Best middle school in arlington

[fran83]

Hello everyone. Grateful if you could help us choose a middle school for my daughter. We will be moving to US soon and Arlington is one of our top choices to live. My husband will be working in Dc. We have not chosen a specific region in Arlington yet. What we are looking for is a good public middle school but also a region near to the metro. Dorothy Hamm looks good but no ranking yet and so would like to get some advice to be able to make the best choice. Thank you

[Anonymous]

There isn’t a “best” middle school in Arlington. There is “best for your child.” Tell us what your child needs in a school and we can tell you more. What do you mean by “best”?

[Anonymous]

Hamm is good but some of the houses feed into Washington and Liberty. Some will feed into yorktown. Personally, I’d do hamm yorktown if you can but also Williamsburg/yorktown or Swanson/yorktown.

[Anonymous]

Middle schools are generally the weak point in APS. Do you have a high school preference, if so look to be zoned to the high school of your choice. Note that there's a chance there could be a high school redistricting in the next year or two as W-L finishes its expansion. So, if you have a strong preference for a particular school find a house comfortably in its boundary rather than along a margin that could shift.

If you want to look solely at test scores you want Williamsburg or Hamm since frankly they are higher SES and far less diverse. By contrast Kenmore and likely Gunston's scores are lower for the same reason.

We have friends who love Kenmore for their kids due to the STEM and Arts focus. They apparently are also good for SN kids, according to friends who did a transfer to Kenmore rather than going to their zoned MS. Jefferson has the middle school level IB program, which feeds to the high school IB program if that is an interest. Gunston is where both the Spanish immersion and middle school Montessori programs reside. To my knowledge there isn't any special program embedded at Swanson, Williamsburg or Hamm.

I'll say that we have friends who currently have kids at every middle school except Gunston and we all have similar opinions of the schools. Good but not great.

[fran83]

Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. We are looking for good academic records, conducive environment for learning, diversity, good discipline, extracurricular activities(swimming would be a plus), 'friendly' educators/teachers. We have been looking at ratings on several platforms and some reviews are concerning. We are worried about bullying since she will be joining in March. So a school with welcoming students will be great. Now, someone mentioned IB, this would be a plus since she has been studying in a british style framework.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Middle schools are generally the weak point in APS. Do you have a high school preference, if so look to be zoned to the high school of your choice. Note that there's a chance there could be a high school redistricting in the next year or two as W-L finishes its expansion. So, if you have a strong preference for a particular school find a house comfortably in its boundary rather than along a margin that could shift.

If you want to look solely at test scores you want Williamsburg or Hamm since frankly they are higher SES and far less diverse. By contrast Kenmore and likely Gunston's scores are lower for the same reason.

We have friends who love Kenmore for their kids due to the STEM and Arts focus. They apparently are also good for SN kids, according to friends who did a transfer to Kenmore rather than going to their zoned MS. Jefferson has the middle school level IB program, which feeds to the high school IB program if that is an interest. Gunston is where both the Spanish immersion and middle school Montessori programs reside. To my knowledge there isn't any special program embedded at Swanson, Williamsburg or Hamm.

I'll say that we have friends who currently have kids at every middle school except Gunston and we all have similar opinions of the schools. Good but not great.

I’m zoned for Gunston and it’s the same: good but not great. I’m sending DS there next year.

[Anonymous]

fran83 wrote:Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. We are looking for good academic records, conducive environment for learning, diversity, good discipline, extracurricular activities(swimming would be a plus), 'friendly' educators/teachers. We have been looking at ratings on several platforms and some reviews are concerning. We are worried about bullying since she will be joining in March. So a school with welcoming students will be great. Now, someone mentioned IB, this would be a plus since she has been studying in a british style framework.

The IB program is at WL, but you have to apply. Maybe look for an area zoned for WL

[Anonymous]

fran83 wrote:Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. We are looking for good academic records, conducive environment for learning, diversity, good discipline, extracurricular activities(swimming would be a plus), 'friendly' educators/teachers. We have been looking at ratings on several platforms and some reviews are concerning. We are worried about bullying since she will be joining in March. So a school with welcoming students will be great. Now, someone mentioned IB, this would be a plus since she has been studying in a british style framework.

