Bakewell

North Hamilton is a school that definitely pushes their students to succeed. They have a very effective RTI program that focuses its' energy on the students' needs. From what I have seen in the classrooms and have heard from the admin, they focus A LOT on test scores. Their main goal within the classroom seems to be getting their scores up so they can beat the other schools in the district. Teaching to the test seems to be one of their strategies to do this. The principal and VP seem to push their teachers to follow EL curriculum as closely as possible. Unfortunately, this means that each day students are given long passages, a worksheet, a page in their workbook and repeat. For math it is the same way, worksheet after worksheet after a lecture. They pay very little attention to science and social studies because "it will not be on TCAP" so they do not feel a need to push it. In my opinion learning is so much more than getting a worksheet and making a good score on a standardized test. There seems to be no fun or exciting things to get the students engaged which is why I rated it the way I did. Apart from the way of learning, the teachers have a way about them that makes it seem very "cliquey". Lots of gossip. Every time a person leaves the room, you can almost guarantee that they will be the next topic of conversation. Very judgmental if the other teachers are not like them or do not do things the way they do. As an outsider coming in, it did not feel very welcoming.