Eureka Valley

Being at Harvey Milk has been such a wonderful experience for my child and family. We knew we wanted a small, inclusive school for our sensitive, neurodivergent kid. The teachers and staff are wonderful and every adult knows every child by name and their unique personalities. My kid is thriving academically, above grade level in all subjects, but most importantly they are growing into a kind and empathetic person. The civil right curriculum is introduced in age appropriate ways at each grade level. The school is diverse and accepting of all people, and bullying is not an issue. We love that it is a neighborhood school and we run into classmates at the playground, practice soccer together across the street, can have easy play dates, and know all the kids in the grade and their parents.

We are just a few months into the school year, but this has hands down been our family's favorite school yet (out of 3!) and we already wish they had a K program. Our kid WANTS to go to school everyday, begs to stay for drop-in aftercare, and will negotiate with us for it. You heard that right - our outlier kid, the one that's just a little (or a lot!) different from the other kids, doesn't always like to participate, and has always kind of wondered why we have to go to school - loves going to Eureka Learning Center so much, that if I wave a longer school day around, kid will happily do whatever I'm asking. It's a unicorn.The curriculum is flexible, thoughtful, and able to meet a wide variety of kids where they are. It's social, academic, AND play-based. The teachers are top-notch and very experienced. I can see progress being made every week. One of kid's favorite parts of the day is "Mindful tops", when the kids get to be quiet for as long as the top spins. There is a large outdoor space that the kids spend lots of time in daily. There are a wide variety of rotating activities.Our conversations on the way home usually go like this:Me: "What did you do at school today?"Kid: "Good! Better than yesterday."OK, so I know that's not exactly answering the question I asked, but the important thing is that there hasn't yet been a limit to how "good" it is. Every single day is better than yesterday. I brought that up recently, and he just looked at me like I must not have understood what he said. So I dropped it. Every day must be better than the one before it. That's just how it is.We got screwed in the public school TK lotto and it ended up being a blessing because we are so lucky to have found this gem of a Kinder prep program. When we enrolled at Eureka, it already had quite a reputation to live up to based on the feedback of other parents. I didn't hear from a single parent with anything negative to say... and I went looking (our kid is an outlier kid, right? fit is super important to us). I heard "thriving", "magical", "wants to go to school on the weekend". It has not disappointed.Eureka takes 4-year-olds of all kinds on a first-come-first-served basis. Run don't walk!