Cherry Chase Elementary School

1138 Heatherstone Way

School District

Sunnyvale
Grade

K-5
Teacher/Student Ratio

1:22
Type

public

School Map for Sunnyvale School District

GreatSchools Rating

The school rating calculation is based on four ratings: the Student Progress Rating or Academic Progress Rating, College Readiness Rating, Equity Rating, and Test Score Rating each designed to show different facets of school success. Learn more about GreatSchools Ratings

Reviews

Submitted by parent on April 25, 2024

The school has taken some time to recover from the pandemic. But many pre-pandemic activities have resumed. These are sponsored by PTA but not listed above, such as Strings, Drama Club, Band, Lego Robotics, Math club….etc. The Sunnyvale School District basically spends its money and resources elsewhere. Most of the wonderful after school programs and school activities are provided by the PTA. Teachers have a low churn rate and many, especially the lower grade teachers, are very good and caring teachers.
Submitted by parent on April 22, 2024

Great school, the principal Ms. Marchant is very responsive to parent inputs and feedback. The PTA is very active, with many in-school and after-school programs being supported. There is a fantastic science program at school for kids to get hands-on experience. Also, many diverse countries and cultures represented in the school community. My kid was never bullied or felt unsafe at school. The only negative would be the lack of home-work even for 4th & 5th graders. It feels like the kids would be under-prepared for middle-school.
Submitted by parent on April 11, 2024

Parents of children with special needs beware: this school's support system is sorely lacking. From a lack of teacher responsiveness to minimal progress updates, it's evident that the needs of these students are not a priority. Despite promises, IEPs are often disregarded, leaving families to navigate a frustrating and isolating educational experience. The school's high rating may mislead, as it seems more a result of affluent enrollment rather than educational excellence. Approach with caution.
Submitted by parent on October 04, 2023

The administration is terrible! There is rampant bullying that is ignored.
Submitted by parent on May 12, 2023

The pandemic was a rough journey for everyone, and at Cherry Chase, everyone tried their best to provide instruction and meet the needs of all students.We just attended Open House a few days ago and are so happy to belong to this community. Ms. Marchant and Ms. Brett have brought back a sense of community and have strengthened the school. Our children grow, learn, and develop in a safe school community. We are so proud to be a part of this community, and we appreciate all the principals, teachers, and staff.
Submitted by parent on March 13, 2021

The "weekly update" from Mrs. Marchant is an insult. Every emails has a copied/pasted "Please do not hesitate to reach out to us if you have any questions or need assistance. We are in this together and we will continue to do our best to support you!" And yet all of Mrs. Marchant's actions, and from the school leadership, is the complete opposite. It seems they either aren't hearing the feedback from parents -and the parents are talking to each other, even if some aren't being loud about it- or they don't care. It almost feels like they're trolling us with demonstrably false statements like this.
Submitted by parent on March 13, 2021

Real scenario, true story. After botching the move to remote learning for the last year, here's where we stand at Cherry Chase:-All teachers will be fully vaccinated by the time the planned, phased-in return to in-person instruction begins-That return includes only half-days in-person, half-day virtual learning, with full cleaning between in-person sessions-Installed higher capacity air ventilation systems, required masks at all times, no recess, constant hand washing-Half capacity of student numbers with each in-person session ....And yet, only ONE teacher in a grade level is willing do to this for kids to have some in-person time, for a half day, four days a week, with half of their classmates and full precautions in place.A few too many parents selected this hybrid in-person / virtual model, and now the administration is waiting (hoping) for a few to drop off. Either because they don't want to do more than one class for the entire grade level, or because no other teacher is willing to do it (though all have received their first jabs and will be fully vaccinated by the time it starts. Again, with FULL precautions in place.)Then why the heck did we prioritize educators in the first place? So they can feel better shopping at Safeway?
Submitted by parent on July 07, 2020

Very dissapointed on the distance learning program during Covid-19 and I am personally scared of what will come this next year. I don't think the leadership nor the staff on this school is equipped to come up with a feasible plan, despite other schools in the area showing progress on this.
Submitted by parent on June 23, 2020

Our experience with the school and the teacher has been very disappointing. A school's effectiveness is measured when times get tough and the teachers and the school have significantly failed to deliver. I wouldn't call it less involvement, but zero involvement in students' education in CoViD times.
Submitted by parent on June 17, 2020

In the time of COVID-19, the only thing that matters is the quality of remote learning. This school let the students down by not providing any feedback on turned in work. I think a few teachers did, but not any in my child's grade. Cherry Chase seems like an outlier in this regard from the information we obtained from parents of a neighboring public elementary school...
Submitted by parent on March 26, 2020

It was good, until Covid19 came. Then it was a disaster. The principle and teacher kept saying they are following the standards which consists of a checklist, a list of online programs, online hours, and only 1 hour per week of video conferencing in zoom. Other schools even within the school district have daily zoom conferencing. I ask what are the teachers doing if they are only available 1 hour per week for online conferencing. Cherry chase will be defined by how they taught our kids during a crisis, not by what they did before.
Submitted by parent on June 15, 2018

