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Hey y'all,

Here are just a few school names for Houston TX that are dual-language immersion schools FREE through the public school district.

My son is 2 so my search is limited to elementary schools so far.  Also, I've not researched other nearby school districts, only Houston where we live / Sharpstown area.

charter:

Ser-Niños elementary through middle school (grade 8)

magnet program:

Helms Elementary

William Wharton Elementary

In addition, there are two elementary schools in the magnet program that are not immersion but their magent focus is foreign languages (Kolter Elementary) or Spanish language (Rice School).

In the magnet program, the district will bus your child free to the campus they attend. Spaces are assigned by a combination of lottery and "classroom balance" (balancing children who speak no Spanish coming in, with children who already have a Spanish-speaking background). Space is severely limited and there is no wait list. The lottery is re-done every year for what open spots there are.  

With the magnet-program schools, if they have a pre-K for age 3, it is available without cost only for families who qualify under Head Start for low income —OR— children who do not currently speak English. Otherwise, the pre-K without cost starts at age 4. (My son is truly bilingual Spanish/English, so he will not qualify for free pre-K-3.)

For the charter school, parents provide their own transportation. Admission is by lottery. I am told there is no cost for pre-K-3 and we are going to the campus next week to pick up the application packet for pre-K-3. Maybe we will hit the lottery!

We did not "win" the lottery for Ser-Niños for the coming school year. We are on a waiting list.

Hi Leslie!

You just go to the school with the child's documents (birth certificate, immunization records etc.) and fill out the registration form. They were very helpful to me on the phone and in person.

The lottery for 3-year-olds was March 31. After that, waiting list.

I think it is a good idea to get on the waiting list now. Doesn't cost anything but a few minutes of your time and even if you decide not to put your child in the school, you haven't lost anything.

We are not decided whether we will put our son in the program if our name comes up on the list, or not. Although it is a half-day, for us 5 days a week for a 3-year-old seems like a lot considering that our son has never been in a daycare at all. He's been at home with his Tia since he was 8 weeks old (and the only child there, most of that time). She and I both work with him a lot on pre-reading, pre-math, science topics etc. and he's doing very well with that. So it's mostly his socialization we're after. Maybe we might start him off a little slower, not right away going 5 days a week.

Coincidentally, I've been meaning to get to church more often, and work out at the gym more often. Both of those places have a childcare room with very, very nice caregivers. A couple hours 3 times a week… might be just the thing.

There are advantages to him staying with his Tia (in Spanish).

My older daughter (19 years old now) was always in a daycare environment when she was little. She had plenty of socialization for being in a group… it was the academic-type of instruction she was lacking. I was very gung-ho about getting her in a pre-K instead of daycare, and it turned out that was absolutely the best thing. My son is in kind of the opposite situation.

There are also partial-immersion programs at The Rice School and at Kolter
http://www.houstonisd.org/port…..147fa6RCRD