1663 River Birch Ct
San Jose, CA 95131

This school does not value students' and teachers' education or safety. When my child was at this school we saw how teachers didn't care about teaching kids who were behind and decided to pass kids on the high school level even if the student was failing the administration would encourage teachers to round grades up from 38% to a passing 60%. While my child was at this school they witnessed many fights in and outside the classroom. One of these fights was between two girls who pounded each other's hair on the pavement. Another of these fights was in a class where two students got into an altercation where they began throwing chairs at each other this led to a teacher hit breaking her leg. There were many other instances of fights on campus. Another issue at Morrell Middle School is the lack of clubs and extracurricular activities. There was only one science fair club with little participation and a few other student-led clubs that didn't really help with academic success.Many teachers, including an 8th-grade history teacher, didn't follow any curriculum and shared their personal opinions on slavery and the Civil War instead of facts. Other teachers gave grades to students who didn't show up or do their work. And often many teachers gave High marks to students who were writing grade levels behind. There was an instance where a student threw scissors at people, stole items, and yelled obscenities and slurs at other students, but this student was allowed to come back the next school year. To sum up, this school has many problems and an administration that only cares about how many students pass on to high school.

There might have been potential improvements over the past 15 years, However my experience at Vinci Park was a terrible one. My time as a gifted student in the GATE program during 4th and 5th grade at this school was highly disappointing. The GATE section, intended to focus on enhancing "IQ," veered into random subjects in 5th grade, during 4th grade it was more appealing as the club involves puzzles and projects with fellow gifted students. However, 5th grade took an unexpected turn with activities like dancing. My experience included a 5th-grade teacher abandoning our class and a overly strict 4th-grade teacher, leaving me feeling unprepared for middle school.I hope future students won't experience the dissatisfaction I did.

Teachers are way too lazy this year with taking attendance (2023). This is bad because during this year, a new rule thing passed down to the school which is basically way way way more strict on being late and absent. Having too much 3 tardies = 1 absent and if you have enough absences, then you can't go to school anymore. Teachers just gave up taking attendance you have to show up to class in like 2 mins or else you'll risk getting marked absent. Like come on it's my last year here.