No experience with this school but every public school I've ever worked at (or my kids have gone to) is the same as the PP's description regarding dismissal. If you plan on waiting outside for your child, wait in the same place everyday. I always did this and it was no big deal. At my school, walkers are dismissed through the front door and that's that. The K walkers are dismissed through a separate door to their parents/babysitters, etc only. Everyone else just leaves and either walks home or finds their parent/sitter outside.

Our kids started at another nearby school and then our boundary was changed to Mantua. So we've had experience with young kids at both a smallish FCPS elementary and at Mantua. Yes, it's huge and yes, you as a parent will feel that, especially at things like the carnival or back-to-school night. But amazingly the kids don't seem to notice how huge it is. My kids just look at me like I'm nuts when I talk about how big the school is, and they swear that they never feel lost in the crowd. The school does a lot to make it feel smaller and I do think it works for the most part.

My only real complaint is how they handle things like dismissal, where they basically wash their hands of any real accountability. At our old school, cars drove up and displayed the kids' names on the windshield for the teachers to call through walkie talkies, while the kids waited in the cafeteria for their names to be called. At Mantua it's a free-for-all of kids milling around everywhere while parents honk and wave and basically do anything they can to flag down their kids. There are teachers there directing traffic, but they play no role at all in making sure kids get into the right cars with the right people. The whole thing makes me uncomfortable every time I see it in action.

I can't tell you specifically about K because we moved here after all our kids were out of kindergarten, but we love the school. It does have art, music and PE, as well as band, chorus and strings in later grades (and chamber strings and chorus for kids who are seriously good). Because the school is large (close to 900 kids I believe this year), the kids eat lunch and have recess in shifts by grade. The little ones bring a mid-morning snack up through 4th grade to make sure they don't get hungry.

Our kids are all very different personality-wise and academically, and we've just been amazed by how approachable the administrators are and the care the principal and her staff take to listen to parents' input when deciding things like classroom placement. Teacher-wise, we've had a couple we didn't care for, several good ones, and a probably higher than average number of outstanding ones. Tje PTA is very active and organizes a lot of activities--the only one they don't have and I wish they did is a science fair, which my older kids had at schools before we moved here and loved.

I've heard it's a fantastic school. Gets good test scores. Parents are very involved. Feeds into Frost/Woodson. Seems like a no brainer to send my kid there. But I'm on the fence. It houses almost 1000 kids. That seems so big. There are 4 kindy classes. I think the principal said she tries to keep the classes between 22-26 with 1 teacher and 1 aide, but there are no guarantees. I'm not sure what the upper limit for class size is.

Can someone provide some insight into the school? Does it have art, music, PE? What about computers and science? Recess daily? How long is lunch?

I only have a child going into K so I'm looking for answers specifically about K, not necessarily other grades. I know I could wait until the open house to get these questions answered, but by May, I hope to have made a decision where to send my child.