About Cabin John Middle School

Cabin John’s mission is to educate all students in a supportive, challenging, and disciplined environment so that they become lifelong learners and a credit to themselves and society.

Cabin John Middle School is committed to an academic environment that promotes rigor, relevancy and relationships.

The school is located in Potomac, Maryland. There are approximately 940 students and 120 staff members. The original school was built in 1967, closed in 1987 and reopened in 1989. The students and staff are currently located in the Tilden Holding Center. The moderized building is scheduled to open in August 2011. The school is organized by interdisciplinary Super Teams in grades 6, 7, and 8.

Recognizing the strengths and needs of pre and early adolescents, Cabin John Middle School provides a nurturing, stimulating climate in which students and staff have time to grow and become active and engaged learners. Every student is expected to make a personal commitment to excellence and will be given the necessary support to realize this goal. Parents are encouraged to be active partners in this educational endeavor.

The student population of CJMS represents thirty-five countries and comes from four different elementary schools in Maryland. We have a diversified student body and staff:
42%

Minority students
58%

Majority students
73%

Majority staff
27%

Minority staff

Our instructional program is implemented by fifty-seven teachers plus the support provided by a Reading Specialist, Speech Pathologist, ESOL Teacher, fifteen special needs resource team members that include one Autism class, and three Learning for Independence classes and two School Community Based classes.

Our school is organized into four interdisciplinary teams of teachers who are responsible for the academic, social, and emotional needs of their students. In addition, there are three other teams: a physical education team, an arts team, and a special needs team. Our team structure is designed to provide a strong sense of belonging between students and staff. Students are assigned to teams to ensure a balance between races, gender, ability, and former elementary school attendance.

We cluster our special needs students at each grade level. This allows us to maximize our support for them since we use a plug-in-model for our delivery of services. ESOL students are also clustered for the same reason. To the extent possible, we strive to construct pure teams in sixth grade. This allows for much greater autonomy by teachers for their students. As a result, teachers are able to share common concerns on a daily basis in team meetings, conduct parent conferences with all of a child's teachers in attendance, improve the efficient planning of team activities, and coordinate the instructional program for all subjects.

Support staff, specialists, counselors, and administrators are also assigned to each team. These staff members bring additional resources to support the instructional and administrative needs of the team.

Our practice of having the same guidance counselor stay with the same group of children for their three years at Cabin John Middle School has proven to be a real asset in terms of continuity and communication among staff and with parents.

Great emphasis has been placed on teacher training at Cabin John and its significance to instruction in the classroom. Many of our staff are enrolled in classes, attend/and or present at conferences, and are members of curriculum development teams. Our active in-school in- service program looks at the needs of students through analysis of data and surveys. The objectives of our management plan are developed in partnership with the community and focuses on specific needs identified by both staff and community, using MCPS goals as our benchmark.

1. Increase MSA reading scores from 95.9% to 100%.
2. Increase MSA math scores from 92.5% to 96%.

While continuing to improve academic achievement for all students, the priority need groups for 2009 - 2010 are:

Min Increase Reading		Min Increase Math
Special Education	80.4% to 85.4% (+5%)	Special Education	62.7% to72.7% (+10%)
FARMS	73.9% to 83.9% (+10%)	LEP	78.3% to 83.3% (+5%)
LEP	84.8% to 89.8% (+5%)	FARMS	73.9% to 78.9% (+5%)
African American	86.4% to 91.4% (+5%)	African American	79.0% to 84% (+5%)

3. Increase to 95% the number of students who complete Algebra by the end of 8th grade with a C or higher.

2009 Performance Report: Test results for Maryland School Assessment (MSA), High School Assessment (HSA), and Alternate Maryland School Assessment (Alt-MSA)

* CJMS met Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for all sub groups for the 2009 MSA Test