I was just telling some friends how great our school is. Then I saw a bummer of a review on here,…read morebased on a short transition period, so I'm writing this. The short story is - it's a very good school run by professionals. A wonderful environment for kids who are neurodivergent or similar and have struggled in a larger school setting. It is supportive and non-judgmental, and we've found it to be a great balance of a place to learn and grow and a place to be supported and accepted. We were worried that it wouldn't be academically rigorous but found that it exceeded our expectations when our child was ready to learn. They meet all children where they are at every step of the way. Also, they do so many fun educational field trips. Here's the long version if you're interested: Our family started at Academy in 2024. That year, the old school director retired. Yes, there were staff changes. Yes, there was an interim director. Yes, it was a time of change and changes is hard especially when you are emotionally invested. Some families were so attached to the old director they didn't come back. Two years later and we're still very happily there. We found gold. Is it fancy? No. Is it exactly like a larger school? No. In areas where a child needs more support, they have it. The policy of "walk to math/language arts/science" allows them to learn subjects at a level and in a group setting difficult to access in larger private or public schools in a supportive way, whether accelerated or at a slower pace. Curriculum is solid and classroom size is excellent. As to the information concern - no. Many kids are district placements. The oversight and regulation involved in that is significant. No public school would partner with them if they broke any laws about information handling and they have placements from many districts. In May of 2024 they had just interviewed candidates for a new permanent director. I hope people will consider that Spring 2024 was just one rare season in the school's administration and while the other review was from someone that felt upset by how that transition was going, the new school director who was hired at the end of that year is awesome. I think she will be there for years to come. I never post reviews, but I hate that that review might be pushing families away from a truly excellent option for kids. To whoever you were it sounds like you felt like your school family was being ripped apart and you were afraid the whole place would be ruined, which must have been awful. Maybe you lost your job, maybe you pulled your child from the school. Regardless, please know that it is still "the little school with a big heart" and from my perspective as a very aware parent, it's in responsible hands.

Academy Schools was a buoy for our family after several years of struggling to stay afloat. The…read morestaff are compassionate, patient, and deeply dedicated to providing an individualized education in an environment that allows many students to feel accepted and safe in school for the first time ever. I'll forever be grateful for the tools and community they provided for both my kid and myself.

Terrible school system. Teachers teach to state minimum standards. So long as teachers have a…read morespecific percentage that pass the class quarterly they could care less about those left behind. It is rare to have found teachers that have compassion towards their job. Just like any other job those new in the field get so beaten down by the pointless burroccratic rules that they too after a few yrs become miserable husks of individuals. The renton school district leaves a ton of kids behind and they could care less. If you average c's or b's in this school system you'll pretty much end up struggling your whole working career because you did not gain enough smarts to go onto the more advanced jobs. Please consider college after high school. It opens up a whole new academia world and teaches you skills that you other wise would not of gained. Working with a high school degree can only get you so far in life. If you find a trade or field you are like really good in then you can go far. Do not feel sorry for your bullies. Just because you get the short end of the stick in your youth will mean if they continue that path they will get the short stick of the path in their adult hood. I keep crossing paths with many of my once upon a time bullies and: They struggle keeping employment, end up getting addicted to drugs that destroy their life, bounce from one relationship to another, have poor financial skills and often end up homeless alot. Don't feel sorry for your bullies. This is their path if they continue it. I keep crossing paths with one lady who is an absolute drunk and could care less about personal hygiene so she's sweaty and frumpy half the time. The other half of the time she can't even talk without spitting. I attended renton school district in my academic yrs and despised it. The only fun part of the school system was elementary school. Kids can be cruel and even cruller if you are low functioning, have any sort of physical visual disability or impairment be it visual or not. Kids are not held accountable for their actions and system fails to properly discipline those that deserve it. Middle school was so cruel to me that I blocked it for most of my life and can't even remember it. High school was okay but I felt abandoned in my studies. When I got to college I realized how little I really knew. I hate to say it but the school system needs to start teaching tolerance classes to society. Not just the you have a physical disability. It goes for everything else too: glbt group, being obese, nationality background, physical impairment.... If the state taught tolerance classes to kids these days I think society would be less arrogant and belittling towards these groups. I got beaten up a lot in middle school because of my disability being very noticeable. It got so bad my parents were considering home schooling. The school agreed to suspend the kids for 2 weeks assaulting me. Sorry but that's just a slap on the wrist. The kids parents didn't even take it seriously. If it were not for my parents assisting me in my academic studies I would of failed school or averaged c's and b's most of my life. I hate to say it but kids these days have too much of a controlled environment. I had food allergies growing up and knew not to eat this or that or be extra careful if I saw a kid eating a pbj sandwich. Kids these days are so damn clueless. No they have to have helicopter state parenting because the parents can't teach them these basic life skills. I work retail and have tweens entering the work force and have absolutely zero clue how to manage their food allergies because of this controlled environment. By 4th grade I knew which foods were a no-no. And I was low functioning more so then than as an adult. Math. I hate to say it but the school needs to teach all math levels to everyone. I am currently tackling the math program in college (later in life) and I'm finding just how much the renton school district screwed my math academia. Stop separating kids from "normal" level math into "advanced" math. There is zero reason for this b.s. Anyone can learn math. I hate to say it but Please teach kids cursive. Since when did the school system decide cursive was obsolete. B.s. You still need to teach it to kids these days as they will not be able to read important documents such as our founding father's documents. It is still vital. I can not tell you how frustrating it is to know how to write cursive at work and companies are considering people being cursive illiterate a disability. B.s. it's not. It's you dumbing down society.

