Tell me about Julius West

[Anonymous]

I saw scattered around various recent threads that JWMS is terrible. I have a child going there next year so would like to be well prepared if it is going to be bad.
I went to the parents night and the presentation made the school seem okay.

Thank you in advance.

[Anonymous]

Bullying is an issue.

[Anonymous]

The Principal is checked out. Usually gone half the year as a rotating Principal. The admins run the school.

Vaping is an issue in some of the bathrooms.

It's a huge school.

Glad to be gone from it. Weakest link in RM cluster, tbh.

[Anonymous]

I have had two kids go through JW. We had a good experience

[Anonymous]

Middle school sucks everywhere, and is usually the weakest link in all clusters.

However, my boys really liked JW. One went there for two years, the other for one year. Then we moved. They wish they had stayed there.

The second one was struggling with the MS transition. His teachers immediately noticed and got him him for the first quarter.

[Anonymous]

I liked JW the best of all 3 schools my child went to, elementary, middle, high school. Hated elem. school, and because of covid my child was barely at the high school and I have not loved RM. I found JW warm, the principal incredibly dynamic and caring, and the teachers fantastic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I liked JW the best of all 3 schools my child went to, elementary, middle, high school. Hated elem. school, and because of covid my child was barely at the high school and I have not loved RM. I found JW warm, the principal incredibly dynamic and caring, and the teachers fantastic.

principal is gone half the year every year.

[Anonymous]

Parent of current JW 8th grader here.
I wouldnt say the school is stellar by any means, but it was not terrible for us either.
DS has never complained about bullying, however he does have a fairly tight knit friend group as well as very good friends in higher grades. I have heard reports of drug use and he was approached by a classmate to try some weed, DS declined. That was very nonchalantly reported by DS himself. Before anyone freaks out, I do consider this as "par for the course" in any middle school nowdays.
There are some amazing teachers in the school who really try to connect with kids and are well loved by them (Mr. Yeh, Mr. Lenz, Mrs. Hollander, etc.) and there are some not so great ones. All of the teachers DS had were very responsive to emails if I ever had to reach out.
Admin team is somewhat "meh" with a lot of turnover in recent years and some very strange decisions in terms of school day organization. The "advisory" period (still dont understand what this is for, but I am assuming it is IB requirement) is in the middle of the day now. Complete waste of 20 min that could be spent on lunch or to add time to class transitions. "Advisory" was at the beginning of the day last year and at least it was useful for kids to transition into the school day. Also, some weird crusade against hoodies by the Principal (again as reported by DS).
FWIW, DS is middle of the road student, he is in advanced classes, but is not a straight A kid by no means. His friends are all similar, they all have good grades and no glaring disciplinary issues, but they are not "nerds", just average kids.
Not sure if this helped.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent of current JW 8th grader here.
I wouldnt say the school is stellar by any means, but it was not terrible for us either.
DS has never complained about bullying, however he does have a fairly tight knit friend group as well as very good friends in higher grades. I have heard reports of drug use and he was approached by a classmate to try some weed, DS declined. That was very nonchalantly reported by DS himself. Before anyone freaks out, I do consider this as "par for the course" in any middle school nowdays.
There are some amazing teachers in the school who really try to connect with kids and are well loved by them (Mr. Yeh, Mr. Lenz, Mrs. Hollander, etc.) and there are some not so great ones. All of the teachers DS had were very responsive to emails if I ever had to reach out.
Admin team is somewhat "meh" with a lot of turnover in recent years and some very strange decisions in terms of school day organization. The "advisory" period (still dont understand what this is for, but I am assuming it is IB requirement) is in the middle of the day now. Complete waste of 20 min that could be spent on lunch or to add time to class transitions. "Advisory" was at the beginning of the day last year and at least it was useful for kids to transition into the school day. Also, some weird crusade against hoodies by the Principal (again as reported by DS).
FWIW, DS is middle of the road student, he is in advanced classes, but is not a straight A kid by no means. His friends are all similar, they all have good grades and no glaring disciplinary issues, but they are not "nerds", just average kids.
Not sure if this helped.

My niece attends West and we have kids at a different MS.

I’ll say two things.

