The classes assign an excessive amount of unnecessary homework without providing any real…read moredifference in instruction compared to standard honors classes at most high schools. The only noticeable distinctions are the heavier workload, limited opportunities for social interaction during the day, and additional fees--for example, charging $75 just to allow casual dress, despite already paying a substantial tuition. Even chapel, which should be a central part of the school's identity, only takes place once every other week. Families like mine are investing in this school expecting consistent spiritual growth, not minimal engagement. There needs to be a stronger commitment to both academic balance and faith-based education.

2020 PVCP Panthets Girls State Championships Head coach: C…read moreSeyler, assistant coaches: N Seyler, M Davis, D Kressin. * Undefeated season * MVP players of the season and State Championships * Outstanding defense and scoring team

This sucks!!!!Some teachers are good(mr chandler, ms carino) but others are terrible! a biology…read moreteacher literally told us she would gag us if we didnt stop talking. terrible!! would not recommend. my childs history teacher gave him a 200 point packet and took all of points away because he used-erasable pen!!!! dont go here!!!

Basically, guys all Basis schools will provide your child with the best education possible. They…read moreare usually 1- 2 grades ahead of every other school. Most people who complain have children that just can't keep up. But give your child the opportunity to discover their educational potential. Even if they can't make it here, they can easily breeze through any other school they transfer to. The teacher's offer student hours after school. If your child needs help. Even the students group chat with each other to help each other out. They provide you with detailed information about what they are teaching and constant progress reports on how your child is doing. They even have an app where you can directly talk to any teacher.. Recently thier sports programs have been doing fantastic. Basketbal,l Soccer, Tennis, Golf, Swimming, Volleyball and they dominate academic competitions as well. It has really round out my daughter's education. She will have no problem in any college she decides to attend. I hope this helps get in as early as you can.

Many family friends have kids going to this district and a few family members do too and all I've…read moreheard is negative. Fights, drugs, etc. I went schools in this district a while back and they were awful. Sad to hear they haven't improved.

This district is solely based on appearances over function. Having worked for this district and…read morebeing told i needed to change a students grades from failing to passing and having the unfortunate luck for both my children to go to these schools as well. The teachers utilyze less instruction and more forced computer interface to establish their own status quo. This last lockdown implement during the solar eclipse also shows how little this district instills true observational learning capabilities for its younger students. If you have an out from this district take it. If you have children that wish to learn , truly learn then avoid this district and its fluffy policies that change at whim.

I absolutely love this school and the staff there. My daughter has flourished since starting here…read moreand the spanish immersion program is a huge plus! I would highly recommend this school to anyone for their K-4th grader.

My daughter absolutely loves it here. She's so excited to go to school every morning. She really…read morelikes her teacher and enjoys the before and after school care. Some of my favorite things about this school is the fact that breakfast and lunch are FREE! Yes FREE! and healthy. Their before and after care is so affordable. And all of the staff are really friendly. The building its self could use some TLC but it looks like they are currently working on making some improvements.

My husband and I are incredibly grateful for CMS, where our daughter has attended for the past…read moreyear. As this was our first time searching for a school, we researched and toured nearly 10 preschools in our area (mainly Montessori, but also some more traditional ones). As a stay-at-home mom, I was also apprehensive about starting our daughter at 2 1/2 years old and even considered waiting longer. If it weren't for CMS, we probably would have waited, because I truly believe no other school offered the environment that was most important to us--especially with her starting so young. The Montessori approach is clearly implemented in every aspect of CMS, both academically and socially. For us--and for our daughter's personality--the nurturing and respectful environment were the most important values in our search. Most of the teachers have been at CMS for over a decade, which was not the case at any of the other schools we toured. I love that our daughter can build a relationship with her teachers over the years, rather than changing to a new teacher every year. I believe this consistency provides a strong foundation for her academic and emotional development. The first thing I always tell people when they ask about CMS is this: At all the other schools, yes, I connected with the director or whoever was giving the tour on some level--but I'd only get maybe five minutes or less of face time with a teacher, and I always left feeling unimpressed with their classroom presence and curriculum. I'm truly impressed with the CMS curriculum and culture. On other school tours, I received more papers and booklets, but honestly, I felt a disconnect between what was written and what I saw. As a family, we follow Montessori values, and I began to research Montessori education on my own. From our first conversations with the Lead Teacher, Miss Jocelyn, I could see those values clearly reflected at CMS. After attending for over a year, I'm even more astounded by the depth and thoughtfulness of the lessons offered for early childhood development. As someone who struggled with math in school, I wish I'd had the opportunity to learn numbers the way CMS teaches them. On your tour, please ask to see the math beads and the related lessons--they are a perfect example of how CMS teaches the concept with real understanding, not rote memorization. The lessons are intentional, and the freedom my daughter has in choosing her work has developed her concentration and self-discipline. I have so much trust in this school--it's not the kind of place where your child comes home with 10+ generic worksheets a day. To get an overview of CMS's culture, I highly recommend reading The Family Virtues Guide: Simple Ways to Bring Out the Best in Our Children and Ourselves. CMS focuses on one virtue per week, based on this humanity program (such as respect, empathy, patience, etc.). To me, this is a clear example of how CMS goes beyond academics and truly teaches life skills and character development. When observing the classroom, you can clearly see how these virtue lessons provide a foundation of calmness that, in turn, allows each child to develop their concentration to achieve their highest potential and practical life skills at an incredible level. We are truly grateful for the foundation CMS is providing for our daughter!

