Ahhh, my first preschool disappointment. I learned a lot and lost my naivete that finding a preschool would be super easy. I attended the Montessori Information Night held in the Winter. Applications were available between early February and due mid-April. It was held at Drew Model School (the location of the APS Elementary Montessori program, which is available to all students at no cost).
The first thing that I learned was that the Preschool Montessori program in APS was created for low-income families. Now, I am all about that. Studies show that kids from low income families don't get a good start in school because they generally don't go to preschool. However, so few slots (29 out of 115 slots) are available to NON-low income families as to be virtually worthless to even apply (hundreds apply for those few slots). Secondly, non-low income families have to pay tuition... on the order of $10,000 for the school year in 2010. Oh, and to qualify to be low-income you have to make less than $78,000. Yes, you read that right. Under $78,000 a year is LOW income in Arlington County. Welcome to insanityville.
Anyhow, many of the APS elementary schools have a preschool Montessori program: Ashlawn, Barrett, Campbell, Claremont, Drew, Glebe, Hoffman-Boston, Key, and Jamestown in 2010. Each has feeder schools. You can only turn in applications at the schools that accept your neighborhood elementary school as a feeder. Oh, and you have to turn a separate application in at EACH Montessori school that you want to be considered at. Claremont and Key also have Spanish Immersion along with Montessori (a neat feature).
For more information go to www.apsva.org then select Early Childhood under the "Instruction" tab.
Well, I figured if I was going to have to pay that kind of tuition, I might as well get the better odds of getting in at a private Montessori school. So my search began...
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