Patricia Knowles Elementary School

Wonderful staff! They welcome parents to attend their kids during lunch time any day. They also have a very unique policy that if a child is in preK then the parent is allowed to walk that child right to the classroom the whole year every single day. No other school allows it. This was a major criteria for us. They dont stress much about late time also which is nice. Kids are very happy their and love their teachers.

I have three children who have attended Pleasant Hill. This is our 8th year of having at least one child there. Overall Pleasant Hill is great. Two of my children have received extra services and testing for disabilities and I’ve been very happy with the staff and how they’ve helped my students with these hurdles. Very happy to be at Pleasant Hill.

Drop off is the worst here. Ive been skipped over at least times dropping my son off where they open the door for you. Teacher so far is okay better than the last school. Everything else sucks. The front desk lady is rude, drop off women are rude and no one knows how to drive.

Thoughts from a CPM graduate:I attended CPM from 1st grade through 5th, I will graduate high school in 2026. To say I am grateful I went to Cedar Park Montessori would not be enough, this school impacted me in so many ways, it allowed me to embrace my creativity, ask questions, learn to share and pay attention and ultimately blossom into who I am now! I read once in a book, something along the lines of “If you're taught wrong in elementary school, you'll be trying to catch that train for the rest of your life." Through my experiences at other schools, they teach you very uniform, everyone is learning at the same speed and you are taught that raising your hand just makes the lesson longer, nobody likes a teachers pet or a goody two shoes. Whatever you do… Don’t challenge popular beliefs, you are taught to follow the system. CPM is quite literally the opposite, you are encouraged to look at things differently and ask “why?“ I used to question “why does this math problem even work?” And at CPM, I was greeted with an actual teacher who wanted me to understand not just pass. It’s a smaller more personal learning environment where instead of memorizing you actually learn!!! And its at YOUR pace, not the kids next to you, when you first grasp something it’s beautiful and at CPM that feeling was honored by teachers and staff, at CPM the reward isn't it in the candy it’s in the understanding. I learned how to love learning at CPM. This is my greatest strong suit; being able to find joy in seeking knowledge. Thats my favorite takeaway. After CPM I went to a public middle school, it was a bit rocky adjusting, not only to the education system but because Montessori kids are so much more emotionally aware. But by having good roots and being taught morals young, I was able to choose my path, I didn't fall into the wrong group, and to this day I've never given into peer pressure, (I know very few teenagers can say that!) and not to toot my own horn, but, im aware that my maturity level is higher than many of my peers because of my early education. I can’t thank my parents enough for choosing CPM, truly, one day, I wish to give my child the education and opportunities my parents gave me by enrolling me at Cedar Park Montessori.

I am trying to be as fair as I can about this school. Learning: You will be taught something in your class and then take a standarized test in which your child will not recognize what is being taught in it because it was taught differently or not in all in school. Then, they will take the standarized test to determine if you are allowed to come back. I've seen a situation when the teacher said everything was going well but the standarized test said they were struggling and told not to come back the last week. So, this gave them no chance to intervene. The cirriculum is often different than other classical schools and thus, if you try to transfer, it is more difficult to do so. The math curriculum at the elementary level is slow paced compared to other classical schools (only learning how to do some double digit addition at the last weeks of school at 1st grade). But then I hear they drown the high school students in homework. Maybe they aren't prepared for it?Teaching: I met some great teachers here but none are really appreciated by the administration anyways. If a great teacher asks for a raise? No. If a faculty wants fairness if their child is buliied. No. These are real life examples I have heard of. Good teachers are always leaving. Social support: I have went to another school in which the faculty and parents are so much more supportive. I used to have a supportive dean but she left due to a disagreement with the other administration. The supportive attitude or lack thereof, trickles down. SPecial Education: this is a private school so there is none. If your child is a bit difficult to teach, they will be asked not to come back so do not consider it. Safety: While I was there, a child threated to bring a gun to school but oh, he wasn't expelled until the other parents starting to pull their kids out of the class. Surprise, all the siblings of that family were friends of one of the heads of school. There was another incident some years back but instead of calling the police, a police friend was called so not to scare people. I knew of someone physically bullied but was told it wasn't bad because the bully was a girl and the victim was a boy. Family engagement: there are many events but none of these parents really care about you after you leave. There is no reach out at all from any adminstrators as well. There are some good teachers but they aren't there long. The education isn't even well matched to other classical schools.