Community Montessori has been a great experience, Zia started there when she was 2, she has grown…read moreso much being in a constant learning environment that consisted of different aged children. The staff at Montessori are invested in and care deeply about the kids and parents. Thank you Montessori!!

I love this school I enrolled my son in kindergarden and he has told me wonderful things about the…read moreschool and the faculty, hes now a freshman in highschool and still talks about his friends and classes from kindergarden through 6th grade, the only problem I have is the 3rd grade teacher Mrs.Stewart who was very unfair to my son other than that it was a great school.

We had moved over to a new area within the same school district, the Paradise Valley School…read moreDistrict. I was confident that the school would be up to the standards of the other schools in this district. Boy, was I wrong. At the time our boy was in the third grade and we had always had teachers tell us how nice, how kind, sweet he is and he had plenty of friends at our old school at Desert Shadows. From the first day of coming to Desert Cove he was treated in a disparaging manner by both the teacher and the children. Yes, you read that right, the teacher. He came to us and told us she has treating him poorly and being mean to him. We went to the school and confronted the teacher, who confessed to us that she had gone on vacation and came back and had three new students in her class and that is why she was treating him differently!?! What, did I hear this right? What kind of teacher takes out her frustration on her students because she had more kids to teach than she had planned? Well we thought we had come to a crossroads where he would continue and we would give her another chance. Things didn't change. He was bullied by the kids and the teacher kept up with her poor treatment even though we had multiple trips speaking with her. It really was an extremely negative experience and he attended only one year and we decided to drive back to our old school even though it was far away. Kate Stewart was the name of this teacher and shame on you for being so rough on a little guy, who wanted nothing but to come to a school to learn, be part of the group, treated with kindness and value, and he got the exact opposite. Highly disappointed with this school and it's staff. I'm sure we are not the only ones. If it's happening to one it's happening to others. A bird doesn't change its feathers.

It is the best K -8 school in the valley, and I am pleased that my kids are the products of Valley…read moreAcademy! The teachers are great and very attentive. They provide a nurturing environment for the kids. The curriculum is strong, and they are pretty much rounded with other extracurricular activities, too, unlike other schools, which do not entertain that. My only complaint is I wish they had a high school. When my son moved to high school, even though he had completed the basic levels of certain subjects in Valley Academy, he couldn't take the advanced level because the new high school didn't recognize the levels at Valley Academy since they don't have a high school. That's a huge bummer

I am in second grade my teacher is Mrs.Carpenter.She's very nice.Their is annoying boys in my…read moreclassroom. The others are tattletales.Valley Academy is a good school.Literally every day I come home from school l have something to tell my parents that I learned.Once my friend had trouble breathing and we went to the nurse. She was very helpful and she sent my friend home.

We discovered Gateway this year. Upon our "trial day" my son greeted me with both fists in the airs…read moreexclaiming, "Finally, we found a great school!" and he was right. After 2 years in the Chandler school district, my son had deteriorated by every measurable standard. The second year I ended up needing to pull him out and homeschool him while he went to therapy to deal with the stress that was seemingly caused on purpose by the staff at the public school. My son had done well generally in a public school setting before moving to Arizona, but the local school here had teachers unaware or unwilling to meet the needs of a high functioning, never aggressive autistic child. Gateway's amazing teachers, therapy programs, and constant communication with the parents allowed my son to recover and begin to thrive. It is no wonder the school received the highest level of accreditation. I have an hour and a half commute (one way), but that is a small price to pay to have my child begin to work independently, to become comfortable around others, to learn to self-advocate for his needs, and to learn to self-regulate. When I asked my son this year why he loves Gateway he said, "Because I just be myself." If you have an autistic child, you know what that meant to me. He can now focus on the business of learning because he is not panicked and overwhelmed by the class itself. The staff are professional, knowledgable, and genuinely care about each child. They create groups of students with similar abilities so the group to work together. They foster independence, confidence, and teach the child how to manage their autism. They empower each student with successful experts in all walks of life on the spectrum, and bring therapy to the group where the teachers can model and encourage what is learned throughout the week. No more driving from one therapist and then another--the school creates a holistic approach to the child's life. The horse therapy has been the best addition to my boy's regimen. He has discovered a passion for animals and now has new friends in the neighborhood because of that passion. But one of the most important gifts has been to learn from the modeling of the staff and the other students how I can do better at meeting my child's needs. When you are surrounded by other high functioning children on the spectrum, it is easy to see the attributes that common among children on the spectrum and I have become a lot more patient with my working with him. I consider this school a godsend for our family. Thank you Robin, Max, and Matt. You have changed our family for the better.

