Please share your elementary experience if it was in a Rockville area school

[Anonymous]

Hi-- We are considering a few neighborhoods in Rockville, that are zoned for various elementary schools: Beall, College Gardens, Fallsmead and Ritchie Park. If you have a child with an IEP that has gone through any of these schools, can you please share your experience? Good or bad? Id like to get an idea if any of these schools, communities, teachers, administration are better or worse for our almost kindergartener with an IEP and how the accessibility to good services is at these schools. Thanks in advance for your help!

[Anonymous]

Op, you posted the same question just the other day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op, you posted the same question just the other day.

Yes, I posted it on MD public schools and was directed to post it here. I haven't posted it on this board though. I will search though in case someone else posted the same question and got answers.

[Anonymous]

Its probably going to be hit or miss depending on your situation. We know families who love the school we are at and we haven't had a great experience. We found they are far more attentive to kids who are higher needs/acting out than the quiet kids who have a variety of needs and those just fall through the cracks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Its probably going to be hit or miss depending on your situation. We know families who love the school we are at and we haven't had a great experience. We found they are far more attentive to kids who are higher needs/acting out than the quiet kids who have a variety of needs and those just fall through the cracks.

Yeah, I think this is probably across the board everywhere.

[Anonymous]

So true. Even within a school it depends on the sped teacher assigned.

[Anonymous]

There really isn't a neighborhood school anywhere that's a SN nirvana.

Within Montgomery county the only school I've consistently heard praised is Bethesda Elementary -- and even that depends on what your child's needs / diagnosis is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So true. Even within a school it depends on the sped teacher assigned.

This is so true.

[Anonymous]

I agree with the people above that there are too many variables for you to get a clear answer. In all schools you will have to be an advocate for your child.

What kind of services does your child need?

We've generally been happy with the staff and community at Beall, but they just don't have the capacity/resources to provide the social skills help that would be optimal for my kid's needs. That would be better for our child in an Aspergers program, but that isn't a good fit for other reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the people above that there are too many variables for you to get a clear answer. In all schools you will have to be an advocate for your child.

What kind of services does your child need?

We've generally been happy with the staff and community at Beall, but they just don't have the capacity/resources to provide the social skills help that would be optimal for my kid's needs. That would be better for our child in an Aspergers program, but that isn't a good fit for other reasons.

Thabks for your input. My ds needs speech, ot and will definitely need extra support when it comes to reading etc. A mainstream class with spec ed support is really what he needs.

[Anonymous]

I haven't been to Beall or had a child there. But they house the Augmentative/Alternative Communication Program so in theory they should have very strong supports for Speech, OT, and reading. Kids in AAC need all three.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I haven't been to Beall or had a child there. But they house the Augmentative/Alternative Communication Program so in theory they should have very strong supports for Speech, OT, and reading. Kids in AAC need all three.

Great, thanks. This is helpful to know!

[Anonymous]

We had an IEP at College Gardens. We did a lot of private support and considered anything MCPS supplied an added bonus. There was just not that much available for a dyslexic kid. We did like the school in general though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had an IEP at College Gardens. We did a lot of private support and considered anything MCPS supplied an added bonus. There was just not that much available for a dyslexic kid. We did like the school in general though.

Thabks for sharing your experience. Does CG have a reading specialist or anyone specific who works with kids that have dyslexia?

[Anonymous]

If you can, supplement with private. Our experience with speech is they group kids who are not similar in needs/ability together for 30 minute sessions with 3-4 kids per group so each kid is only really getting a few minutes of attention. They work on common issues the kids are having but if your child has different needs, like ours, those needs get ignored. Also, MCPS, depending on the school does not work a lot on handwriting and other fine/gross motor so that is something you really need to do private and work at home with.