Niskayuna High School

My experience with this school was great. The teachers are friendly and always have the kids best interest.

I’m very happy with my child’s experience at St. Kateri’s. How many kids do you know who get up set when there is a snow day? I don’t know many. But that is how my daughter feels. She is so happy to get back to her teacher and friends every day. I feel she is truly cared about at this school. Not only are the teachers caring, but the principal has to be one of the kindest and caring people I have ever met. It is clear that her number 1 priority is the well being of ALL the students at this school. I feel lucky that my daughter has so many caring people around her at school. And to me that is the most important thing. Her feeling of being safe and happy at school.

I keep getting impressed in my dealings with Brown School by how clear it is that everyone working there LOVES kids! You might think, duh, they work at a school, but after interacting with two "top" school districts here in the Capital District and a similar one in Western Mass., I call or show up at the door at Brown School and think, wow! This is nice! They "get" kids here. They want to deal with real kids and their families. Instead of acting like guards at the Tower of London, they're kind and helpful... and hey, one of the core staffers is willing to pretend to be in the Tower Guard, but only because it makes my youngest child break out in peals of laughter.Brown School has very strong academics, but they really do treat their students as individuals, so the academic rigor does not translate into pressure. If you're looking for a school that broadcasts how alternative it is in every way, this might not be the best fit, but based on the experiences of my kids and their friends, Brown School is a place where students who have struggled elsewhere can really blossom. When I've needed to bring up a concern, the school director has been more than ready to take that concern seriously. At the same time, she and the board really do seem to appreciate that teachers are the heart of a school!All of my kids have learning issues of different kinds, and the approach Brown School has taken has been very helpful before and after those issues were identified. At one point, one of my kids was going over to a very highly regarded public school for support services then coming to Brown School... the teachers were incredibly helpful, and the contrast became so clear: on one side, the administration reviewed my son's assessments and said, "oh great! He's making so much progress, we can reduce his sessions each week!" At Brown School, the classroom teacher reviewed the same assessments, applied her own observations, and said, "oh great! He's making so much progress! He's participating more in this way, but I'd like to see him participating even more fully! Here are a couple suggestions for how else we might support him..." And the Brown School administration backed her up, and my son really benefited. A world of difference.