733 Mediterranean Ln #422
Redwood City, CA 94065

Bullying and harassment is a constant issue. Instead of the teachers stopping bullying, or people yelling racial slurs, or graffiti, (which is all very common) they have unjust punishments on people who don't deserve it. The teachers don't try to help our mental health (which gets worse every day we're here), in fact, they actively lower it and make us miserable. Just don't go here.

Review from an eighth grader who has been in this school since fourth grade:Sandpiper School offers a unique experience for middle school students due to its smaller size, with 50-60 students per grade level (150-180 students in total). This smaller setting facilitates personal connections and interactions with both students and staff at a more intimate level.One standout feature of Sandpiper is its innovative learning approach, which has earned the school awards. The use of 1 hour and 50-minute periods aims to create a more productive and patient learning environment. Additionally, students engage in various projects throughout the trimesters. In the first trimester, they work on passion projects using a Google-based concept called Genius Hour. The second trimester involves exploration of STEM Fair or National History Day, with opportunities to compete at County, state, and national levels. In the third trimester, students revisit passion projects and share their learnings.During parent-teacher conference weeks, when students have minimum days, traditional learning is replaced with themed electives taught by teachers based on their passions. This offers students exposure to a diverse range of topics, such as watercolors, chemistry, forensics, calligraphy, kinesiology, moot court, japanese, french, financial literacy, and more.Benefits of attending a smaller school like Sandpiper include higher potential for leadership development. Students actively contribute to improving the community through events, clubs, and initiatives aimed at enhancing the school environment.Recent improvements at Sandpiper include the introduction of advanced math for sixth and seventh graders, as well as Algebra 1 for eighth graders. Additionally, there are now more elective options available, with six options for eighth graders compared to just one for the entire year previously. The school has also invested in better sports equipment for physical education classes and sports teams.What truly sets Sandpiper apart is its commitment to continuous improvement. Over the past 7-8 years, the school has evolved significantly, with teachers dedicated to enhancing the learning experience. Despite being a developing middle school, Sandpiper consistently strives for growth and development, fostering a close-knit community focused on academic excellence and personal growth.

Having attended Carlmont High School myself I find many of this school's teachers to have the wrong approach to learning. Nearly all classes are based around memorizing and busywork, close to zero focus is placed on developing useful life skills other than in math and science classes. I personally felt my talents to be completely wasted at this school and have even heard teachers gossip about students to other teachers which cannot possibly be acceptable. Test scores and ratings for this school are high because the students here come from wealthy and successful households, I personally found myself to have learned more from my parents than from the teachers at this school. Key evidence pointing at this is that those students who come from underserved communities or have parents with low incomes tend to perform poorly, whereas the wealthy students with good home environments perform well. Secondly, this school didn't educate me at all about the benefits of the community college system, only placing it as "that's where you go if you can't go anywhere else" which is a completely wrong approach if you actually understand - most reading this will likely disagree, aka you don't understand how the transfer system works.Counselors at this school would take over two weeks to respond to inquiries which I find completely unacceptable, and even though the office staff cares about the students the thought of replacing teachers who don't do their job properly appears to never cross their mind. I know many here, primarily parents, idolize this school and find it to be the best ever, I personally graduated early from this school and have had exposure to different systems, even hearing from past Carlmont teachers and other adults who truly vocalized critical viewpoints. If you are a student and want to do well, or a parent of a student here, don't waste your time on AP classes, the college board is a for-profit organization and MANY flaws have been found about this system. (A correlation between lengths of essays and higher scores even if they were poorly written has been found - plus many schools don't even accept these anymore). Instead, start taking concurrent enrollment classes at community college as soon as you are mentally ready and developed far enough, I can guarantee you won't regret it. Even if continuing to a private 4-year institution starting in freshman year of college - you'll want college counselors, not Carlmont's.