Mills Elementary - New student (Austin: how much, transfer, neighborhood)

[yankeeintexas]

Hi -- We recently moved to this neighborhood and will have a 4th grader at the school this year. Previous school (still AISD) was smaller and I'm a little overwhelmed by the size of the place as an adult, so I can only imagine what this will be like for a child.

Anything Mills parents can tell me to reassure me? ...It was a rather abrupt transfer precipitated by a move by one parent and the need to dedicate the school year to the other's school district.

Tips? Thoughts? I know it's an exemplary school but how much is the overcrowding impacting the kids? What do we need to be vigilant about? Is it friendly? Seems like the PTA is active. How active will we need to plan to be?

Anyone with a 4th grader (especially if you're new to the neighborhood) might want to have a meet and greet?).

Anything would be REALLY helpful. Thank you!

[Trainwreck20]

Our oldest starts Mills next year, so no first hand experience, but we have lived in the neighborhood for many years and most of our 'parent-friends' seem very please with Mills. Honestly, most kids will not be bothered by the number of students since their world will probably revolve mostly around their classmates regardless of the size of the school. The school is huge, but there is not any immediate remedy on the horizon, at least none that will impact someone already in 4th grade (those portable classrooms have been there for as long as I can remember).

As for the parents, I can only speak to the ones I know, but in a very general sense Mills draws from a very down to earth but middle class group of people. The 'higher dollar' families tend to be at Kiker to the south. Having done some teaching in the past, this group is (imho) often the most involved group of parents - sometimes too much .

One possible drawback is that Mills splits to two Jr Highs right now, so your kid may lose some classmates when they move up to Jr. High (or middle school, whatever they call it now ).

Where (or what school) did you move from?

[yankeeintexas]

Thank you for the reassurance, TrainWreck! All very good info. I'll keep the identifying into to a minimum but it was a school in S. Austin (also exemplary). A third of the kids there and we liked that about it. I don't love the whole "portables" thing. Good to know the kids seem not to really notice this. I'm kind of a wreck right now, myself.

As I mentioned, this move is happening pretty quickly and I don't want to throw the kiddo into the shark tank without doing more recon as one of the grown ups in the equation.

[texastrigirl]

Can't speak to Mills but we were at Kiker for a few years. It was at the height of its overcrowding when we were there because Clayton was not built yet. My son was in 1 of 10 Kindergarten classes and even being from the neighborhood preschool, only recognized a few kids in his class. The sheer number of kids (about 1100) and overcrowding was overwhelming from a safety standpoint but they had very strong administration and overall, it was a fantastic school...just very big. Then we moved to the Seattle area to a school that had only 580 kids. I appreciated the 580 so much more after coming from 1100. I was not very involved in the PTSA at Kiker as I chose to stay more in the classroom and also still had one at the CDC preschool where I was board member. I think you can chose to be involved or not but by 4th grade, there's not a lot of options to be involved in the classroom. At Kiker it seemed to be the same core group of people doing everything (and do it well, they did!). I have friends with kids that go to Mills and it seems to be the same type of operation there.

Good luck with your transition. It's always hard to move at first but give it a few months. Once a few friends are made, all will be well.