Oakton High School? Opinions?

[Anonymous]

For parents with kids going to Oakton high school, what do you think of the school? Please post your thoughts, whether good or bad or both. My kids are little now, and they will eventually go to Oakton high school. I've looked at the boundary for the school, and I'm not clear on which areas besides parts of Oakton will go there.

[Anonymous]

My next door neighbor is a teacher at another public Fairfax school and she highly recommends Oakton. Fairfax "doesn't rank" their schools, but if you look at Virginia state rankings, Oakton is way up there. We're currently in the boundary for Falls Church high school and I'm hoping to move to Oakton district in the next few years. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

My kids are still in elementary school, but we moved last year to the Vienna/Oakton area, (specifically for the schools), and looked closely at Oakton. Both Madison and Oakton are really very good. On many lists/scores they are really neck and neck, and in some, Oakton has a slight edge. We ultimately chose the Madison district (in large part due to location), but also because its a bit smaller, and I think my older son will benefit from that environment. But Oakton has some real advantages: lots of language offerings (I think Japanese, Chinese, German, etc.), and just a lot more course offerings. It also has a slightly more diverse student body than Madison.

Anyway -- it looked like a really nice school to me.

[Anonymous]

My child is a sophomore at Oakton high school and we have decided that it is not a good fit for us. She will be transferring to a private school in the fall.

Her freshman year went very well. Most of her teachers that year were wonderful, 2 were absolutely top notch.
This year we have not been quite so lucky. The only really outstanding teacher was one of the 2 whom I mentioned ( a language teacher who is the sole teacher of that subject - she is a gem!).

The academic opportunities are there at Oakton. Especially with the AP program a student can certainly be challenged. The school is huge (if I remember correctly the student body is about 3K) and unfortunately, the AP and Pre AP classes are overfilled and while DD is not shy, she felt a bit overwhelmed by the number of students in these classes.

The size is the main reason we are leaving, but she also wanted a school with a stronger arts program. As well as the opportunity to do a lot of extracurriculars. The extracurricular thing is set up in a complicated fashion at Oakton.

But if your child comes to Oakton with a strong set of friends from middle school, and is in a sport or the band, and is not phased by the size of the school, they will probably do well at the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child is a sophomore at Oakton high school and we have decided that it is not a good fit for us. She will be transferring to a private school in the fall.

Her freshman year went very well. Most of her teachers that year were wonderful, 2 were absolutely top notch.
This year we have not been quite so lucky. The only really outstanding teacher was one of the 2 whom I mentioned ( a language teacher who is the sole teacher of that subject - she is a gem!).

The academic opportunities are there at Oakton. Especially with the AP program a student can certainly be challenged. The school is huge (if I remember correctly the student body is about 3K) and unfortunately, the AP and Pre AP classes are overfilled and while DD is not shy, she felt a bit overwhelmed by the number of students in these classes.

The size is the main reason we are leaving, but she also wanted a school with a stronger arts program. As well as the opportunity to do a lot of extracurriculars. The extracurricular thing is set up in a complicated fashion at Oakton.

But if your child comes to Oakton with a strong set of friends from middle school, and is in a sport or the band, and is not phased by the size of the school, they will probably do well at the school.

3,000?!

[Anonymous]

I just looked up the size of the school. Overall, there are a little over 2,300 students total.

[Anonymous]

disclaimer - remember i stated "if i remember correctly"
; D

and i didn't remember correctly. i just checked and 2007-08 their numbers came in at a little over 2300. still, that is too large for us. : )

[Anonymous]

I went to a high school in the midwest that had 2,400 students. that was normal for our school district. it was big, but not overwhelming for me - but I imagine that would not be the case for everyone. some kids would benefit from a smaller school, i'm sure. I felt like when I went to college, the big high school experience had been helpful. (I went to GW, which had about 6,000 undergrad but a total population of 20,000 and a city feel.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to a high school in the midwest that had 2,400 students. that was normal for our school district. it was big, but not overwhelming for me - but I imagine that would not be the case for everyone. some kids would benefit from a smaller school, i'm sure. I felt like when I went to college, the big high school experience had been helpful. (I went to GW, which had about 6,000 undergrad but a total population of 20,000 and a city feel.)

Perfect timing! I am the PP who has decided to take a student out of Oakton High School. I agree with you, many if not most kids are fine with a student body this size. My kid was not. And as I said earlier tho the size was the biggest problem for her, the quality of teachers was an issue, too. I do have to admit that in all honesty, I do not like the FCPS. We spent grade K-3 there then did private school from 4-8. Oakton had such wonderful reputation and I did not like what the Oakton/Fairfax/Vienna/McLean area had to offer as far as private schools go, so we decided to try Oakton. I wasn't crazy about it from the beginning. I found it cold and impersonal from the very beginning. However, my daughter had good teachers her freshman year and good teachers can compensate for almost everything IMO. This year has been a different story and reminder of all of the reasons we left FCPS 7 years ago.