There is an alternative school housed in the bldg I know this b/c the Renton Worksource employee…read moretold me. I was going to the Worksource when a student whom I did not know was a high school student attempted to approach me. At the time I was smoking a cigarette. There needs to be in place a separate space for the alternative school kids the minor alternative school kids. There were at least over a dozen kids standing around a make shift awning smoking. It doesn't make for a great impression. These kids should not be in close proximity to the adults it just didn't seem too appropriate & I didn't feel comfortable.

Omg i really cant with this school i cant wait to leave, the kids in this school suck, the teachers…read morecan't or don't know how to properly teach, and i cant even understand how the teachers think that to learn we have to write a 4-5 page essay and the tests every friday? i cant even anymore this school also gives kids lunch detention for no reason, and will send a bad note home because of other kids acting up, even is you don't know them. This school sucks.

My son attended private school all his life and is currently all honors here, so take the review as…read moreyou wish. Just in our experience so far, this school is top notch in all areas: math, science, language arts, orchestra. We could not be happier with the number of opportunities (clubs) within the school as well as in the Renton School District. If I could go back in time, I would have put him through the public school system, specifically Renton. It is a challenging but supportive school. Thank you, Risdon staff!

After sending two of my three girls to RAHS, I can't say enough good things about this school…read more This school offers everything a parent is looking for, teachers who are challenging and caring at the same time, an administration that is willing to help the students learn good values and lead them to success, and a place where everyone knows your name. Voted as the one of the top 4 schools in Washington state, this school stands up to its reputation.

Hello! Im a former student here, I was apart of the class of 2023. First let me start off by saying…read moreAmazing teacher, Terrible administrators. Now what I mean by that is that within my four years attending this school I noticed that my teachers would support me in pretty much every decision i've made for myself. Now I will admit I wasnt the brightest student but let me explain myself. In the beginning, Freshman year, i felt inspired to go to school. I took the Metro bus every morning not just to my highschool here at raisbeck but to Foster highschool as well. I went to foster to attend a class in the morning before my actual classes started every morning. After my freshman year was over, they actually never credited me for my time spent in the morning after i filled out all the "paperwork" we had at the time. I ran in circles as i was sent back and forth asking the same questions no results. Now you may be reading this, thinking oh, thats not a big deal. Unfortunately this is just one of many different scenarios have ruin my experience here. Let me also talking about how the students of dean mis calculate my credits to graduate. Not once, twice, but three different occasions. With each occasion they contacted my parents and i had to explain to them i was still infact passing. After the third time this notification happened i told my my father to come with me to school and ill show him how what i've been through. In doing so i got both the dean pt students and students councilor to have a seat and talk with me after school. Well at this point in life Ive been working in customer service for the past 2 years and even got offered the manger position. (now i work at boeing ) I understand who and i can't talk to. This is one of those moments no matter how well i tried to show the different mistakes brought opon me and how it's affected me. What i mean by this was there wasnt a moment where when i was explaining my situation i didnt get talked over, and when these situations happened i stop talking let him finish then ask how it what he just said had to do with anything with my situation and the reason why i brought my father down. Instead of getting an inperson apologizing and saying in sorry i made a mistake, i quoted the student of dean said "If you dont respect me we can't have this conversation." Wow. just wow, you would think someone who deal with highschool students all day would understand that u dont need to respect someone to have a respectful conversation. I said "Mr, Sav I lost respect for you when u caller my father telling him i was failing highschool." he than proceeded to say "then we cant have this conversations." I stood up right there and say thank you for your time and have a nice day. These are the same people that ask me if i had depression and ask if i needed professional help. While in fact I was thriving out of their control. Overall If You Want Your Child To Have A Highschool Experience. This Is Not The Place. Below i'll attach an imagies of emails showing one of the times my credit have been miscalculated. I forgot to mention A hood fan in one of the classrooms is venting chemicals into another, it was discovered by students burning insect inside of it and being able to smell the insect a rooms over. A hood fan is to removes airborne grease, combustion products, fumes, smoke, heat, and steam from the air by evacuation of the air and filtration. In this case it's unclear if students and teachers have been exposed to harmful chemicals as the hood fan has not been serviced, and was never serviced for the duration i attended. Who knows when the last time that has been done. Thank you for spending time reading this, If You a teacher I MISS YOU!!! also Ms, Tipton(School Principal) i wish you took more control, ur minions are outa control