1) Our school also has Advisory mid-morning. It’s not an IB requirement because my kid is not at an IB school. Our MS uses it as a time to catch up, or sometimes MCPS forces useless SEL lessons during Advisory.

2) Our ES and MS also cracked down on hoodies. The kids were vaping and hiding the cartridges (?) by having hoods pulled up. Or using AirPods, etc. I don’t think it is just West that does this.

Also, we have weed at our MS and even in the bus back and forth to school. Think it’s just unavoidable now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I liked JW the best of all 3 schools my child went to, elementary, middle, high school. Hated elem. school, and because of covid my child was barely at the high school and I have not loved RM. I found JW warm, the principal incredibly dynamic and caring, and the teachers fantastic.

principal is gone half the year every year.

He wasn't when we were there, which was 5-6 years ago. He was there the whole time.

[Anonymous]

I have two children who graduated by JW. Both "normal" kids. They never had any issues that required me to deal with the principal/counselor.

My youngest went to JW during Covid so she only spent half her middle school years actually at JW. The youngest did not have the same experience at JW as my oldest did.

My oldest really enjoyed her time at JW. She enjoyed all her teachers (yes, some were better than others. You'll find that anyplace). Had a great time with PE (JW PE department is absolutely the best). She made some great memories there - the Hershey Park trip with orchestra, the trip to Quebec.

My youngest spent half of 6th grade and all of 7th grade virtually. She was just starting to get in the groove of middle school when they were sent home. She didn't get back to the building until 8th grade so her experience was quite different. She missed out on Outdoor Ed and a foreign language trip. She said the teachers were fine. PE was still awesome - they started a unit on bike riding and they would ride bikes in adjacent neighborhoods. I did hear that there were more fights than what my older daughter experienced but it didn't phase her.

[Anonymous]

JW has had a lot of issues, starting with administration. The principal starts off way too strong every single year (taking away cell phones in a bin, screaming that kids can not move seats in lunch to talk to others, and cracking down on things in the hall.) Then it gets super laxed. Then he leaves to another school and the school is just a mess. There is always a new principal every year that has no idea what they are doing.

Cell phones are everywhere, all bathrooms smell like vape or weed and the lunchroom is so chaotic that many kids try to eat in teacher's classrooms. There is a ton of relentless bullying and the 8th graders last year and this year are by far the worst. Boys and girls equally. Multiple fist fights a week too.

The PE department is strong, but they are way too laxed on changing and the kids are all in crocs. Most other middle schoolers, the kids need to be out of denim and have sneakers on every PE class.

There is zero dress code policy at JW besides hats and hoods being up. A lot of girls wearing sports bras as shirts to school which seems really weird.

Phone policy is too laxed. Kids use them all day and also all lunch period and in PE as well.

Teachers are hit or miss. Band/Chorus not that good. Theater I is super weak. Clubs are only attended so the kids can hang out in the halls, make-up, or goof off. They don't have strong clubs like best buddies or community service that other middle schools do.

Counseling is beyond over stressed. They need at least 3 more counselors for the demand. They did finally get a social worker, but she is only in for 1-2 days a week as she is shared by multiple schools. There is just not enough resources for these kids.

The worst part about JW is it is the only school that goes to RM. Most other high schools have 2 middle schools that feed in and you can make new friends. RM only has the IB kids who tend to keep to themselves as the high school has so many issues too.

We ended up pulling our sophomore out to private school this year and our current 7th grader(who we were hoping would have a bette year and is not) is going to private next year. We are just not happy with the RM cluster except for elementary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:JW has had a lot of issues, starting with administration. The principal starts off way too strong every single year (taking away cell phones in a bin, screaming that kids can not move seats in lunch to talk to others, and cracking down on things in the hall.) Then it gets super laxed. Then he leaves to another school and the school is just a mess. There is always a new principal every year that has no idea what they are doing.

Cell phones are everywhere, all bathrooms smell like vape or weed and the lunchroom is so chaotic that many kids try to eat in teacher's classrooms. There is a ton of relentless bullying and the 8th graders last year and this year are by far the worst. Boys and girls equally. Multiple fist fights a week too.

The PE department is strong, but they are way too laxed on changing and the kids are all in crocs. Most other middle schoolers, the kids need to be out of denim and have sneakers on every PE class.

