Richard Montgomery or Rockville?

[Anonymous]

Both are good schools in my honest opinion, but RM has to be better in my opinion. Rockville is just..the most forgettable out of all the MCPS high schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RM has kids that feed in from Julius West. JW has problems with bullying, violence etc that have impacted RM.
I would choose Rockville. It’s also a smaller school so feels more personal.

Exactly!

JW into RM has so many fights, drugs, and gang related activity. The 3rd floor bathrooms were basically 8 hours of drugs and drug deals until they were locked up.

Also RM is already so big and still so over crowded, that after the Crown reconfiguration, the other half of King Farm will be going to Gaithersburg HS and Fallsgrove will be going to Crown. Then RM can get more IB and the extra Twinbrook and Tower Oaks condos and homes. It’s another step backwards for RM.


And the IB program has declined since 2018 and Poolesville and Blair and even Wheaton are perceived as better.

If I was in Rockville, I would say:

1. Wootton
2. Rockville
3. RM

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RM has kids that feed in from Julius West. JW has problems with bullying, violence etc that have impacted RM.
I would choose Rockville. It’s also a smaller school so feels more personal.

Exactly!

JW into RM has so many fights, drugs, and gang related activity. The 3rd floor bathrooms were basically 8 hours of drugs and drug deals until they were locked up.

Also RM is already so big and still so over crowded, that after the Crown reconfiguration, the other half of King Farm will be going to Gaithersburg HS and Fallsgrove will be going to Crown. Then RM can get more IB and the extra Twinbrook and Tower Oaks condos and homes. It’s another step backwards for RM.


And the IB program has declined since 2018 and Poolesville and Blair and even Wheaton are perceived as better.

If I was in Rockville, I would say:

1. Wootton
2. Rockville
3. RM

Do you have a kid in the IB program now & did you have a kid there in 2018?

I have a kid there now, and they're getting a fantastic education! I did not have a kid there in 2018.

General feeling towards school has declined since 2018, but that's not related to the decline of the IB program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RM has kids that feed in from Julius West. JW has problems with bullying, violence etc that have impacted RM.
I would choose Rockville. It’s also a smaller school so feels more personal.

BS

OP ignore this poster

There is no question, Rockville HS is smaller and more tight-knit. Most of the kids there have gone to elementary and middle school together.

Let's try some fact...

There are five elementary schools that feed into Rockville
There are five elementary schools that feed into RM.
There is one middle school that feeds Rockville.
There is one middle school that feeds RM.

No difference.

There are 1550 students at Rockville
There are 2400 students at RM

The difference is almost entirely the county-wide magnet IB program.

[Anonymous]

I have a kid at Rockville.

Pros—it’s nice to be at a small school because you have more chance to get on the sports teams and you can always get into clubs. It is a nice community—when I volunteer the students are incredibly polite. I have one kid in IB and they enjoy it. Academically you can shine in a smaller school (big fish, small pond).

Cons—the sports teams quality vary because they’re pulling from a smaller population of possible good athletes. Some sports have to actively recruit when numbers are low. This can be great for kids who want to try something new, but if your kid wants to get recruited for college, they may not get noticed as much. Coaches are pretty good. The theater department is weak. There is a marching band where a lot of HS don’t have them. There aren’t as many choices in classes as there may be in a larger HS.

Closed campus for lunch can be a pro or con depending, but there’s no going out for fast food for lunch because they’re not allowed since the closest food option is a 15-20 min walk.

Overall? We love Rockville. So glad we are in this neighborhood.

[Anonymous]

I mixed some of my pros into the cons list! Sorry

[Anonymous]

Rockville: IB program that is not cut throat and the music teachers are great!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've lived in MoCo for 40 years and I never knew there was a Rockville High School.

RM

I've only lived here two years but same! I don't think my kid's sports teams have ever played them. Maybe not enough interest to field teams in field hockey and lacrosse (admittedly very UMC sports)?

[Anonymous]

If your kid is interested in theater, the program at RM is amazing!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do you value more? If it's a bigger size, bigger athletics program and high-performing academics, RM is probably better. Rockville is going to be a safer, small, more tightknit experience.

It’s all MCPS. Neither is ‘safer’.

Have we forgotten about the Rockville HS sexual assault case from a few years ago? And of course, RM has that Security Team leader who was accused of sexual misconduct with a student.

Wood MS had to ban its students from the Safeway nearby because of all the shoplifting and one particularly terrible incident of fighting inside the store.

I certainly wouldn’t judge one option as safer than the other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've lived in MoCo for 40 years and I never knew there was a Rockville High School.

RM

I've only lived here two years but same! I don't think my kid's sports teams have ever played them. Maybe not enough interest to field teams in field hockey and lacrosse (admittedly very UMC sports)?

RM and Rockville are actually informal rivals. RM kids called RHS "the school in the woods"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RM has kids that feed in from Julius West. JW has problems with bullying, violence etc that have impacted RM.
I would choose Rockville. It’s also a smaller school so feels more personal.

I have a kid at Wood MS and it’s the same. Lots of fights and kids vaping/smoking weed AT school.

DS told me that Security was called to his Science classroom twice last week. There are a lot of kids who just don’t want to be in school, and cause disruptions for the rest of the students.

[Anonymous]

OP, you should look at the Schools At A Glance information sheets that MCPS posts. It will give you stats for the percentage of kids that are proficient in Math at both schools so that you can compare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RM has kids that feed in from Julius West. JW has problems with bullying, violence etc that have impacted RM.
I would choose Rockville. It’s also a smaller school so feels more personal.

I have a kid at Wood MS and it’s the same. Lots of fights and kids vaping/smoking weed AT school.

DS told me that Security was called to his Science classroom twice last week. There are a lot of kids who just don’t want to be in school, and cause disruptions for the rest of the students.

That's all MS. I know Twinbrook gets a lot of hate on DCUM, but my kids love Twinbrook-JW-RM. We love Rockville as a whole, so RHS would be our second choice out of all of MCPS.

[Anonymous]

This is for Rockville HS.

https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/04230.pdf