nice town centres, Belconnen has a shopping centre, loads of resturants and the lake, whereas Gungahlin also has quite a few shops including 3 supermarkets, BIG W, bakeries, liquor shop, banks, some clothing shops etc. When we moved Gungahlin was in the process of building a massive college and sports facilities as well. Gungahlin also has land to the north of it that can't be built upon and it makes the suburb feel 'open'With regards to schooling I put my son in the Good Shepherd Catholic school in Amaroo and can not say enough good things about it!!! The teachers are excellent, my son's teacher even dropped me off at the airport when we moved back to Perth The school fees were relatively cheap when I consider what I am paying now. I paid $200 a month inclusive of all school activities including tennis, dance and swimming lessons and including all stationery. In perth I am paying $230 a month, plus the $400 I just forked out for stationery....for YEAR 1!! We are not Catholic, but we are Christian and I liked to the strong focus on Christian values the school promoted. The good thing with putting your kids into private schools is that they are not zoned, so you can move around and not have to move them from one school to another. At the time we enrolled our son into Good shepherd, there was no waiting list. This may have changed though.Hope this helps,candice Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pine and Riana Pienaar Posted February 7, 2011 Report Share Posted February 7, 2011 We live in Belconnen. It is an older part of Canberra with older houses and more established parks and bigger gardens and trees. Gunghgalin is a newer area with modern houses and more townhouses. More families with young children living there and there is also a lot of SA families.We live in Dunlop, the newest superb in Beldonnen, which also have newer houses and is right on the edge of town. It is a quite area and you can see horses sheep and cattle when you go for a walk. The disadvantage of living here is that there is not a high school close to us. The nearest state high school is Kingsford Smith in Holt. In Belconnen, Charnwood is seen as one of the superbs to avoid due to a lot of goverment housing. Dunlop however is right next to Charnwood and we walk through Charnwood to the shops. It has bauetiful parks and I have never felt unsafe. Some areas like Flory, Page and surtain parts of Holt and Higgins have older houses and looks a bit run down. Older areas that are beautiful is Aranda and Hawker. They are however very expensive.The university of Canberra, the Australia instetude of Sport and Calvary hostpital is in Belconnen. Superbs closer to these include Bruce and areas like Kaleen which I also think will be nice to live in. We also have a great shopping centre (equivalent to Menlen in Pretoria) and aquatic centre with 50m and 25m pools. Hope this helps a bit. I also think it might be a good idea to deside on a school for your kids and then either try to live close to the school or close to public transport so that the kids can get so school and back on their own. Most state schools have school busses and many kids use them. The only problem in Canberra is the tight rental market. It is not always possible to find a rental in the area that you want and you may need to compensate.Hope this helpRiana Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keglin Posted February 7, 2011 Author Report Share Posted February 7, 2011 Thank you so much everyone, this is hugely helpful. My girls are 3 and 5 at the moment but we are hoping to go next year. Lots of food for thought thank you.Karen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cramer Posted February 8, 2011 Report Share Posted February 8, 2011 Thanks from me to! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IamInACT Posted February 8, 2011 Report Share Posted February 8, 2011 Thank you so much everyone, this is hugely helpful. My girls are 3 and 5 at the moment but we are hoping to go next year. Lots of food for thought thank you.KarenHey Karen.With regards to schools .... in ACT you kids can go to a gov school from 4yrs , the first year they can do max 12hrs per week. This is normally 2 days of 9 to 3 or 3 days of 9 to 1. If you need any more then that you will have to look at private daycare which is about $75 a day ... no part days or Catholic schools do it for about $40 per day.From experience, when they are 5 they do kindie (year 0) and then at 6 move to year 1. My son was at Harrison school for pre-school (4 year olds), he was schedule to do Kindie at Harrison but fortunately we got a place at Brindabella Christian College. He went back to school last week and things where so organised and they were well prepared. My wife spoke to some friends to day about Harrison and they said it was chaos.We have deduced that whilst the gov education is not to bad here, your child will receive better education in a christian or private school. By the Grace of God, we got a place at BCC.So whist you are basing your ares on school you almost need to start putting your childrens names down now at schools as there are extensive waiting lists at some schools but most you should not have to wait.RegardsT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keglin Posted February 8, 2011 Author Report Share Posted February 8, 2011 Thank you so much for that T. I will have to look into it all and have made a note of Harrison too. Crumbs so strange to put names on a waiting list when we are not even sure yet that we will get SS.Thank you Keglin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sibella Posted February 8, 2011 Report Share Posted February 8, 2011 Thank you so much for that T. I will have to look into it all and have made a note of Harrison too. Crumbs so strange to put names on a waiting list when we are not even sure yet that we will get SS.Thank you KeglinKeglin I don't want to sound negative but I think you need to slow down a bit. The immigration journey is a windy road and you never know how long its going to take and where you are actually going to end up.Its good to have a broad overview of the city you are looking at but I know from experience (having contacted various schools and spending hours on realestate.com.au) that until you have your visa in hand, and even after that when looking for work, nothing is guaranteed.I drew the line with myself when I started thinking about paying hundreds of dollars to private schools to put our girls' names on waiting lists in places we will probably not end up in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IamInACT Posted February 9, 2011 Report Share Posted February 9, 2011 I think the time to start considering waiting list is when your visa is submitted. Unfortunately in the ACT if you want your child to go to a christian school ... you have to do it sooner rather then later because you could potentially arrive and not be in your school of choice. The norm is about 150 dollars per child per shcool. We put my eldest down for Canberra grammar in 2009. He is still on the list. At burgmann at the beginning of 2010, still on the list. We are just extremely greatful that he got q place at Brindabella christian college. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keglin Posted February 9, 2011 Author Report Share Posted February 9, 2011 This aint no easy journey is it???Keglin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deon-Louise and kids Posted February 12, 2011 Report Share Posted February 12, 2011 It really is difficult to advise as we all want different things. We live in Scullin,Belconnen.An older suburb, Huge house that has been renovated but only 500m2 of land. 18mnths on we have re-evaluated and r now lookig at property in NSW where we can buy a great almost new house on 2000m2.For us Scullin has been great. Kids ride 2 km to school or catch a bus if is it is raining. Love all the cycle paths around our area.When we were in SA the area we looked at was Cook and Aranda ended up not even looking at any properties there.Good Luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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