Changing schools

Hi. Long story hopefully not too long, my ex wife and I split 4 years ago and she moved to the adjacent city (20 minutes away). I stayed in the city where the kids (I have 5 kids with her and now have a step son with my fiance) went to school so they could have some consistency and stability. However, after 4 years that city became unaffordable and housing was extremely limited. Made the decision to move to the same city as ex as there were better housing options.Backstory on the ex - she was previously homeschooling the children with most of the focus being put on religion (she subscribes to the Quiverful ideology - Google it if you feel like being creeped out). What I believe ultimately ended the marriage was that I was adamant about putting the kids into public school because I wasn't comfortable they were receiving a proper education. Ex took the kids and ran and tried to cut off contact. I battled her in court and the court awarded me with final say on education for the reasons previously mentioned.Fast forward, ex has been engaging in parental alienation and trying to make me the bad guy to the children at every turn. Now back to the school situation... My elementary aged kids have been experiencing a lot of bullying issues and problems at school. I have also confirmed the widespread bullying issues with a number of other parents - it seems systemic at the school.My oldest is in high school and has been very happy with her school. My second oldest has expressed that she wishes to go to the same high school as my oldest next year given that her current friends are going to move there. I don't have any particular issues with the high school.Now the challenging part - given that we've moved to the same city as the ex, it seemed a logical choice to move the children to new schools within the geographical area. In my mind, it was also a good opportunity to get the elementary kids away from the troubled school and given them a fresh start. Additionally, the children would not have to wake up extra early to account for the commute. Finally, from a logistics standpoint, it would be very difficult to maintain extra curricular activities for the children as both my fiance and I work. I am able to work from home 3 days per week, but have a very demanding job and need to stay pretty close (i.e. I can take them to and from school as long as they're close by, but it isn't feasible to drive to the old city as it consumes almost an hour round trip depending on traffic).The younger kids expressed that they would be good with the change. The older two expressed that they want to stay at the school in the old city. The challenge with a big family is that it isn't always possible to please everyone and it really seems to me that moving the kids' schools makes logical sense. However, the ex wants to villify me to the kids and has given them the impression that she is going to fight me to stop me from moving the older kids to new schools in order to protect their wishes. She is unwilling to open a dialogue with me and discuss the issue like an adult and instead is bombarding me with letters from her lawyer telling me I'm not considering the best interests of the children.That couldn't be further from the truth and honestly I have lost so much sleep over this issue because I care so much. As mentioned, I do have final say regarding education, but I can see that my ex is going to try and undermine that with the courts under the guise of me not considering the children's best interests and unfortunately, there is a strong gender bias as I've seen. I love my kids more than anything in the world and would do absolutely anything for them. It just doesn't make sense to me that they would keep going to the same schools in another city when my ex and I both live elsewhere and for the other reasons mentioned.Any thoughts / advice would be appreciated. via /r/Parenting http://ift.tt/2rRcct1