My daughter has been attending this school for a little over a year now, and I am amazingly impressed. First, I’d like to state that my daughter is Black in a predominately Chinese school, however never once have my daughter or I ever experienced being mistreated by the staff or even the other students. The environment is nothing less than welcoming, helpful and friendly. Also keep in mind, that she just turned four years old.
What are the things parents need to know?
Curriculum: They have one! So rest assure your child isn’t just being babysat for the day -- they are in a classroom setting with academic goals, along with a daily report card that details what they learned for the day, the child’s behavior, what they ate/how much they ate, and even how long their nap was. It’s an amazing feeling knowing your child’s progress every single day. She also gets daily homework.
They do Chinese lessons for an hour each day, and offer extra curricular activities including private piano lessons, and the Enopi math and English program. I haven’t taken advantage of the piano or Enopi programs here, so I can’t speak to it this time.
Food: They give the kids breakfast, lunch, snack and a PM snack. My daughter seems to enjoy the food, and it’s usually a mix of either Chinese food or American food.
Tuition: I pay $800/month, which includes the extra $50 I pay to drop my munchkin off 30 mins early each day. Her hours are in total from 8am-6pm. Not sure if this is considered pricey – I’ve seen schools as low as $500 but as high as $1300. Also, they are part of the free full-day and half-day UPK program, so come Sept, her tuition will be slashed down to $450 (whoo hoo, thank you, DiBlasio!)
Staff and Students: My daughter seems to truly love her teachers, and when I pick up/drop her off, all of her classmates welcome her with open arms. Super refreshing! This tells you that the parents are also doing a stand-up job at home with their children. Seldom does my daughter complain about being picked on, and in the few occasions it’s happened, the teachers addressed it full on. There’s always one head teacher and a TA in the classroom.
Extras: During the calendar school year, they go on monthly school trips, which has always been $20 per person (so $40 if you’d like to attend with your munchkin). The also do some free trips to the local library and the fire station next door.
They have parent-teacher conferences every year, and they give your child an assessment that lays out what they improved on from the following year, and what could use some work moving forward. This helps keeps me on track as far as age-friendly expectations.
Hugely important – They aren’t afraid to push your child up a class if they feel he/she is excelling. Within my daughter’s first two weeks in the school, the Director saw she knew everything being taught and moved her to the big class (huge plus that helps your child progress and not regress). She also started the Pre-K program early since the teachers believed she was ready to move up again.
I cannot recommend this school enough, no matter your ethnicity!
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