important information
The Maryland State Department of Education requires schools in Maryland to be in session at least 170 days during a school year. We have always exceeded that minimum requirement. Each year we are open between 180 and 184 days.
LENGTH OF SCHOOL DAY
Winchester School opens at 7:30AM and closes at 6:00PM. The instructional school day at Winchester is from 9:00AM to 2:45PM, in the Pre-kindergarten three and four-year-old programs, in the Kindergarten, First Grade, and Second Grade. Time from 7:30AM to 9:00AM and from 2:45PM to 6:00PM is available for before school and after school care.
SCHOOL CALENDAR
Click here to see the Calendar.
TEACHER AND STAFF QUALIFICATIONS
All teachers at Winchester School hold four-year college degrees. Since teachers of art, music, and foreign language are not required to have a college degree, our teachers in those areas exceed the Maryland State Department of Education requirements by holding a degree. Teacher Aides are not required to hold college degrees, but they frequently do have or are currently in college working toward a degree.
TEACHER / PUPIL RATIO
Our teacher/pupil ratio in the Pre-K programs is between 10 and 12 children per teacher; in the Kindergarten, First Grade, and Second Grade, between 12 and 15 children.
CRIMINAL BACKGROUND CHECKS
We are required by the Maryland State Department of Education to submit fingerprints of all persons employed by Winchester School for two criminal background checks: (1) by the state of Maryland and (2) by the FBI.
ADMISSION POLICY
To be admitted to the Winchester School Pre-kindergarten programs, children must be either three or four years of age by September 1 of that year. To be admitted to the Kindergarten, First Grade, or Second Grade, a child must be five, six, or seven years of age by September 1.
Montgomery County Public Schools has an early admission policy which will allow children born between September 1 and October 15 to be tested and admitted to a public school upon passing the test. Therefore, if parents wish to enroll a child born in that six-week time frame in Winchester School, we will enroll that child after a successful screening.
Children applying for admission to our Kindergarten, First Grade, or Second Grade who have not been in our Pre-K program are tested for admission. Children are not tested for entrance into the three or four-year-old Pre-K programs. We do require, however, a written report from the day care center or nursery school in which the child has been enrolled.
DIVERSITY OF STUDENTS AND OF STAFF
Winchester School has always had a student body and teaching staff highly diverse by race, ethnicity, by cultural and religious backgrounds. Children are not born prejudiced. They’ve “got to be carefully taught,” according to the song from “South Pacific”:
“You have to be taught before it’s too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You’ve got to be carefully taught.”
We will continue always at Winchester School to create and promote an atmosphere of inclusiveness, of understanding, of appreciation, and of respect for all members of the Human Family in which we should share equal footing.
CONFERENCES AND WRITTEN REPORTS
Parent/Teacher conferences are held at the end of the first semester in late January. School is open for child care from 7:30AM to 6:00PM while parents and teachers are in scheduled conferences throughout several days. Pre-kindergarten children receive a written report at the end of the school year in June; kindergarten children receive a written report twice a year, in January and in June; first and second grade children receive written reports four times a year in November, in January, in March, and in June.
Parents or Teachers who are concerned about a child’s behavior or academic progress in the school may initiate calling a conference at any time during the year.
DISCIPLINARY ACTION REPORTS
We enter severe behavioral problems (hitting, kicking, biting, lying, or extreme disrespect toward others) into our records, and they will result in immediate notification of parents by phone and/or a written note. If such behaviors are frequent, we will ask for a parent conference.
FIELD TRIPS AND SPECIAL EVENTS
We try hard to plan trips and events which are worthwhile for the children. Some are just for fun like Butler’s Orchard for hay-jumping and pumpkins or Wheaton Regional Park where we see the butterflies, take the train ride, and eat lunch in the Park. Other trips are in conjunction with things the children are studying. We go to the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum to see the dinosaur fossils, of course, and to the Air and Space Museum which has a wonderful planetarium show for young children. We’ve even seen “To Fly” there! Tiny Tots concerts given by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; the National Gallery to see the “real” paintings of artists whose work the children recognize from reproductions at school; professional theatre shows for children at Imagination Stage; Glen Echo puppets; ethnic storytellers, musicians, and dance ensembles; a wonderful “Incredible Insects” program; ; a Native American exhibit; a program with over 200 instruments from all over the world. Special events include our annual International Dinner with dishes from many cultures and parents and children in beautiful native dress; the Thanksgiving Feast which the children help prepare at which tables Indian chiefs and Pilgrims sit side by side; and the Halloween parade around the driveway and parking lot as the cameras roll! Stretching young minds and imaginations is a Winchester tradition.
LUNCH / SNACKS
Children carry a lunchbox with their lunch and a drink in it. Breakfast is eaten at home, sometimes finished in the car, but never at school! Two snacks are served around 10:00AM and 3:00PM. Fruit juices are served with crackers and cheese, crackers and peanut butter, mixtures of cereals and raisins, popcorn, pretzels, apple slices, baby carrots, vanilla wafers, oatmeal cookies with raisins, etc. We are extremely careful in following parents’ instructions concerning food allergies and religious objections to certain foods.
INCLEMENT WEATHER POLICY
When MCPS are closed due to weather, we also are closed; when MCPS have a late opening at 10.00AM, we also open at 10.00AM.
SUMMER PROGRAM
Winchester School has a nine-week summer play program, beginning the Monday after the close of the academic school year and continuing until the middle of August. We are closed the last two weeks of August to get ready for the new school year. There is a scheduled program during the summer beginning with circle time and continuing with arts and crafts, music activities, story time, some science and social studies projects which follow “the theme of the week”. The children bring bathing suits and towels and enjoy water play in the sprinklers! We usually take several field trips relatively close to the school. Hours remain the same as during the school year: 7:30AM - 6:00PM.
TUITION FOR THE 2009 - 2010 SCHOOL YEAR
- Full-time tuition: $995 per month
Full-time tuition includes the school program plus any amount of before and after-school care you need. Kindergarten, first grade, and second grade are automatically full-time because their academic day is from 9:00AM to 3:00PM.
- Part-time is for the teaching day only, from 9:00AM to 2:45PM
Part-time (9:00AM - 1:40PM) is available only for the three and four-year-old Pre-K children. It is essentially the teaching time in the Pre-K programs and includes the lunchtime. No before or after-school care is included. Pre-K children may, of course, stay all day for which they would pay full-time tuition.