6255 4th Ave NW
Seattle, WA 98107

My son attended this school until halfway through his junior year when he dropped out and got his GED at Shoreline CC and is now attending college courses there. I can't help but point out some negative things regarding this school. He was kicked out of one of their programs his freshmen year for not having "good enough" grades across his classes, the grade in question was a C in algebra, he had Bs and one A in all other classes. We also came from a middle school in West Seattle, so he did not have many friends to start here and experienced bullying from a group of kids in his home room class that were a part of the football team, and the faculty failed to do anything about it his freshmen year. His second year he also experienced bullying from kids on one of the Soccer teams when he made one of the teams throughout the season. We also had a teacher his second year tell my son he would be a "drop out" and "to just quite school." Halfway through his third year his father passed away and that was the last straw, as nothing was done about the bullying or teacher, we decided it would be best he just get his GED and start college early. I would not recommend this school to anyone as we have had nothing but pour experiences all around.

We have had a great experience the past year at Hamilton - really great teachers and staff and a strong community!

If you are looking for a school that is close by, has updated facilities, and requires little parental involvement, you may be quite content with West Woodland. The building was recently updated, the staff is friendly, and it runs on par with any other Seattle Public School. The choir program and the before and after-school offerings (mostly by third parties) are bright spots. In particular, we appreciate that our kid can take the bus directly to Jump on Languages, which is a fantastic program. However, the curriculum (probably like most non-HCC public schools) is lackluster. In kindergarten, your child starts by learning how to draw lines. Addition might be introduced by the end of the year. They will do the same dot-to-dot worksheet for every letter in the alphabet. It is mind-numbing work. There is little in the way of science or social studies and nothing outside of grade-level work. Communication about anything other than logistics is poor. You'll have very little idea what your child is doing or learning unless you happen to get a particularly communicative teacher. Recess is a bit of Lord of the Flies with a hundred kids and very little supervision. We thought going to our local neighborhood school would mean finding community. But because parents are rarely in the building and there is very little community engagement, we are no closer to meeting anyone or our kid finding friends than we were on the first day, even with active volunteering on our part. In short, if you keep your expectations in check, it's ok as a public school. We used to hear it was a great school, but recently, it is, at best, mediocre.

I have already commented but would want to mention the fact that this school often prevents students from taking math lessons at their math level trying to simply not teach them until they are average and it is an ongoing fight to keep HC student in math classes at their skill level rather than their grade level.