Brandy Holw
Dante, VA 24237

My daughter has autism and was suspended from this school. Yes her behavior can be unruly at times but the teachers here are not qualified to handle students with autism.

When I was going there, students really had the system figured out - I watched many times as entire classes would claim to have not done homework to avoid having to turn anything in, knowing the teachers had no recourse if the whole class was about to fail. The boys bathroom toilets were destroyed at least once before all the stall doors and exterior doors were removed and teachers were made to be monitors during breaks.The drama class/club/team was treated as a sport, and students would regularly take over other classes to practice solo performances, especially as the competition season took off. So math class or English might now be entirely dedicated to an unrelated monologue about a princess going on an adventure. SoLs (standards of learning - state testing) were taught to very strictly, it was memorization for one test, which didn't allow a lot of actual learning about the subjects. There were regularly fill in the blank sheets in high school that were literally the previous year's SoL. Some teachers were regularly involved in student drama, gossiping about relationships and allowing class time to be taken over by it. The gifted program was not set up, and while some teachers absolutely jumped at the excuse to actually be allowed to teach kids, others dug their heels in and continued talking about wanting to work at Walmart for the better pay.Students with more severe learning disabilities benefited from one on one attention, tests would regularly be read out loud to kids that couldn't read.Overall, it wasn't a place of learning, it was a place to memorize test answers or socialize. If you are considering enrolling a student who is gifted and interested in actually learning about topics, consider a different school. If you have a student who just needs to do the bare minimum to get a diploma, Castlewood HS will work.

The teachers at Lebanon Middle School are dedicated to provided the highest level of education for each individual student. The administration supports the students and strive for a structured, safe, and enjoyable learning environment. The goals of all the educators in this school is to help build strong students and good citizens that can move onto high school with the tools they need to succeed in furthering their education.