Quality of Davis schools

Both my kids graduated through the Davis school system, although it's been a while since they are now 20 and 24.  My eldest went through DaVinci and it was a great experience for her.  Small classes, lots of room for individual difference and strong school spirit.  It was a very good place for her.  My youngest went to DHS.  Classes were bigger and it was impossible to get a sense of solidarity, though that may not be the experience for kids who excel academically and join the many extra curricular clubs and sports.  The special ed services were much better there than I would have gotten in the Bay Area.  Ultimately, my youngest graduated from King Continuation.  She was only there a short time and in retrospect I wish she'd been enrolled there for 10, 11 and 12.  There were less than a dozen kids, the staff were enthusiastic and supportive of the kids and they were flexible in their approach to learning.  I hope my perspective helps.

We have been very happy with the Davis schools. We have one child in junior high and another entering in the fall (and another in elementary school).

At the elementary school the classes were not crowded. I don't know about the junior high or high school because we no longer go to volunteer in the classrooms or anything but our 8th grader always felt like he was well served by the teachers -- his assignments were graded on time and he could talk to them if he needed to. I even had one teacher email me to tell me that there had been an incident in his class where someone was mean to my kid. The teacher told me he had sent the other kid to the office and would make sure to keep them separated. My kid didn't even think it was a big deal but I liked that the teacher was on top of things. The junior high counselor also proactively talked to me about what classes both our oldest and middle should be taking. You can also opt-in to receive nightly emails about their grades on assignments.

If singing is important to your child at the junior high level, know that they are cutting the music teacher from 1.0FTE to 0.6FTE which is a bummer. The high school still has a strong music program but surely it will eventually be impacted. For now the high school has three choirs you get in to by auditioning and one or two that you don't audition for. They are phasing out German at the high school level. This year the lowest they have is German 3. The robotics program is growing and is very very strong. I know there are waitlists for some classes at the high school and  sometimes kids have to wait a year before taking a class they want.

For math, Davis has switched from Algebra/Geometry/Algebra 2 to Integrated Math 1/2/3 so it can be a pain if you come in with them having taken part of one series. If your kid is good at math, I have heard to put them in Honors Integrated Math 3 which gets them out of Pre-Calculus which is basically a bunch of juniors and seniors who are burned out or don't like math.

The district has a prohibition on taking very many units outside the district which can be a pain if you have a kid who wants or needs to take classes outside for graduation.

I have a friend whose son graduated from the high school two years ago and who has a daughter there now. She says she thinks the high school has gone downhill since her son left. But there is a strong new principal so hopefully things will turn around.

I know that there are kids drinking and using drugs, even at the junior high, but I have seen no evidence of it. I also know that there were kids doing the same when I was in high school but it didn't really impact me.

The town itself is very livable and there are lots of kid activities.