Douglas Anderson School Of The Arts

The D.A. administrators have a lot of work to do in terms of focus on donor money, publicity, and their lack of attention to the AMAZING history of the school itself and its student body issues individually and at-large. Besides that, I wouldn’t have gone to any other high school in Duval County. For the most part, it is rigorous while an extremely accepting and supportive environment, which is contributed to by outstanding students, great parents, and passionate teachers who care and uphold the values of the school.

DA is an outstanding school with a great music program. Academics are good and I feel that they well prepare students for college. I see comments regarding favoritism- in my experience with the school if you work hard it will be noticed and you will be rewarded. The school challenges students and drives them to get better in their respective arts area. Kids graduating this school are admitted to prestigious colleges and granted with very generous scholarships.

DA advertises academic excellence, but academics are mediocre at best. In the majority of my child’s classes, nine weeks worth of grading is typically saved until the last few days of the quarter. Therefore, students are not given feedback on their mastery of the subject matter until it is too late. Any concerns about this are shrugged off. The school is highly unorganized. My child’s classes were shuffled around multiple times for weeks after school began with multiple scheduling errors made. DA calls this “leveling” classes and it occurs after students re-audition for placement in their arts areas. I understand the reasoning, but it is so chaotic and widespread that it should be embarrassing to the administration. Rather, it seems to be something that they are proud of. Finally, it has been our experience that within arts areas, teachers will have favorites, so some students will have better opportunities than others. I’m sure it is this way at every high school, but don’t expect DA to be different in that regard.

This school should take a que from the Hamilton musical regarding diversity. I live in the community and this is my third show and possibly my last it's very disappointing is it only one group of students that can star in their productions?