Prinicipal felt she was more of a mother to my kids then i was. She would tell them they couldnt eat items i had packed for their lunch because in her eyes they weren't healthy enough.
Well as perhaps my nature I think I spent more time on concerns than kudos. Let me be perfectly clear: although not perfect, William F. Fox Model School is an excellent school, and our family has truly been quite blessed/lucky to have been able to send our precious daughter here to start her educational journey. Elementary school is quite important and this is probably one of the best elementary schools in Virginia if not the entire USA, and no I am not embellishing! If you're fortunate enough to live within the district, save your money for college, send your kids here.
My only two concerns about Fox School as it is known are first regarding something not even run by the school but conducted on school grounds, which is the YMCA afterschool program. My daughter did not like this program at all. She complained that the staff was far too authoritarian and strict with her. I looked into this by spending time in the program myself, and I found her concerns to be reasonable. The staff was not abusive at all, to be perfectly clear -- it just seemed that perhaps they lacked proper training and did not give the children adequate ways of spending their time which led to some minor and unnecessary discipline issues. I feel that Fox should take more responsibility to monitor and improve problems with this program. Children in this program of course deserve to spend their time enjoyably and productively.
Perhaps of little importance the school itself is a block long and wide historic building and is situated charmingly in a legitimately historic neighborhood of Richmond (not manufactured as many "Old Town" neighborhoods have been in the last fifteen or so years across the US) known as The Fan due to how the roads "fan out" from the center at Virginia Commonwealth University to the "Near West End" neighborhood.
My daughter loves attending school here. She has been blessed to go to school here solely since she started in kindergarten. I give high praise to all of the staff of the school, from the principal to the building maintenance and sanitation folks. Everyone has a positive and enthusiastic attitude as I have seen via parent teacher conferences, PTA meetings, escorting daughter to class when she is late, and the like. My daughter enjoys her classes as well as her extracurricular activities such as art, foreign language, and choir.
My second and more substantial concern is that the school building is old, just over one hundred years old in fact, and as such is not built to accommodate physically disabled students, teachers, parents, and other staff/public. Recently this has been addressed in small measure through installing an elevator. This is quite inadequate, however. I dearly hope that the principal of William F. Fox Model School, and indeed the Richmond Public Schools board will make a much more concerted effort to make not only Fox but all of the many beautiful, historic Richmond City school buildings much more accessible and accommodating for folks with physical disabilities (such as yours truly, a lower limb amputee who uses crutches and doesn't enjoy a choice between walking an extra block to access the one elevator or risking a tumble down stone staircases to visit the auditorium and my daughter's classes).
Ignorance!
My two boys attended here in 2011. We had moved from Williamsburg,VA and desired a similar school environment. We are an interracial family that wanted a diverse atmosphere for our children. Although we weren't zoned for this school we applied early in hopes that both of our boys a 4th and 5th grader would be accepted. To our dismay this was a horrific school environment for our oldest son. He was consistently bullied and administrators truly didn't care, although they portrayed as if they were doing everything in their power to alleviate at. This was not the case! My son experienced sexual teasing and constant physical harrassment. On one incident his shoes were thrown over the school fence and no administrator knew what happened. It seemes as if the assistant principal desired to protect the perpetrators and not my child! I am not an uninvolved parent. Although I had two smaller children I volunteered often, and truly cared about being active in my children's educational development. I attended school with him to oversee what was taking place in the classroom. My husband and I contacted the school board and wrote letters to the entire administration. We scheduled a meeting with the principal and a Richmond Public Schools board member. The meeting concluded that my son may have issues with his absent father (I had remarried 3 years ago) and the fact that he was of mixed race. Nonsense!!! The true issue was that we were not a wealthy family that lived in the Fan district and they could care less about my child!! These bullying issues have left lasting effects on him through his teenage years! Shame on the administrators here for not caring and neglecting to protect my child and any other child in this situation. They care more about your bank account and social status than the safety of our children.
Great teachers and staff
This is an excellent elementary (grades kindergarten - 5) school, even notwithstanding its circumstances as a school: public school, urban school district in politically conservative state (to me this equals woefully underfunded public education), overall economically distressed citizenry in the school district (though the students who attend Fox are from largely professional, college educated and above middle income families), and large population of students. In fact we chose this school for our daughter over the private educational offerings that are nearby. Governor Tim Kaine sent his kids to this school while sitting as governor of Virginia. I asked him personally and he gave the school, in particular his son's third grade teacher whom is also my daughter's teacher, a very strong endorsement.
Both of my daughters went to Fox. It is a fantastic public school with an amazing PTA & super engaged families.
William Fox Elementary School is a US School based in Richmond, Virginia. William Fox Elementary School is located at 2300 Hanover Ave, Richmond, VA 23220, USA.
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