Do the middle schools in MCPS just suck?

[Anonymous]

That age is an awkward time and kids' behavior compared to ES or HS is not good. Teachers spend a lot of time managing behavior. Hence, there are fewer minutes in each class period to teach.

I have a lot of admiration for MS teachers!

What's nice is they change classes and have the option for electives.

The PE and music departments at my kids' middle school was especially strong (Julius West).

[Anonymous]

TPMS was great for both my kids - one magnet, one not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope hs and es suck too. It's really bad admin who mismanage the teachers leading to low morale, job insecurity, and teaching kids it's ok to be criminals bc everyone will just work to be hush hush; as they take it out on teachers who do their jobs reporting.

Not really. A lot of kids seem to prefer HS much more than MS, and ES is much better for memories than MS. It seems like many kids don't seem to get much enjoyment or forget a lot about middle school because it's apparently so "cringe" to them.

Agreed. My kid’s ES is a lovely place. My older kid’s MS feels like the place where dreams go to die. It’s joyless and there’s not much community spirit-I think the lack of extracurricular activities has something to do with it. Kids do private sports because there are so few spots on school teams and our school only has a few extracurriculars, most of which you have to pay for and mostly on a single day of the week

[Anonymous]

My kids had a great MS experience.

[Anonymous]

The BOE pointed out yesterday in its Board Business meeting that its middle schools have the lowest Maryland School Report Card scores in the system and that middle school seems to be the system’s weak point. So it seems that MCPS is aware that their middle schools suck.

The question is why they allow this to be the case despite knowing this?

[Anonymous]

Direct quote from MS leadership “we are here to get them through asap with limited damage”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope hs and es suck too. It's really bad admin who mismanage the teachers leading to low morale, job insecurity, and teaching kids it's ok to be criminals bc everyone will just work to be hush hush; as they take it out on teachers who do their jobs reporting.

Not really. A lot of kids seem to prefer HS much more than MS, and ES is much better for memories than MS. It seems like many kids don't seem to get much enjoyment or forget a lot about middle school because it's apparently so "cringe" to them.

My DS went to MS from 2017-2020 and yeah, I would +1. The trends that were popular while he was in middle school were hideously bad, and he also agreed that it was a very weird and rough time.

[Anonymous]

My DD’s experience from Pre K-12 goes from this according to her:

HS > ES >>> MS

High school - It’s more fun, and experiencing. You generally have more freedom compared to elementary and middle school and there’s more opportunities to make better connections before graduation
Elementary school - Mostly meant for memories and nostalgia. Depends on family relations with the child during this time. DD loved ES for the memories. There are more events like homecoming, FB games, sports and clubs, prom, pep rallies
Middle school - Obviously the weak link out of the three and yeah, DD had many awkward memories during this time. It’s a very rough transition between ES and MS. DD also had difficulty making friends during this time but had a small group of friends prior to freshman year at high school. I don’t blame many kids for saying middle school sucked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The BOE pointed out yesterday in its Board Business meeting that its middle schools have the lowest Maryland School Report Card scores in the system and that middle school seems to be the system’s weak point. So it seems that MCPS is aware that their middle schools suck.

The question is why they allow this to be the case despite knowing this?

A lot of middle schools report cards seem to barely even recover after COVID. Compared to elementary and high school post-COVID, middle schools here in MoCo are reprogressing much slower, even after 5 years.