Terrible school system. Teachers teach to state minimum standards. So long as teachers have a…read morespecific percentage that pass the class quarterly they could care less about those left behind. It is rare to have found teachers that have compassion towards their job. Just like any other job those new in the field get so beaten down by the pointless burroccratic rules that they too after a few yrs become miserable husks of individuals. The renton school district leaves a ton of kids behind and they could care less. If you average c's or b's in this school system you'll pretty much end up struggling your whole working career because you did not gain enough smarts to go onto the more advanced jobs. Please consider college after high school. It opens up a whole new academia world and teaches you skills that you other wise would not of gained. Working with a high school degree can only get you so far in life. If you find a trade or field you are like really good in then you can go far. Do not feel sorry for your bullies. Just because you get the short end of the stick in your youth will mean if they continue that path they will get the short stick of the path in their adult hood. I keep crossing paths with many of my once upon a time bullies and: They struggle keeping employment, end up getting addicted to drugs that destroy their life, bounce from one relationship to another, have poor financial skills and often end up homeless alot. Don't feel sorry for your bullies. This is their path if they continue it. I keep crossing paths with one lady who is an absolute drunk and could care less about personal hygiene so she's sweaty and frumpy half the time. The other half of the time she can't even talk without spitting. I attended renton school district in my academic yrs and despised it. The only fun part of the school system was elementary school. Kids can be cruel and even cruller if you are low functioning, have any sort of physical visual disability or impairment be it visual or not. Kids are not held accountable for their actions and system fails to properly discipline those that deserve it. Middle school was so cruel to me that I blocked it for most of my life and can't even remember it. High school was okay but I felt abandoned in my studies. When I got to college I realized how little I really knew. I hate to say it but the school system needs to start teaching tolerance classes to society. Not just the you have a physical disability. It goes for everything else too: glbt group, being obese, nationality background, physical impairment.... If the state taught tolerance classes to kids these days I think society would be less arrogant and belittling towards these groups. I got beaten up a lot in middle school because of my disability being very noticeable. It got so bad my parents were considering home schooling. The school agreed to suspend the kids for 2 weeks assaulting me. Sorry but that's just a slap on the wrist. The kids parents didn't even take it seriously. If it were not for my parents assisting me in my academic studies I would of failed school or averaged c's and b's most of my life. I hate to say it but kids these days have too much of a controlled environment. I had food allergies growing up and knew not to eat this or that or be extra careful if I saw a kid eating a pbj sandwich. Kids these days are so damn clueless. No they have to have helicopter state parenting because the parents can't teach them these basic life skills. I work retail and have tweens entering the work force and have absolutely zero clue how to manage their food allergies because of this controlled environment. By 4th grade I knew which foods were a no-no. And I was low functioning more so then than as an adult. Math. I hate to say it but the school needs to teach all math levels to everyone. I am currently tackling the math program in college (later in life) and I'm finding just how much the renton school district screwed my math academia. Stop separating kids from "normal" level math into "advanced" math. There is zero reason for this b.s. Anyone can learn math. I hate to say it but Please teach kids cursive. Since when did the school system decide cursive was obsolete. B.s. You still need to teach it to kids these days as they will not be able to read important documents such as our founding father's documents. It is still vital. I can not tell you how frustrating it is to know how to write cursive at work and companies are considering people being cursive illiterate a disability. B.s. it's not. It's you dumbing down society.

Went here from 2003 to 2007…read more Felt like it was More of a community center, for teenagers during the day more so then anything Else. But I loved how Diverse it was and don't regret going to this school at all! But the renton school District did Rob me of my education and I might as well gone to an alternative school. This school did not challenge me in the way that I needed. They shoved me into "special Ed" classes so I had enough credits to graduate but even then I didn't graduate on time. I graduated leaving my mind with a Freshmen's education, leaving me so far behind once I went into college. This just shows you how messed up the public school system is. Love their performance arts programs. And love the Ikea performance arts center. Go Indians!

A good sport team. People might think it's a dumb school but it's really not it's just the people…read morethat were there made it look bad

My son goes here. He has excelled here since the 8th grade. He is now a senior. If you're child has…read morea learning disorder or disability this school is geared towards that.

Great place for children with learning differences to explore and thrive in their individual…read morelearning styles. Helpful teachers, low teacher to student ratio, and numerous student lead ASB activities gives the feel of a larger welcoming education community. Their mission states this is a place where students come first and it's definitely apparent in the effort and caring attitude of their office personnel and staff.