M. B. Kennedy Middle School

This school is mediocre. We feel as though the re-naming of the school to "East Aiken School of the Arts" was to appeal to the parents who were choosing to send their children to local charter schools instead of this school. Just because "The Arts" has been enforced does not make it a better school. My son is a natural learner and we do not have many problems with his learning, he has made wonderful grades. We have never had a direct problem with a teacher; however we have felt as though some teachers just simply did not care about their class, as if they just viewed it as a paycheck... again, I know this is a problem everywhere, in every profession and career.The schools car-line pick up and drop off procedure has improved greatly over the past few years and flows rather well.Another worrisome thing about the school is the design- please take a tour if you ever look into the school for your child. It would NOT be safe in certain situations. The "arts" should be less focused on. Several of the teachers who teach the arts classes end up making the children who do not have natural talent or want to participate in that art form feel as though they do not belong or something is wrong with them. Art, dance, music, drama, it's all great and important for children to see and experience... but it is not something that they should have to feel bad about if they are not "good" at it or want to do that. I know I would not enjoy dance class if I could not dance, or felt like I could not dance.

Millbrook Elementary School is the best school in whole Aiken County. School has an amazing administration and fantastic teachers. They have great students/ families events like Fall Festival, Halloween party etc.

I hope this school is better than when I attended; I once had a teacher throw a chair at me and my friends, and the school did nothing about it.

It certainly easy to criticize a school and it staff, as I’m one of the first ones to do it. They had a lot of change in the staff, including principal and assistant principal. Last year I wasn’t too happy about that. However, on defense of the new principal, Miss Brooks, she truly is very engaged in the students, well-being and education.. if I’m not mistaken, she came from a high school assistant principal. She is very engaged with the children and their entire families and bringing people together, which is awesome . When we first moved here a year and a half ago we put her on the list to go to a charter school and just recently received a call to get her into horse Creek Academy. I was truly excited when we got the call, but believe when you have children who have friends at a school that it’s detrimental to relocating them to another school. So she will remain at Aiken Elementary .. where I feel like she is flourishing because the principal make sure she gets what she needs in her education and emotional support. Those things are truly detrimental to a child growing up..

This was absolutely the worst experience of a school I could’ve possibly had. The bullying was absolutely awful, I hated my life, and even though it’s a “Christian” school, I didn’t really see any good models of “Christianity”