My advice is to read community reviews on a school and ask around. That's how I decided not to send my child to Northview in Bowie. I read that the school is overcrowded and has some bullying issues. Also, you could visit the school to get a feel for the climate.

The "Heights" thing? Ridiculous. That's not how you pick a school. Go visit some schools. It's usually pretty apparent when there's a problem. When I visited our local school, I got a fairly unvarnished look as compared to the private school tour where they are really trying to show you at every turn how fantastic everything is. The principal really didn't seem to care if my kids were coming or not. Kind of refreshing. School was already overcrowded and there were trailers out back.

Since you haven't moved yet, I would look first into schools that seem to be performing well academically. I would be very surprised that some of the high performing schools in the county also have high disciplinary issues. Usually the two do not go hand in hand.

Anonymous wrote:In PG County if there have been issues, then the children wear uniforms. Some of the parents at our school wanted uniforms because they had transferred from schools that had uniforms and found that it was easier. We learned about the policy and still had the option to vote to wear uniforms. It was voted down.

I also don't think this is accurate at all. Our school has uniforms because the middle school it feeds into has uniforms and parents voted for having continuity with uniforms throughout. It had nothing to do with behavioral issues at the elementary school. Maybe at the middle school it did, I don't really know, but not at the elementary.

Anonymous wrote:In PG County if there have been issues, then the children wear uniforms. Some of the parents at our school wanted uniforms because they had transferred from schools that had uniforms and found that it was easier. We learned about the policy and still had the option to vote to wear uniforms. It was voted down.

That's ridiculous. Uniform policies at PGCPS schools are set by schools and parents. There is a system-wide dress code -- http://www.pgcps.org/~procedur/5000/5152.pdf -- and a set policy for instituting a school uniform policy -- http://www.pgcps.org/~procedur/1000/0600.pdf . It has noting to do with whether on not there "have been issues" at a school.

Anonymous wrote:In PG County if there have been issues, then the children wear uniforms. Some of the parents at our school wanted uniforms because they had transferred from schools that had uniforms and found that it was easier. We learned about the policy and still had the option to vote to wear uniforms. It was voted down.

I don't think that uniforms are the best indication of discipline problems. Our local elementary school has uniforms but it was due to parent input not as a Scarlet letter for bad behavior.

In PG County if there have been issues, then the children wear uniforms. Some of the parents at our school wanted uniforms because they had transferred from schools that had uniforms and found that it was easier. We learned about the policy and still had the option to vote to wear uniforms. It was voted down.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi:

We will be sending our child who will be entering as a 4th grader. While it is easy to find out the MSA Scores to find out the academic reputation of the school, how do you check on whether if it is a disciplinary/violence prone school?


We are planning on living somewhere in the north county part of the school. I have heard that if any school has the name "Heights" in it, don't send your child there. Also to stay away from schools which border DC.


Thank you

If you follow the DC border from West to East, you get the following schools: Westbrook, Somerset, Rosemary Hills/Chevy Chase, Rock Creek Forest, East Silver Spring/Piney Branch, and Takoma/Piney Branch. That's a pretty impressive list of schools, some of the best in the county.

Those are all MoCo schools. PG border of DC boundary schools are Chavez, Mt. Rainier, Chillum, Seat Pleasant, Bradbury Heights, etc.

Anonymous wrote:Hi:

We will be sending our child who will be entering as a 4th grader. While it is easy to find out the MSA Scores to find out the academic reputation of the school, how do you check on whether if it is a disciplinary/violence prone school?


We are planning on living somewhere in the north county part of the school. I have heard that if any school has the name "Heights" in it, don't send your child there. Also to stay away from schools which border DC.


Thank you

If you follow the DC border from West to East, you get the following schools: Westbrook, Somerset, Rosemary Hills/Chevy Chase, Rock Creek Forest, East Silver Spring/Piney Branch, and Takoma/Piney Branch. That's a pretty impressive list of schools, some of the best in the county.

in high schools at least recent graduates tell me many many more police come to school and larger crimes occur than are reported in the newspaper crime reports. They seem at some schools to try very hard to keep things quiet.

Hmm, not sure where you're looking, but I don't think the "no Heights" rule is all that great. Berwyn Heights is our neighborhood elementary and granted we're not to 4th grade yet, but neighbor children are and we've never heard anything about violence at school from them or their parents. A couple of behavioral problem kids, sure, but not violence. I've never seen any kids in uniform fighting after school either, which was sadly something I saw a fair amount of in our old neighborhood, though I am pretty sure those were 5th/6th graders.

Hi:

We will be sending our child who will be entering as a 4th grader. While it is easy to find out the MSA Scores to find out the academic reputation of the school, how do you check on whether if it is a disciplinary/violence prone school?


We are planning on living somewhere in the north county part of the school. I have heard that if any school has the name "Heights" in it, don't send your child there. Also to stay away from schools which border DC.


Thank you