MONTESSORI PARTNERS SERVING ALL CHILDREN

The Montessori Partners Serving All Children initiative is unique in its approach to school and social reform.  The Montessori Center of Minnesota supports the capacity of the communities most impacted by low-performing schools to lead change for quality of education within their own community.  This represents a major strength of the initiative, igniting profound passion in community leaders to bring opportunities to their children and overcome years of social inequities.

Over 100 years ago the Montessori approach to helping children learn, develop, and grow proved incredibly successful with low-income children in Italy.  Today, Montessori early childhood education across the U.S. and in Minnesota is most often associated with children from affluent families and private schools. The Montessori Center of Minnesota and it’s Montessori Partners Serving All Children outreach initiative actively advocate for providing quality early childhood development experiences in the Montessori approach to underserved children and families.

We are a recognized AMI EsF project. We contribute to the efforts of Access Montessori (accessmontessori.org) to increase access to the benefits of Montessori education and family support services to our most vulnerable children. We are a focus of the Following the Family study, which examines the process of how high-quality Montessori education and attention to the entire family can serve to ameliorate the social and education effects of poverty.  Finally, we are a “chapter” in the full-length documentary film, Building the Pink Tower, which reimagines school through the lens of the possibilities of Montessori.

The Montessori approach is being more widely accepted in public school systems, as evidenced by many districts across the United States having adopted Montessori in magnet schools and charter Montessori schools opening across the country. Montessori Partners Serving All Children is demonstrating how the Montessori approach, starting with the early years, can be viable, effective, culturally responsive, and accessible for all Minnesota children, including those from culturally rooted families and communities who have been traditionally underserved. Expanding the access of all children to community-led Montessori education is an important contributor to their school success and to eliminating educational disparities. 

Cornerstone Montessori School

Our pilot programme, Cornerstone Montessori School, is an exemplary early childhood program fully recognized by AMI and with the highest possible rating from Parent Aware, our state’s quality rating improvement system. Cornerstone serves an economically and culturally diverse community in east St. Paul, housed on the campus of the Montessori Center of Minnesota.  Providing Montessori All Day / All year, we are committed to reserving at least 60% of our enrollment for underserved families.

In our work with the young child, we always dwell in the possibility. Conscious evaluation of results is essential to our work at the Montessori Center of Minnesota and we now have data to show that the possibility can be a reality. In 2012, we commissioned a three-year evaluation of then four MPSAC affiliate partners.  In all three years, data showed no statistically significant disparities related to ethnicity, socioeconomic status, or language spoken in the home, with children performing mostly in the average and above average range. During 2014-2015, we saw a statistically significant growth in African American children’s proficiency in mathematical thinking over the course of that school year, with an improvement from 60% of children scoring proficient in the fall to 93% scoring proficient in the spring.  Read our full evaluation report here.

One of the most important outcomes of our program evaluation is validation of the social justice mission of this work. Program evaluation evidence has borne out that the Montessori approach works for all children, regardless of culture or socioeconomic status. Our work has provided a foundation upon which others may build similar work around the United States and the world.  

We are a recognized AMI EsF project. We contribute to the efforts of Access Montessori (accessmontessori.org) to increase access to the benefits of Montessori education and family support services to our most vulnerable children. We are a focus of the Following the Family study, which examines the process of how high-quality Montessori education and attention to the entire family can serve to ameliorate the social and education effects of poverty.  Finally, we are a “chapter” in the full-length documentary film, Building the Pink Tower, which reimagines school through the lens of the possibilities of Montessori.