35500 N Ridge Route Rd
Castaic, CA 91384

My daughter recently graduated from VHS. We moved to the area specifically because of the "great" schools. Don't be fooled. The schools are not great--they are slightly above average but far from great, but VHS is considerably below average despite what test scores may indicate. Students who do well are the same students who would do well anywhere, not because of the school. My daughter, who is now at one of the top colleges in the country, was constantly complaining about the lack of teaching--she essentially had to teach herself most of the material especially in the AP classes. The cheating among students is out of control and the principal turns a blind eye to it. Another thing he turns a blind eye to is bullying--the school does not foster a sense of community, decency, or fairness. Let's not talk about the counseling staff. There is no direction or guidance at all. If your child is college bound, you had better not rely on VHS to guide him or her. My daughter's counselor told her several things that were verifiably false and could have derailed her college application process. Luckily, my daughter was able to navigate through four years here without too much damage but I feel sorry for kids who rely solely on VHS for a decent education, guidance, or supportive community because they will find none of it here.

AOC has to rethink its policies and create a student-focused school environment and it especially needs to readjust its policies and treatment of special needs students.There is too much unnecessary homework at this school. The instructions are confusing, sometimes conflict, and the instructions change without email notice to the students.Most weekends and holidays have to be spent doing homework and projects and studying for tests for AOC and COC classes. There is not much free time or time to develop a students' individual interests and goals that would help them in their college applications. Too much group projects where some of the students try to dominate and mistreat others and/or do not do their fair share of the work. Some of these students even use profanity and encourage each other to do sex and drugs in group texts.The large clique of group of students exclude and bully some of the students. Some of the teachers can be rude, mean, and incredibly unjust in their policies. A teacher even made threatening comments to students. But not much is done about issues when it's reported.In order to even attend this school, special needs students' parents have been required to sign away their rights to special needs services such as speech and language therapy or resource therapy. AOC sometimes does not follow the IEP accommodations such as extra time that is stated in their IEP (as is mandated by IDEA law) during the regular school year or summer school. For example, during the Summer Honors Geometry, students with special needs were not granted extra time as stated in their IEP and they felt forced to drop out of this class when they worked so hard to qualify for this class (when they got As in Honors Algebra 1, Honors Algebra 2/ Trig classes that they had to take prior to Summer Honors Geometry. This summer geometry teacher emailed that even if a students fails one test the student would fail entire geometry course (even because of an illness or internet issues). In fact they got all As in their classes were not allowed to move onto COC precalculus in the fall (whey they qualified with their A grades and COC algorithm for math) and now are forced to take regular geometry over the school year (because AOC does not have summer geometry over the school year) where they are not being given complete test reviews with problems and solutions (as the rest of the math classes are for AOC or other jr. high and high schools in the district have been given)

I have had two children attend this school, therefore I have had four yeas of different teacher interactions. Teacher interactions have been great. Even with the less favored teachers ;-)The biggest issue is not the teachers, but the school's administration. The office manager, Jodi Buntich, and the current principal, Bob Brauneisen. I would not recommend this middle school at all, simply because of the "regime" Bob Brauneisen has created. It's very much smoke and mirrors from Jodi. This school's administration is the complete opposite of Castaic Elementary as far as showing concern and genuine care for all students. And a sincere inclusive environment. Bob Brauneisen's a steamroller who begrudges. Bob Brauneisen, has on multiple occasions, under the guise new school procedure, continuously implements segregationist ideology. I didn't notice this at first, but a pattern has formed. Other parents have noticed as well. It is very obvious that Bob Brauneisen has very toxic traits by which the Office Manager will stand behind. The student are well aware of the ostracization the principal creates. At a time when there is a major societal move for togetherness and inclusiveness, this school's principal crates discriminatory filled division. I do not recommend sending children to this school unless you want your child exposed to or to view segregation and blatant administration approved student ostracism.

Overall, very happy with this school. My daughter is very happy as well.