If you want IB, you need a middle school that feeds in Washington Liberty, or you can apply from out of bounds for HS. My son went to Hamm for middle school, although most of it was virtual. The principal is great, and the teachers seemed good. The facilities are mostly new. In general, it pulls from a fairly upper middle class demographic, and you can see the racial diversity here:

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Civil-Rights-Table-1-2021-11-08.pdf

[fran83]

We are not in the US yet. We have been looking at ratings, gradings, reviews, videos on youtube...The school system in our country is different. It's kind of hard to choose at a distance. We have chosen Arlington mostly based on its closeness to DC. We also looked at Mclean and Vienna. Looks like the schools are better there?

[fran83]

We are not in the US yet. We have been looking at ratings, gradings, reviews, videos on youtube...The school system in our country is different. It's kind of hard to choose at a distance. We have chosen Arlington mostly based on its closeness to DC. We also looked at Mclean and Vienna. Looks like the schools are better there?

[Anonymous]

fran83 wrote:Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. We are looking for good academic records, conducive environment for learning, diversity, good discipline, extracurricular activities(swimming would be a plus), 'friendly' educators/teachers. We have been looking at ratings on several platforms and some reviews are concerning. We are worried about bullying since she will be joining in March. So a school with welcoming students will be great. Now, someone mentioned IB, this would be a plus since she has been studying in a british style framework.

I would not worry about bullying. Try to join a swim program now if you can. There’s york and NCAP. All of the high schools have pools. What’s your budget?

[Anonymous]

fran83 wrote:We are not in the US yet. We have been looking at ratings, gradings, reviews, videos on youtube...The school system in our country is different. It's kind of hard to choose at a distance. We have chosen Arlington mostly based on its closeness to DC. We also looked at Mclean and Vienna. Looks like the schools are better there?

A bit, but they are mostly all the same with rich kids who will do well in life no matter what.

[Anonymous]

fran83 wrote:We are not in the US yet. We have been looking at ratings, gradings, reviews, videos on youtube...The school system in our country is different. It's kind of hard to choose at a distance. We have chosen Arlington mostly based on its closeness to DC. We also looked at Mclean and Vienna. Looks like the schools are better there?

Honestly, it's all basically the same. These are affluent schools and neighborhoods with many resources. PP is right in the sense that what matters is what's best for your child. You're looking at meaningless metrics/rankings.

Progrmmatically, it's better to look at the high schools. Yorktown most closely matches the county's demographics from a diversity standpoint but not the school population's -- so it's predominately white. It's historically considered the "best" HS in the county on a metrics perspective but W-L has its fans, IB and more recently better success in elite college matriculations (not that any of these schools matriculate a whole lot to the ivies, etc -- you need to go to private schools in DC for that path).

One thing to consider is it can be harder to get into Virginia's better universities (UVA, William and Mary) since they tend to prioritize school ranking and Arlington schools are populated by over-achievers in general. So, the competition for limited spots is more fierce.

[fran83]

Anonymous wrote:

fran83 wrote:Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. We are looking for good academic records, conducive environment for learning, diversity, good discipline, extracurricular activities(swimming would be a plus), 'friendly' educators/teachers. We have been looking at ratings on several platforms and some reviews are concerning. We are worried about bullying since she will be joining in March. So a school with welcoming students will be great. Now, someone mentioned IB, this would be a plus since she has been studying in a british style framework.

I would not worry about bullying. Try to join a swim program now if you can. There’s york and NCAP. All of the high schools have pools. What’s your budget?

She will be joining middle school. We will see regarding swimming when we are in ghe US then. You said not to worry about bullying. This is not really a problem then? We have read several reviews and we were quite concerned about that.

[fran83]

Anonymous wrote:

fran83 wrote:We are not in the US yet. We have been looking at ratings, gradings, reviews, videos on youtube...The school system in our country is different. It's kind of hard to choose at a distance. We have chosen Arlington mostly based on its closeness to DC. We also looked at Mclean and Vienna. Looks like the schools are better there?

Honestly, it's all basically the same. These are affluent schools and neighborhoods with many resources. PP is right in the sense that what matters is what's best for your child. You're looking at meaningless metrics/rankings.

Progrmmatically, it's better to look at the high schools. Yorktown most closely matches the county's demographics from a diversity standpoint but not the school population's -- so it's predominately white. It's historically considered the "best" HS in the county on a metrics perspective but W-L has its fans, IB and more recently better success in elite college matriculations (not that any of these schools matriculate a whole lot to the ivies, etc -- you need to go to private schools in DC for that path).

One thing to consider is it can be harder to get into Virginia's better universities (UVA, William and Mary) since they tend to prioritize school ranking and Arlington schools are populated by over-achievers in general. So, the competition for limited spots is more fierce.

Thank you for the info. So we don't have to reconsider our choice regarding staying in Arlington then?