There is zero dress code policy at JW besides hats and hoods being up. A lot of girls wearing sports bras as shirts to school which seems really weird.

Phone policy is too laxed. Kids use them all day and also all lunch period and in PE as well.

Teachers are hit or miss. Band/Chorus not that good. Theater I is super weak. Clubs are only attended so the kids can hang out in the halls, make-up, or goof off. They don't have strong clubs like best buddies or community service that other middle schools do.

Counseling is beyond over stressed. They need at least 3 more counselors for the demand. They did finally get a social worker, but she is only in for 1-2 days a week as she is shared by multiple schools. There is just not enough resources for these kids.

The worst part about JW is it is the only school that goes to RM. Most other high schools have 2 middle schools that feed in and you can make new friends. RM only has the IB kids who tend to keep to themselves as the high school has so many issues too.

We ended up pulling our sophomore out to private school this year and our current 7th grader(who we were hoping would have a bette year and is not) is going to private next year. We are just not happy with the RM cluster except for elementary.

As JW parent I agree with some of this. However, I am wondering how do you know all this stuff? Ie, I have no clue what other kids are wearing to school or what they do in clubs? Also as far as I know phone use is allowed during lunch.
May be I am a bit more "hands off" than "DCUM approved"? I do care about grades, but beyond that kids should figure out how to live in the complex society and "fight their own battles" so to speak.
FWIW, I only had to deal with counselor once for a class change and they responded in timely manner and resolved the issue. I dont think DS even knows (or cares) who his counselor is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:JW has had a lot of issues, starting with administration. The principal starts off way too strong every single year (taking away cell phones in a bin, screaming that kids can not move seats in lunch to talk to others, and cracking down on things in the hall.) Then it gets super laxed. Then he leaves to another school and the school is just a mess. There is always a new principal every year that has no idea what they are doing.

Cell phones are everywhere, all bathrooms smell like vape or weed and the lunchroom is so chaotic that many kids try to eat in teacher's classrooms. There is a ton of relentless bullying and the 8th graders last year and this year are by far the worst. Boys and girls equally. Multiple fist fights a week too.

The PE department is strong, but they are way too laxed on changing and the kids are all in crocs. Most other middle schoolers, the kids need to be out of denim and have sneakers on every PE class.

There is zero dress code policy at JW besides hats and hoods being up. A lot of girls wearing sports bras as shirts to school which seems really weird.

Phone policy is too laxed. Kids use them all day and also all lunch period and in PE as well.

Teachers are hit or miss. Band/Chorus not that good. Theater I is super weak. Clubs are only attended so the kids can hang out in the halls, make-up, or goof off. They don't have strong clubs like best buddies or community service that other middle schools do.

Counseling is beyond over stressed. They need at least 3 more counselors for the demand. They did finally get a social worker, but she is only in for 1-2 days a week as she is shared by multiple schools. There is just not enough resources for these kids.

The worst part about JW is it is the only school that goes to RM. Most other high schools have 2 middle schools that feed in and you can make new friends. RM only has the IB kids who tend to keep to themselves as the high school has so many issues too.

We ended up pulling our sophomore out to private school this year and our current 7th grader(who we were hoping would have a bette year and is not) is going to private next year. We are just not happy with the RM cluster except for elementary.

As JW parent I agree with some of this. However, I am wondering how do you know all this stuff? Ie, I have no clue what other kids are wearing to school or what they do in clubs? Also as far as I know phone use is allowed during lunch.
May be I am a bit more "hands off" than "DCUM approved"? I do care about grades, but beyond that kids should figure out how to live in the complex society and "fight their own battles" so to speak.
FWIW, I only had to deal with counselor once for a class change and they responded in timely manner and resolved the issue. I dont think DS even knows (or cares) who his counselor is.

DP

I know quite a bit about my kid’s MS experience also for a variety of reasons. I am involved in the PTA, talk to a lot of other parents at the pool/sports events and I have two kids at the school who are quite chatty and like to share. I don’t think it’s weird that the PP knows those things!

[Anonymous]

My kids were fine there. It was middle school. One of my kids still keeps in touch with a language teacher she had there and she is in college. I think that says alot about her experience.