That said, many families are happy there. So, it is likely that it will be a good fit for the OP's children. : )

[Anonymous]

I went to a large southwestern H.S. with about 2,000 students, a little over 500 per class. Even though I successfully went on to an Ivy from there, I still feel like that school was WAY too large. At the collegiate level there seemed a qualitative difference in those students who came from smaller schools. My impression was that they gained a deep inner confidence from having developed in an environment where they were a student, an individual, and a known quantity and not an anonymous cog in the machine.

My sample set may well be flawed in that so many of those students came from not only small schools, but small elite private schools - so it's not truly reflective of a small school experience. Still, it gives me great pause about sending my children to such an enormous H.S. like Oakton.

[Anonymous]

I actually went to Oakton...graduated over a decade years ago, but had a wonderful experience. I am still close with pretty much all my friends from HS as well. We talk about how unusual that is as well. We all went to different colleges & many have moved to different states, but we continue to keep in touch, especially as we are all having children now. I also work in a school in the vienna area & believe the schools are top notch. There is a reason why housing prices are higher in certain parts of fairfax co. The ES/MS that feed into Oakton are also good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I actually went to Oakton...graduated over a decade years ago, but had a wonderful experience. I am still close with pretty much all my friends from HS as well. We talk about how unusual that is as well. We all went to different colleges & many have moved to different states, but we continue to keep in touch, especially as we are all having children now. I also work in a school in the vienna area & believe the schools are top notch. There is a reason why housing prices are higher in certain parts of fairfax co. The ES/MS that feed into Oakton are also good.

OP here. I went to FCPS myself, and I was wondering if the PP or others could answer: are there "gangs" at Oakton high school? Are there a lot of AP classes offered? How big are the classes? Like 30 students?

I don't know how this thread turned into a discussion about how big Oakton high school is overall. Personally, I don't think that matters to me. I'm more interested in the individual class sizes -- like how many kids in a Math class, Spanish class, etc., not how many kids in Freshman, Sophomore class.

Also, what are the kids like? When I was going to FCPS, in high school, I would say that most kids were very interested in grades and most kids were "clean cut". By clean cut, I mean, no gangs, definitely headed to college, they were involved in afterschool activities, etc.

And besides the town of Oakton itself, where do the kids live that go to Oakton High School? I looked at the boundaries, and I couldn't really tell.

TIA!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I actually went to Oakton...graduated over a decade years ago, but had a wonderful experience. I am still close with pretty much all my friends from HS as well. We talk about how unusual that is as well. We all went to different colleges & many have moved to different states, but we continue to keep in touch, especially as we are all having children now. I also work in a school in the vienna area & believe the schools are top notch. There is a reason why housing prices are higher in certain parts of fairfax co. The ES/MS that feed into Oakton are also good.

OP here. I went to FCPS myself, and I was wondering if the PP or others could answer: are there "gangs" at Oakton high school? Are there a lot of AP classes offered? How big are the classes? Like 30 students?

I don't know how this thread turned into a discussion about how big Oakton high school is overall. Personally, I don't think that matters to me. I'm more interested in the individual class sizes -- like how many kids in a Math class, Spanish class, etc., not how many kids in Freshman, Sophomore class.

Also, what are the kids like? When I was going to FCPS, in high school, I would say that most kids were very interested in grades and most kids were "clean cut". By clean cut, I mean, no gangs, definitely headed to college, they were involved in afterschool activities, etc.

And besides the town of Oakton itself, where do the kids live that go to Oakton High School? I looked at the boundaries, and I couldn't really tell.

TIA!

I am the poster who mentioned the overall size of Oakton High school. There are a lot of AP classes offered at the school. And these classes are quite large -- well over 30 students per class. The same goes with honors classes. As far as I know there are no gangs at Oakton High school. And I would say that at least 90% of the kids are headed to college and the colleges they are accepted by runs the gamut, as I suspect is the norm for all public high schools.

Funny enough, most of student body comes from the Herndon, Oak Hill, Chantillyish (Chantilly - Fair Oaks area), and Fairfax area with actually not a lot of students from Oakton at the school (i do live in Oakton) . The boundary is really quite strange.

[Anonymous]

PP who went to OHS. I took AP classes and plenty were offered. My friends and I were all involved in after school activities and sports. The students and community supported all the sports games. Most everyone went to college and there were no gangs while I was there. This was 12 years ago and while things may change, I don't believe it has at Oakton. Some students from the school I work at transition to Oakton and they are definitely good 'clean cut' kids. The boundaries are strange. If I were a student today I believe the boundaries have changed and I would actually attend South Lakes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP who went to OHS. I took AP classes and plenty were offered. My friends and I were all involved in after school activities and sports. The students and community supported all the sports games. Most everyone went to college and there were no gangs while I was there. This was 12 years ago and while things may change, I don't believe it has at Oakton. Some students from the school I work at transition to Oakton and they are definitely good 'clean cut' kids. The boundaries are strange. If I were a student today I believe the boundaries have changed and I would actually attend South Lakes.

OP here. Thanks, to the PP and all your posts. Your description, PP, sounds a lot like the high school I attended -- Langley HS -- lots of APs, most everyone goes to college, no gangs, and clean cut kids. I also read a lot of good reviews of Oakton HS in www.greatschools.net.