Original Research by School Decision on Howard B. Owens Science Center
Howard B. Owens Science Center is classified as an alternative school serving kindergarten through twelfth grade under Prince George’s County Public Schools. Its location in Lanham places it within a suburban corridor of Prince George’s County, a community that houses several major employers including 2U, Shoppers Food & Pharmacy, and Doctors Community Hospital, and sits near the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. The school’s alternative designation immediately signals that this is not a standard neighborhood school. In Maryland, alternative schools serve a range of purposes, from specialized academic programs to settings for students who need a different structure than a traditional school provides. Without additional detail from the school or district about its specific mission, a family should expect to investigate directly what sort of student population and instructional approach this center uses.
The data on enrollment and student demographics is reported, but every grade and every racial category shows a count of zero, and fields for free or reduced-price meals, special education, and English learner status are all missing. This pattern is unusual even for a small alternative school, and a parent or guardian should ask the school to confirm its current enrollment and population. Because the school is an alternative school, it may not participate in the same state testing program as regular public schools, which would explain the absence of proficiency data and graduation rate. The comparison fact-set we looked at, which places this school relative to other districts in Prince George’s County, could not calculate any metrics because the school has no reported state testing or graduation outcomes. This is not a sign of weakness, but it does mean that the usual academic benchmarks families use to assess a school are simply not available here.
Lanham itself is a census-designated place with a suburban character, a mix of single-family homes, apartment complexes, and office parks. The housing market in this ZIP code shows typical values that fall close to both the Maryland state benchmark and the national median, though pricing varies widely across the county. Rent is near the national average, and the area has significant employment anchors, which shapes the population of families who might consider this school. The broader district, Prince George’s County Public Schools, has recently increased its operating budget with a focus on teacher salaries and student support, introduced a district-wide literacy curriculum grounded in the science of reading across elementary grades, and conducted a boundary review that may shift attendance zones for some schools starting in the 2025–2026 school year. These changes could affect how students are assigned to programs or schools, though how they specifically influence an alternative school placement remains unclear.
Because Howard B. Owens Science Center sits outside the typical accountability framework, a family evaluating it will need to rely on direct communication with the school to understand its academic focus, the types of students it serves, and how students progress after attending. The lack of test scores and graduation rate is not inherently negative, but it removes two of the common tools for comparison. A parent should plan to visit, speak with the staff, and ask about the school’s goals, its relationship with the district’s other programs, and how it measures student success. The data tells us this is a specialized institution within Prince George’s County, but it does not tell us much else about what a student’s day-to-day experience looks like. That gap is best filled by the school itself.
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