W
Boise, ID 83713

If I could give a negative star review I would, but since I can't I am stuck leaving it as a one star. My son started kindergarten this year and we've had nothing but trouble with the school. He started being bullied and then because of that started to act out. He was not getting the support he needed or being watched very well. I will not go into details to give our identities away. But if I could start his kindergarten year over at another school I would. I am investigating and looking for another option starting today. Do not allow your kids to go here! I constantly worry about his safety at this school.

Spalding elementary was one of the biggest mistakes we made as parents sending our children here. They say they are a STEM school however over the course of the year my son did two stem assignments ( one was once a week for a couple weeks) When he asked why they don’t do more stem, he was told that was for the older children. Come to find out the older children for fourth and fifth graders also did not do much STEM. They are advertising the last week of STEM activities, they will do more STEM in the last week of school than they have done the entire year combined. If you were choosing Spalding elementary because it is a stem school, I would recommend finding a different school. Not only was it not a stem school as it was advertised and we believed, but there were major issues with the school itself. My child’s teacher has also told the students several times to “not snitch” about things that happen. This has been said so many times that my child has said they don’t want to tell me things because the teacher says “don’t snitch”. This is the worst thing to teach a child. We should encourage them to tell an adult if teacher if something makes them uncomfortable, hurts or if something bad happened. This is inexcusable. There were also instances where my child was physically hurt by another child. We noticed it when he had large scratch marks and bruises on him. At no point during the day was I called or notified by the teacher. When we called the teacher, we were told that she said she did everything she thought was right, and that she had taken care of it during the day but again my child was physically injured and assaulted by another student and no call was made. The parent should at least be notified of the situation, this happened on at least two occurrences.My child also told me that a student got a bloody lip during class with that same sub. The teacher would not allow the child to go to the nurse and actually got mad at them for bleeding. Told them to take care of it themselves. Not only should this not be a school of choice for West Ada it should not be a school choice for any parent. I would not recommend sending any child here at all.

For context, I’ve already graduated. I don’t know why you’d pick this school given that there’s not much that stands out. A large portion of the student body here is also involved in marijuana usage. There’s few good teachers and a portion of them seem to have trouble maintaining composure—I’ve noticed that the front desk staff in particular seem to have trouble with this. On a side note, I wouldn’t be surprised if the school gets highlighted in the press for misconduct related to the special needs students. I’ve had conversations with some of them and they don’t seem to be getting treated too well behind closed curtains.If you want an alternative, you’d probably be better off at a public charter school (a publicly funded school that has more flexibility in its curriculum which also attracts a stronger body of staff).

Don't get me wrong, I love this school! but I would say that it's not the school's fault, but I have seen some student interactions that aren't very healthy, like bullying, racism, and overall, just the atmosphere of the school's student population isn't the happiest. another thing is the mental health, which is (from overall student population, not me or select group) but the sheer amount of depression, drug use, and state of the student's health is on the low side. the teachers are overall great, and i feel like every teacher is very different, which can be good and bad. good because students can really find teachers that they work well with. but bad because if a student is placed with a teacher they don't work well with, they may want to switch, causing schedule issues. I participate in sports here, and i really think it's a good program. last, i think that the extracurriculars are great here! we have an outstanding band and orchestra group and lots of clubs for specific things offer a variety of ways for students to interact with people they work well with. all in all, this school is pretty great, but its educational side is way better than social, which can affect some people.