Note: I wrote this in the past and am posting it now) ---- I am a past student that attended…read moreGateway academy for one year , and god! I would not recommend you go here if you or your child is gifted or at least grade level. You ask for harder work, and are dismissed by teachers that wish they could actually teach you more, but as per the dictators policy (Mrs. Robin) they can't give me actual challenges. I have had 2 tests maybe, and I'm more than halfway through the year. To add to this, these tests were the easiest tests I've ever taken in my life! Do not send your child here! Also, here's a list that I took at the begining of the year (when I still had hopes of leaving) which doesn't include a lot of the new stuff. Here's a summary of the information because the school would probably kick me out (not that I would mind) Version to my parents My classes this year aren't challenging me or giving me the resources I need to learn. In math, we're a month behind because the online curriculum still isn't fixed, and we're stuck reviewing topics I mastered in sixth grade. Science work is so easy and drawn-out that deadlines mean nothing, and tests are recycled to the point where grades don't reflect real understanding. Language class is almost entirely Duolingo, which doesn't teach grammar or real communication skills, and even "enrichment" work takes weeks for something I could finish in days. History is just fill-in-the-blank notes and shallow projects instead of meaningful, in-depth learning like I had before. I'm not being pushed to grow, and staying here is holding me back academically. Version for administration In math, we are already a month behind because the Savaas curriculum still isn't fixed, despite my teacher contacting Mr. Anthony 1-2 weeks ago. My teacher wasn't given proper resources and had to reuse slides from a previous school, so the pace is slow. We've spent over a week reviewing order of operations and negative numbers, which I mastered in sixth grade. In science, deadlines are stretched far beyond what's needed--two weeks to take notes that should take 2-3 days, and tests are meaningless because, after taking them, we just redo the same questions for credit. Even when I ask for harder work, I'm told I still have to do the same easy assignments, which wastes time. Language class is almost entirely Duolingo, which doesn't teach grammar or sentence structure, and enrichment work is stretched over three weeks for tasks I could finish in days. History is mostly fill-in-the-blank notes and shallow projects, like spending a week on domestication with no deeper exploration, compared to last year when I created in-depth presentations on world history topics. I'm not being challenged, my time is being wasted, and staying here will hold me back academically.

My child just aged out of a few years at MCS. I see our family entered the school just after the…read moretransition to the current operator, Ms Li. I have nothing but positive things to say about her and the staff at MCS. She took over the operation just as we hit Covid and the work they've put in to keep things running -- and then make capital improvements and prioritize grounds care on top of it -- I see the love they put into their place. As far as the schooling goes, I'm happy. Really enjoyed the small size, multi age classrooms, and their commitment to the Montessori Method. "I've got friends..." who tried Montessori schools elsewhere with poor results -- but none of their schools sounded like MCS at all. For my two cents, the environment MCS cultivates daily is safe, considerate, honest, and supportive. I'm on my only child so preschool research wasn't a major priority for me. But now, having seen my child grow through MCS and the instruction Ms Li provides-- both to students and staff -- I would recommend any parent consider this school. It's the real deal. I've been so impressed. And because I'm clearly a MCS fan, I'd like to add my own thoughts regarding the ownership transition. I didn't experience the old owner everyone loved. I did experience some parents choosing to leave the school, in part, because of the results of the change. I liked the school enough to stay here as long as i could. My thoughts today: (1) everyone seemed to like the decisions of the old owner; (2) he sold it to the owner; (3) today the new owner seems to have it under control and is putting her mark on it -- sounds like the old owner made another good decision. Since we started at MCS, I've seen a consistent child-first atmosphere from the staff that does not compromise on the child's experience. They've not kept around staff that did not fit. They have invested In the building and landscaping. And they even have a little monthly newsletter now. It's an awesome little school and you deal right with the operators. I love it. Plus Ms Li is really on it about the Montessori Method and she walks the talks. She's a real professional.

I highly do not recommend Montessori Center School under the new ownership of Ms. Li and her…read morehusband, John. Positive reviews are from years ago before Ms. Li and her husband John bought the school. If you notice all parents sharing having a similar experiences. And please read Ms. Li's responses, pointing the finger back at the parents. The gaslighting and lack of accountability by Ms. Li and her husband are not acceptable. There's a reason they always have openings. We had ongoing issues, and every time my wife or I tried to bring something up, it felt like we were met with defensiveness instead of a real conversation. We often left those discussions feeling dismissed and blamed rather than heard. There was no genuine engagement with parents. We were asked what we could contribute to the "community," but we never experienced any real sense of one. Communication felt controlled and one-sided. After we set boundaries around comments we felt were inappropriate, our child was removed from the program without notice. As far as we know, our child had done nothing wrong. It was abrupt, upsetting, and incredibly disruptive for our family. This was not the supportive, respectful Montessori environment we were expecting.