For elementary school we rented an apartment for 6 months to get an address in a decent school, it wasn't a guaranteed ticket but a risk we took because it was cheaper than private school. We were able to get in and worked closely with the school and our kids to make sure they were learning what they needed to get to the next school. They both got to a magnet middle school thankfully which was goal #2 but I mean even the magnet school is still like a zoo (sex in bathrooms, drugs, etc). Again, we work closely with the school and our boys, teaching them a lot of the skills they're not getting at school (it's very time consuming and basically a second job for me and my wife). My oldest is now in 8th grade and tested recently for the top magnet STEM HS in DFW. He feels pretty confident about it but we find out March 1 if he got it, that's goal number #3.
Looking back, my wife and I both strongly agree just moving 45 miles north to suburbs with actual functioning public schools would have been so much better. Yeah sure, we live in a hot neighborhood (north oak cliff), downtown, uptown, and deep ellum are < 3 miles away but we never go down there anymore anyway. Suburbs with good schools and other amenities geared toward families are where it's at.