Dr. H. O. Smith Elementary School

This school is amazing. The staff are all supportive and encouraging, the school itself is warm and welcoming and feels like a community. They do all kinds of extra activities for the kids, like this year every kid got a cookbook and apron with chef hat, and at Christmas every kid got to pick a board game to take home. The curriculum is very good, and the advanced math and science tract is very apparent. My son was a little behind in reading at the beginning of the year, and by the end he is a full grade ahead. These teachers truly care about your child.

I returned to Nashua area after nearly 30 years overseas. My (foreign-born) wife followed, with our young kids. We fully intended on putting our kids in the public school system, once they were of age.I was not prepared for the shock of the degradation of Nashua’s public schools. We researched school assessments and toured our assigned public elementary school.A staff member at that school, who is a friend of the family, sent us a stern warning not to send our kids there. She said she would not send her kids there, if mine were hers. That was an honest, ominous warning from someone on the ‘inside’. We decided to make up our own minds, so we toured the school and observed a bit of the school day.My wife, who is not Catholic and was against sending our kids to private school, finally ‘relented’ (after her extreme disappointment with the atmosphere at our assigned public school) and she let me schedule a tour of Saint Christopher (then “School”) Academy.The difference in the tours between the two schools was so stark, in all the most meaningful ways.(These were not all-day tours, but we saw/heard enough at both schools to have a good feel about which one we definitely did NOT want our kids subjected to.The students at St. Chris were courteous and polite, and the teachers we spoke with, spontaneously, were willing to (transparently) talk about what they do/were doing, in their classrooms.There was far less teacher ‘screaming’ at kids (read: fewer education-degrading disciplinary distractions).For a school in a nearly all-white state, St. Chris was, visibly, quite diverse. Later I came to know parents of a multitude of nationalities and non-Catholic/non-Christian religions.Uniforms: No matter what one thinks about uniforms, they do engender a certain ‘feel’ to the place. It feels like a ‘community’. As kids of various ages sought to get by us in the hallway between classes, they were universally polite—greeting us, or excusing themselves as they squeezed by. Our kids have done pre-school to (now, oldest) 7th grade, and though no place is perfect, in all things, at all times, we, as parents, have been pleasantly surprised at the level of work our kids are doing at such a young age. I grew up in Hollis, NH (with its good public school system) and my kids are way ahead of where I was, at THEIR ages.Though many dislike discussing ‘morality’, there is a keen sense that, at St. Chris, morality counts. If $ is an issue: #NH Education Freedom Accounts!

Our son is currently in Kindergarten, and we've just enrolled our younger son in their Pre-K 3 program next year. We could not be happier with our overall experience. Our son is loved and cared for, and his test scores have improved tremendously over the course of the year. He was struggling to learn to read, and they offered extra help and support, and he is now soaring in that area of development. More importantly, he's learning to be a kind, empathetic and spiritual little boy who knows what it means to serve others. We cannot recommend this school enough, and there are many ways to receive tuition assistance, so don't let the price tag of private education keep you from touring and considering this elementary school.

This school focuses a great part on discipline and Christianity. There are only some good teachers, and the students are not motivated to learn. They went on many field trips and events though. Lots of money is gone. Sr. Maria needs to focus more on the curriculum and the students, not on how much money she gets. 4/10. Do better.