This week so far:
Monday - student of month assembly
Tuesday - Military family recognition with popsicles
Wednesday - Walk to Basilica for mass
Thursday - All day Lenten retreat

Instruction time = very very little just throwing a ton of tests at them when they are in the classroom.

Anonymous wrote:Respectfully, OP it's LENT - the most holy season of our faith. I went to Catholic Schools in the Northeast (so, not the Arlington Diocese) and going to Mass every Friday, and then during a feast day, and then to Stations weekly during Lent was normal, and to be expected.

With regards to your complaint regarding instructional time - there is actually a lot to be learned by going to mass this frequently - among them patience, the ability to sit still and calm their mind, reverence, humility. These are all characteristics which many modern-day children (and adults) seem to lack lately, but which will serve them well in the long-run. I'd rather they learned and practiced this, than they learned to do busy work.

Finally, if your kid isn't getting the education you would like, that's on YOU. Move them, please. I have multiple kids there. They've all tested, without fail, high on those MAP tests, compared to the national average. And no, they're not naturally geniuses. So, clearly, the kids are learning SOMETHING there, compared to the rest of our nation. If your kids aren't learning enough, by your standards, move them.

As a Protestant whose kids regularly sit through chapel and long church services, I pretty much love the bolded. Saw it in my own peers growing up, even in a time when kids were expected to have longer attention spans than they are today.

Respectfully, OP it's LENT - the most holy season of our faith. I went to Catholic Schools in the Northeast (so, not the Arlington Diocese) and going to Mass every Friday, and then during a feast day, and then to Stations weekly during Lent was normal, and to be expected.

With regards to your complaint regarding instructional time - there is actually a lot to be learned by going to mass this frequently - among them patience, the ability to sit still and calm their mind, reverence, humility. These are all characteristics which many modern-day children (and adults) seem to lack lately, but which will serve them well in the long-run. I'd rather they learned and practiced this, than they learned to do busy work.

Finally, if your kid isn't getting the education you would like, that's on YOU. Move them, please. I have multiple kids there. They've all tested, without fail, high on those MAP tests, compared to the national average. And no, they're not naturally geniuses. So, clearly, the kids are learning SOMETHING there, compared to the rest of our nation. If your kids aren't learning enough, by your standards, move them.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

How’d they go all in on inclusion? (Other than pausing on announcing honor roll last year)?

The program for ids with intellectual disabilities was not in place but now those kids are all over social media. There certainly wasn't an inclusion week. Also the Honor Roll was published and a big deal.

Yuck. What a horrible post. You should be ashamed. Good for St. Mary’s and other schools who actually at least try to include all the children in a family who may have varied intellectual abilities.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

How’d they go all in on inclusion? (Other than pausing on announcing honor roll last year)?

The program for ids with intellectual disabilities was not in place but now those kids are all over social media. There certainly wasn't an inclusion week. Also the Honor Roll was published and a big deal.

Are you talking about their Mater Dei program? Good for St. Mary's for actually following their Catholic beliefs and also providing an education for kids with intellectual disabilities. There are hyper-competitive, high-academic pressure private schools out there that you can attend, PP, if you want your child to only be with kids of the highest ability.

Unpopular opinion but I loved the inclusion assemblies they did last week. My kid came home so excited to talk about all the different ways people interact in the world. It made me proud to be a catholic school parent.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

How’d they go all in on inclusion? (Other than pausing on announcing honor roll last year)?

The program for ids with intellectual disabilities was not in place but now those kids are all over social media. There certainly wasn't an inclusion week. Also the Honor Roll was published and a big deal.

Explains a lot.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

How’d they go all in on inclusion? (Other than pausing on announcing honor roll last year)?

The program for ids with intellectual disabilities was not in place but now those kids are all over social media. There certainly wasn't an inclusion week. Also the Honor Roll was published and a big deal.

Anonymous wrote:I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

How’d they go all in on inclusion? (Other than pausing on announcing honor roll last year)?

I used to work at SMS many years ago. It was not well run. Trust me, teachers do not like the constant disruptions as it makes their life really difficult. It was hard to get through the curriculum.

Also there were several students who would have been better served in a public school due to learning or behavioral differences. (This was before they went all in on inclusion.)

I am just repeating what everyone has said, but if you are this unhappy, you need to make it known to your family and/or the administration. However, you won't exact that much change. It is a school that is very set in its ways.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s once a year — get over it or leave catholic school.

It’s not once a year. It’s multiple weeks a year. There’s always some random “feast” (that most Catholics I know have never heard of) as an excuse to not have class. I grew up Catholic and went to a catholic school through HS — never heard of all these feasts and special days! Is this diocese the only one that recognizes them?

Then, on top of the random feasts, now we have Inclusion Week, Bullying Week, etc etc. — each with special assemblies that take time from academics.

How about MATH week? Can we start that?

My dc goes to BI with a lot of kids from St Mary’s and they all seem well-prepared for high school. While I believe your complaints are genuine, I don’t think they’re all that valid.

Really op, your choices are:
1) Talk to the principal about your concerns,
2) Move your kids to a different school, or
3) Complain on DCUM for years until you send your kids to BI and then start complaining about them.

OP is a troll. A parent with this level of concern would change schools. They have it out for the school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe OP secretly doesn't want St. Mary's to get bigger and regularly posts these threads to discourage others from applying.

Or like someone else said, wants to leave but spouse and kid(s) disagree.

Instead of the idiotic, irrelevant passive aggressive, ad hominem attacks, why don’t you tell me: How much classroom time is appropriate? How much mass is too much? I get the sense that some parents would be fine with mass 5x a week.

I also get the sense that some parents don’t care about or emphasize academics bc their kids aren’t very good at academics, so it’s better for them to dilute what they’re not good at.

I don’t disagree that some Catholic schools go overboard with mass, other services, assemblies, etc. but you don’t seem capable of answering these questions either. There’s no magic formula, one way or the other.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe OP secretly doesn't want St. Mary's to get bigger and regularly posts these threads to discourage others from applying.

Or like someone else said, wants to leave but spouse and kid(s) disagree.

Instead of the idiotic, irrelevant passive aggressive, ad hominem attacks, why don’t you tell me: How much classroom time is appropriate? How much mass is too much? I get the sense that some parents would be fine with mass 5x a week.

I also get the sense that some parents don’t care about or emphasize academics bc their kids aren’t very good at academics, so it’s better for them to dilute what they’re not good at.

OP, you never answer the obvious question. Why should anyone else answer yours?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe OP secretly doesn't want St. Mary's to get bigger and regularly posts these threads to discourage others from applying.

Or like someone else said, wants to leave but spouse and kid(s) disagree.

Instead of the idiotic, irrelevant passive aggressive, ad hominem attacks, why don’t you tell me: How much classroom time is appropriate? How much mass is too much? I get the sense that some parents would be fine with mass 5x a week.

I also get the sense that some parents don’t care about or emphasize academics bc their kids aren’t very good at academics, so it’s better for them to dilute what they’re not good at.

DP. Frankly, I think there’s a ton of over-exaggeration happening on this thread. I don’t really think the school is all-Catholic all-the-time like the OP is complaining about. I suspect there’s still plenty of focus on academics, but that the OP is choosing to disregard that.

I also think the OP should do something if she’s that upset. Leave the school. Private schools are a choice, and you can choose to leave if you don’t like the way the school is run. This isn’t that hard.

Complaining on DCUM will get you nowhere.