As a young single mother, who moved as a child frequently and experienced countless public schools and their cracks... I wanted more; a village for myslef and children. I wanted to know I had more control and envolvement in my Childrens education surrounded by caring staff who support me and my children. It’s become an amazing community for me and my kids, each member of the staff I truly consider a friend, same goes for the other parents. The school can be challenging, but within the limits of what each child can achieve. Every teacher is happy to adjust, problem solve, and apply a personalized approach for what best suites each child. I have a child with ADHD and anxiety issues that can easily be overlooked as just defiant and disruptive. It’s critical to understand what he’s really saying when he has issues. He also has a rare not yet fully understood vision disease that cannot be corrected or fixed, only understood from their perspective and from observation to see when and where they are struggling but not articulating. (For example reading was becoming very difficult with smaller font and worksheets without enough contrast causing eye fatique.... we problem solved, communicated, and realized that when the vision fatigue hit a certain level, or in certain environments, my child would act out or do the bare minimum. Not because of work ethic, behavior, or actual reading acuity, but because they had reached a point where their visual processing wasn’t able to keep up. We adjusted his schedule, seating placements, and the resource room made photo copies of colored worksheets into a black and white more contrasted worksheets. When his ADHD was causing bad days, they helped find ways of redirecting him and stay in constant communication with me and his doctor about how well his medications are working and any side effects so we could adjust as needed. All without ever needing to go through the IEP process he would need in public school) It does require parental involvement and communication of course, but my children continue to thrive, test in top percentiles in all standardized testing, and truly enjoy school. As a result they continue to build self confidence, responsibility, time management skills, and compassion.
