I attended this school from K-8. Class of '98. In 7th and 8th grade, our "English" class, which was called "Language Arts" was basically watching movies like The Diary of Anne Frank, A Christmas Story, etc. The teacher at the time could never control the class and no one took her seriously. We didn't get a damn thing done in that class to prepare us for high school. We never ONCE wrote an essay during 7th or 8th grade, let alone 5th or 6th. It did absolutely nothing in preparing me for highschool at Sacred Hearts. I ended up teaching myself to write an essay from one of my mom's college text books and went from B's and Cs in 9th grade (all cause I apparently couldn't write a proper essay, and neither could the other girls from my SPS class who went over to SHA), to As in 10th, and then moving to AP English for 11 and 12, earning As and Bs. Thank goodness I'm a self-motivated person to get myself from 0-100. Math and History classes at SPS were fine when I was there, as was Science. But nothing extraordinary or that you couldn't get from public school.
Now let's go to the teachers/staff. When I was here, Sr. Rose was principal. I distinctly remember an event where Mr. Gaston Gosselin (8th grade teacher) had grabbed me by the arm during basketball practice or scrimmage, so hard and yanked me off the court. He left bruises on my arm and my mother and myself went to talk to the principal and showed her the bruises on my arm and discussed the incident.
She completely sided with the teacher, regardless of the marks on my arm from physical assault. She's honestly lucky I was "just a kid" because if it was me now, this school would have had another damn thing coming to them. I honestly don't know how my mom let this go with the "resolution" or lack thereof from the school. Unfortunately, this is the type of approach you can still expect from the current principal. I guess things don't change, they just get worse at this school.
The school now. The teachers are still not qualified for early childhood education. Being "Patch Certified" means nothing because this is not a daycare, it's a school. That's one of the problems with private school, they can make their own rules and don't have to follow DOE rules for certification. We have people who absolutely NO background in childhood development or education, with degrees in "Science" or "Accounting" teaching 1st, 2nd and 3rd graders. People with Associate Degrees as Pre K teachers and aides.
Who sends 3 year olds to the principal's office an hour into the school day?! SPS Pre-k "teachers" apparently! Why? Because that's what happens when you have a class packed with 24 kids and only 1 teacher and 1 aide. There should at LEAST be 3 adult bodies in a pre-k class of this size. It seems like a lot of teachers here hate their job and unfortunately that reflects on their students.
Then we have the "principal". It is absolutely DISGUSTING the way she talks to parents. I would say "as if they're 12 year old kids" but not even a 12 year old kid deserves to be talked to that way. She has absolutely ZERO respect for others yet expects you to kiss the ground she walks on. I'm sorry, that's not how this works. You don't demand respect, it's earned.
Just because you're ancient compared to the parents, doesn't mean they automatically respect you.
The only legit people at this school are the PE teacher and "Aunty Karen" in the office. Shout out to Aunty Karen cause she was a real MVP even when I was at this school.
You're better off sending your kid to public school, honestly! And for pre-k, find a montessori or waldorf school on island. Even Honolulu Christian Preschool would be a better pre-k option! read more