Avoid Ashburton elementary.

Anonymous wrote:We have two elementary age kids. Looking for a school cluster that's not overcrowded, where the majority of students are performing at or above grade level in testing, and we don't have to worry about daily fights or frequent disruptive incidents. Recommendations to checkout?

Wood Acres elementary in Bethesda. (Stars there then Pyle and Whitman)

Anonymous wrote:We have two elementary age kids. Looking for a school cluster that's not overcrowded, where the majority of students are performing at or above grade level in testing, and we don't have to worry about daily fights or frequent disruptive incidents. Recommendations to checkout?

Stay away from east county.your kids will be eaten alive.

Cold Spring/Cabin John/Wootton. Not overcrowded. As a matter of fact, Cold Spring is underenrolled.

All the MS and HS have fights. It’s worse right now, well last year, because of the problems with that age group and Covid.
I’m assuming that will improve across the board as the kids age up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh, really? Well, I guess then if they're all overcrowded what our best option is considering the other factors?

1. a residence you can afford, in
2. an area you like, with
3. transportation options that work for your transportation needs.

This is good advice. And there are many schools all around the county that are not overcrowded. MCPS has 136 elementary schools, about half of which have 50 or more empty seats available. You can look up this past year's enrollment and projections, capacity, average class sizes, and other info here:

https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/sharedaccountability/glance/

Anonymous wrote:Oh, really? Well, I guess then if they're all overcrowded what our best option is considering the other factors?

1. a residence you can afford, in
2. an area you like, with
3. transportation options that work for your transportation needs.

Pyle was overcrowded by 100% capacity - so they were at something like 200% but then building was done and its now officially "under" capacity even though the numbers are still huge.

Horrible school of course, but the only bridge between a variety of good ES (5 I think?) and Whitman.

Beverly Farms/Hoover/Churchill has been great for all 3 of my children (2 still in ES and 1 in Hoover). Parents are also down to earth (more so in elementary but that’s when you interact more anyways) and the PTA is active. The teachers seem to stay. There is a neighborhood pool that almost all of the elem school feeds into. We are walkers to all 3 schools which s also great. We love it!

This county is huge - 1.1 million people, 25(+) high schools. Start with where your jobs are and your commute, then consider type of neighborhood and budget, after that, people can recommend elementary schools/neighborhoods for you. ES probably has the most variability, but is also most closely correlated with a neighborhood (and presumably, neighbors with similar goals to you.) The HS cluster isn't as critical because there are special programs and high academic achievers at all of them. There are also current HS expansions and 2 new high schools being finished in the next 5 years which will impact articulation.

It's going to depend on your budget and commute.

Anonymous wrote:The is no cluster that is not overcrowded. There may be individual schools.

Not true. Neither Wootton nor Sherwood clusters are overcrowded.

Oh, really? Well, I guess then if they're all overcrowded what our best option is considering the other factors?

The is no cluster that is not overcrowded. There may be individual schools.

We have two elementary age kids. Looking for a school cluster that's not overcrowded, where the majority of students are performing at or above grade level in testing, and we don't have to worry about daily fights or frequent disruptive incidents. Recommendations to checkout?