Mr. G moved to Montgomery Knolls this year.

MKES is getting Mr. G from Piney Branch? From everything I have heard, he's fantastic.

fyi on the new principal. He came from Piney Branch Elementary in Takoma Park and was well-loved by families AND teachers there. It has one of the strongest total set of teachers at any school.

I hope the MKES parents like him as much as we all did. Our school was crushed to see him leave.

Anonymous wrote:Good luck.
Just in case you're still interested in MKES, 16 staff memebers are leaving at the end of this year and at least a few more are trying to transfer elsewhere. They had a new principal this year and things are run quite differently.

The former principal had a high turnover rate every year and drove a lot of (good) staff away. So it's probably good news that the new principal is running things differently.

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else know about this or have details? We have DC started kindergarten at MKES in August.

My child goes to MKES and I have actually heard from teachers that they like the new principal better and feel more supported this year. I know that some of the teachers leaving are doing so because they got teaching jobs closer to where they live.

Anyone else know about this or have details? We have DC started kindergarten at MKES in August.

Good luck.
Just in case you're still interested in MKES, 16 staff memebers are leaving at the end of this year and at least a few more are trying to transfer elsewhere. They had a new principal this year and things are run quite differently.

Anonymous wrote:Wow. White kids are few and far between at Montgomery Knolls. Are the rest in private school?

OP here. Thank you, everyone. Just to clarify, I was not the above poster. We decided that the house we were lokking af will not work for us but we loved the feel of the neighborhood, so we will keep looking. Thanks!

Anonymous wrote:Wow. White kids are few and far between at Montgomery Knolls. Are the rest in private school?

While this isn't true, I am at least glad we have one less racist parent to worry about. K in Montgomery Knolls, we've had a great experience in a diverse (probably 50% white if that matters) class setting. Have heard great things about Pine Crest. Eastern gets so-so reviews, I'm hoping in 5-6 years that as the current cohort of kids goes into Eastern things improve. We've had neighbors who have gone to Blair and thrived, going on to all of the top public and private colleges people rave about here.

And, the Woodmoor neighborhood is truly like no other I've seen around here. Welcoming, friendly, down to earth, and just a wonderful place to live.

Anonymous wrote:Wow. White kids are few and far between at Montgomery Knolls. Are the rest in private school?

Woodmoor can't populate the entire school. And I think they may even allow non-whites to live there now.

Wow. White kids are few and far between at Montgomery Knolls. Are the rest in private school?

We've been very happy with Montgomery Knolls and have also heard good things about Pinecrest. There is a nice mix of kids from different backgrounds at MKES, and in the past several years, a much larger comtingency of kids from Woodmoor have been attending.

Where is the house you are looking at? Woodmoor is a great friendly neighborhood!

We have an incoming kindergartener in the fall, so can't speak first hand to Montgomery Knolls just yet. However, we thought long and hard about where to send our DC, ultimately choosing MKES and we are very excited about it. We toured the school, sat in on some classes, and talked extensively to our Woodmoor neighbors with kids already there. We loved everything we saw, and virtually everyone we spoke with spoke very highly of the school, teachers, etc. Ditto for Pine Crest, the grades 3-5 school which is actually in our neighborhood.

On top of all that, you can't beat Woodmoor for an awesome, active, family friendly neighborhood.

Good Luck!

We are considering a house in Woodmoor. We have two kids under 4, so are planning for schools starting with kindergarten. I searched the archives but didn't find much recent discussion about Montgomery Knolls or Pine Crest and a little on Eastern that was pretty negative. Can anyone share their experiences over the past few years with these schools, plus Blair? Thanks!