Courtesy of http://www.tlhclassical.org/
Tallahassee Classical School will open in the fall of 2019. After originally getting denied by the Leon County School District, the charter school was approved by the state to begin the opening process. It will be the district’s fifth charter school. It will start with kindergarten through eighth grade.
Each year it will be adding a grade level so in five years, the school will have its first high school graduating class.
Tallahassee Classical School has a unique curriculum that its founders will be using for their students. They are adopting the Singapore math curriculum, which will focus on concepts and procedure processes at the same time.
Also, they are using the core knowledge sequence, which was developed by professor E.D. Hirsch at the University of Virginia. It sequentially ties in all of the subjects being used throughout the nation.
This school has no tuition and is run by a volunteer board.
“If we love it, there’s other people in the community that loves it and can’t access it. We wanted to make it accessible for everyone. This is why we placed it in a public charter school,” said the founder of Tallahassee Classical School, Adrienne Campbell.
Tallahassee Classical School will not be able to offer transportation at first. They are trying to locate themselves in a central area of town to make it accessible as possible. School will begin at eight in the morning and parents can drop their children off as early as 7:30 a.m.
Campbell has her master’s degree in curriculum and instruction and was a former high school teacher. She came across classical school by exploring education options for her own children, and shared with the co-founder Jana Sayler, which motivated them to start this charter school.
“The foundation in liberal arts, the historical perspective, the roots in Latin and rhetoric and also the emphasis on civic virtue were appealing to me,” Sayler said.
Tallahassee Classical School still has to get its contract signed and finalized before they take the necessary steps to finding a location for the school. However, the children and parents are still eager for this up and coming school year.
“We are very excited that our children have the opportunity to attend a one of a kind charter school in Leon County for free,” said a parent, Joni Weideman.
Tallahassee Classical School anticipates an enrollment of 450 students and is expecting more before it opens next August.