Reply to Tell me about the schools in Herndon/Chantilly - Crossfield, Oak Hill, Navy, Fox Mill, Lees Corner

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Reply to "Tell me about the schools in Herndon/Chantilly - Crossfield, Oak Hill, Navy, Fox Mill, Lees Corner"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here, really not as concerned about STEM/STEAM as I am about the community and whether the school is well regarded and families like it there. There are a couple schools that get brought up in this forum a lot and fortunately those are in areas we can't afford to live in, I just want to make sure we're avoiding schools like that where parents get all up in arms about AAP vs General Ed, or are racists, or things like that. We are a mixed race family (half Asian/half white), and I hope we'd be welcomed in these communities, I think there are decent sized asian/south asian populations?[/quote]

You might want to avoid Navy then. The AAP vs Gen Ed culture is real and sadly I feel like it’s ruined the experience for us. The teachers are great, but when you split everyone into  “the smart kids” and “the not smart kids”, and everyone knows who is in which class, you’re setting yourself up for a not so great learning experience. If we had a choice, we would have chosen Fox Mill. It’s a super tight knit community and everyone (parents, teachers, kids) are lovely. If you value community, those are your people. [/quote]

+1 Navy does absolutely nothing to try to integrate AAP and Gen Ed kids. There are no team activities. AAP and Gen Ed teachers don’t plan units together. Everyone does their own thing (all upper grade teachers departmentalized) and it’s a mess.[/quote]

I had a gen ed kid at Navy who grew up going there so she knew a lot of AAP kids as well. Those friendships died, as the divide is steep so they never interacted. Even at recess, the AAP teachers stood together and the gen ed teachers stood together on the other side of the playground. I had an older child there prior, who went to Hunters Woods for AAP prior to the change. I LOVED that at that school everyone was mixed for specials--each child was assigned a number 1-7 and all the "1s" were together each day for their special. He didn't know any of the kids there in gen ed or magnet prior to going there, but at least got out of his AAP group for a portion of ea day. It can be done, is all I'm saying. When he was at Navy, the afterschool activities were the usual ones (karate, etc) but when  the younger kid went there, by that time the school was majority Asian (maybe 55%?) and even the activities had changed--every math and science activity/ competition under the sun was now available, but according to my kid, "only the AAP kids go to those". I don't know, it was a weird vibe by the end. I think 7 years in one school is too long anyways...[/quote]

I agree with this.  Navy does a terrible job integrating the kids.  It's our base school and each of my DCs went into 3rd grade AAP with plenty of close friends who went to gen ed (or PBL, as they call it).  The divide was immediate because they never saw the PBL kids again during the day since even specials were all with AAP kids.  In 4th grade they start to mix by specials group, but the damage is already done.  By the time they graduated, none of my DCs had any close friends in PBL.  It's bizarre to watch happen and it's from both sides - neither wants to spend time with the other.[/quote]

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