We’ve been parent in the school for the past 4 years. It’s been a great environment for our children and we’re happy to be part of this community.
Submitted by parent on January 26, 2018

Cherry Chase is a great all around public school. It has high quality teachers, good and stable school leadership, involved parents, a well maintained campus, and lots of good in-school programs and after school enrichment opportunities. The school has grown a lot in recent years (it's at/near capacity in most grade levels, with about 850 students total). Cherry Chase is well managed and the principal and teachers work well as a team. Parent involvement and thousands of volunteer hours at the school make extra great stuff happen at Cherry Chase (which is true of many great schools).
Submitted by parent on March 25, 2017

My son has been in this school for five years now and i am very disappointed. We moved in this area because the school was rated 10/10. I am surprised with this rating. We are not happy with 4 of the 5 teachers who taught my son . Most teachers don't give any feedback about the child's progress/problems. They also don't return HW or test papers on regular basis. We have no idea what is being taught. My son used to get good grades but his grading is going down. Overall, I am not happy with the school and we are thinking of moving out of this area because of this school.
Submitted by parent on October 07, 2016

Pros: 1. Strong PTA, actively engaged parent community raises plenty of resources for the school and also supports teachers in the classrooms. 2. Most teachers are a good mix of fun+ learning+ discipline but there are some bad apples. There are/were some outstanding teachers. 3. Extensive and diverse in-school and after-school programs to cater to pretty much every kind of student: chess, drama, French, robotics, strings, City-X, band etc. 4.Pretty well-rounded education without over-emphasizing computer learning. 5. School (and the students) is still getting used to Common core especially the conceptual aspects of common core. 6. Fairly diverse student population in terms of ethnicity, but most students come from economically comfortable/well-off families. Very few reduced lunch students. 7. Of late, Principal turnover has reduced. The current Principal Mrs. Anita Lee has been in office for about 3 years (since summer of 2013). 8. Home work is manageable, but teachers are open to increasing/decreasing HW based on student needs. 9. Good anti-bullying program but not consistently enforced by all teachers. 10. PTA Board used to be largely Caucasian, it has recently gotten more diverse in the past couple of years. Cons: 1. Class size is around 24 from K-3, goes up to 32 in 4th and 5th grades for most batches, although there are some exceptions. 2. Teacher turnover is high, some bad apples are not in the school anymore. Some teachers got pulled into the Fairwood Explorer program in the last 3-4 years. Other reasons for high teacher turnover being (guessing here): the school district is not ready to offer tenure to some good teachers due to resources (?) but may be also due to politics in some cases. 3. Not enough noon aides to deal with the growing and diverse student population. Some of the noon aides not having grown up here don’t quite know how to deal with certain situations. This sometimes results in bullying (elementary school kind) go unnoticed. 4.Cultural/Ethnic diversity does not translate into striking friendships with a different background for the students. That’s possibly because many of the parents are first gen immigrants from places like Europe, Korea, India, China and may be looking to stay in their comfort zones. In any case, this is a wasted opportunity for the society at large. 5. Front office is largely curt and condescending. Overall: Cherry Chase elementary has been a pretty decent school for us this far.
Submitted by parent on December 09, 2014

This school has grown tremendously over last several years. Classroom size is growing (used to be 20 students/teacher). Unfortunately, there is such high turnaround not only with students, which is fine, but with teachers and the principal! Although this school got high API score with a 10 rating, there are some bad teachers. Can be a nightmare if your child gets one of them.
Submitted by parent on March 04, 2014

PTA works really hard. Children are competitive. However, It is hard to get help from teachers, either "no time" or no respond to e-mails. My questions may be around once every two months. It is not too much disturbing to the class teacher. I wish the principal could ask the feedback to each family about class teacher. I guess it is free public education. We only can be grateful for any treatment that we receive and cannot ask for more than that. I really do not know whether parents deserve getting attention from teachers or we are using extra time from teacher, which is not allowed.
Submitted by parent on August 05, 2013

Great school, very good parent communication and attention given to every child. Would definitely recommend.
Submitted by parent on August 01, 2013

my school is the best. it is the greatest school in the whole world. I am waiting very eagerly for my school to get open.
Submitted by parent on September 15, 2012

This school is growing like crazy. A few years back, there were a little over 500 students and now there are close to 850. With so many students, and limited space and supervision, the quieter kids were getting lost. Now, they started a great program run called the Fun Zone during the 10 minute recess. It's a classroom opened up for students to come hang out and do arts, games, origami and so much more. We hope to see similar initiatives sprout up in the future! There are many wonderful capable parents who are 100% committed and very involved at the school. It's a place you can come to join the community or start building your own. But you do need to invest your time to be part of the community. We have a new principal this year and she is warm and inviting. My hope is that she will be able to bring a warm and trusting environment to the students, parents and the teachers. Academics are generally good but quality of teachers can vary. There is a large disparity of homework load among teachers even within the same grade. Some teachers don't even check homework themselves or keep a keen eye on student correction so they don't have a clue when students are struggling.