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Giving Compass' Take:
• Wildflower Montessori School in Cambridge, MA is using a flexible operations model that incorporates Montessori principals, new age sensor classroom technology, and walks the line between public, private and charter school status.
• What are the potential challenges for Montessori schools that utilize hybrid models for education? What are the benefits?
• Read how some public Montessori schools are closing the achievement gap.
Wildflower, a 21-school Montessori network that spans multiple states, including a handful in Puerto Rico. But as compelling as the technology is, it might not be the strangest thing about Wildflower.
It has a flexible operations model, which fully embraces what education reform advocates call “school choice,” and blurs the lines between public, private and charter schools.
Wildflower began its life as a private school network, charging students tuition north of $15,000 a year, explains Matt Kramer, Wildflower’s CEO. “As the number of schools grew, that became no longer a workable plan,” Kramer says. He began a quest to learn how to fit the model into different governance laws, with public funding.
Wildflower students do not take traditional classroom assessments. Instead, their growth is measured in ways that reflect Montessori values like observations and portfolios. As a result, the network has designed special assessments that satisfy both states and Montessori purists.
Operating in storefronts, school footprints are too small to include outdoor spaces, which are encouraged in Montessori schools, so classes use local parks instead. This intentional approach is designed to reflect what kids might do with their time away from school anyway, like playing outside or going apple picking. “It feels more like some cross between homeschooling and regular institutional schooling,” Kramer says. “It feels like you don't have to step so far from reality to our school.”
Transparent Classroom, a cloud-based record-keeping system designed for Montessori classrooms, serves as a digital progress log, though teachers still have to key in data manually.
But at Wildflower, the tech goes beyond digitizing observation logs. The organization has a team of in-house engineers developing cameras and sensors tucked into classroom materials and slippers.
Read the full article about Wildflower Montessori school by Stephen Noonoo at EdSurge