5409 Aztec Dr
Raleigh, NC 27612

This school has been excellent for both of my kids. The commitment of the Principal Mr. Cohen and all the teachers is commendable. Families feel supported and the kids love going to school.

Wouldn't recommend if you're low-income or minority. Most of my teachers were amazing. Truly better than a lot of my college professors. Still, there seems to be a "popular teachers click" that runs the school. All of their students are in dance, theatre, or student government, so they get all of the awards and credit that go to graduating seniors. Seems like the same people always get the same opportunities. Half of these are the teachers' favorites and the other half is the old money, preppy students who own houses on St. Mary's. These kids aren't overtly unfriendly, but if you don't fit into their circle, you're not getting in. Their friendships were formed before birth. The school seems to favor these kids subconsciously. Were they ever more qualified than others, or did they become more qualified than others because they were treated as such? A lot of them are big donors to the school, I'll put it that way. The boys in this group are the ones who make fun of kids with disabilities or who are minorities. They take in a few token friends as pets. If you eat at the cafeteria or take the bus, you're automatically typecast. Everyone who is popular ( on the homecoming court and qoh court) gets all the roles and all of the cred. They are seen as the only talented people in the school, more or less, and everyone else is discouraged from trying. The students mostly worship these kids, and if you dare acknowledge this issue, people will gaslight you. Nobody uses the term preppy or old money, but everyone knows exactly who they are. These kids come from insanely rich families, they have their well-to-do accent, and they wear the same clothes. Different races and economic statuses aren't friends, which is really sad. I feel like they don't really encourage low-income minorities to try very hard, and the school has an issue with racism. I think if you fit into this demographic, you'd be better off at another school that sees you as an individual. I like that the school offers an off-site internship class in your senior year. The history department is also fantastic. The IB program seems insanely high-pressure, and the school in general has a very competitive atmosphere. Still, there are a lot of truly caring teachers who don't judge you based on who your family is. The new principle does not seem to care about students and is aggressive. Some of the teachers are straight up coasting and there's a mix of hard classes and insanely easy classes.

Most of the teachers and school counselors are great. Unfortunately, the members of the administration possess poor leadership and communication skills . The leadership style of the Principal could most easily be described as someone who is more focused on "clearing the inbox" than providing a collaborative environment for children, parents and staff. Our personal observation from the actions exhibited by the Principal were that of someone who's methodology was to use her current position as a stepping stone on a path to achieve a long term goal to be promoted to the central office as an Assistant Superintendent or similar role. It was clear her focus was not on educating but instead rising through the ranks as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the school administration as a whole seems to be a poorly matched team. We only had multiple personal dealings with one of the Assistant Principals however we quickly observed that both that Assistant Principal and the Principal had aversions to the truth in several instances. The administration pays a large amount of lip-service to the importance of being a "partner" with parents however we only observed contradictory behavior from them. Unfortunately for both the students and their families the current administrative team suffers from a lack of adequate leadership, the inability to accept responsibilities for mistakes made and poor judgement in decision making. The school itself has great facilities, a dedicated group of teachers who are clearly devoted to the success of their students and tremendous potential to become a credit to the Wake County system. However, a restructuring of leadership is the only way for this to successfully occur.