Growing Place Montessori, The

TGPM was our first experience with a school. We chose it because our son's daycare provider recommended it as one of the most loving and academically rigorous preschools in the area... and she had sent her kids there. We love the inclusive, diverse environment for our kids. In addition to the array of materials, activities are planned and customized according to the needs of each child. Our son needed extra help in a few developmental areas, and both his teachers and the administrative staff were empathetic, knowledgeable and willing to work with us for his success. He has now been there for 1.5 years, and we all love it. We're excited to send our daughter when she turns 2.

We have our toddler enrolled at the pre-primary here at the Growing Place Montessori. His teacher Ms.Cruz has been so loving and caring towards him and we really liked the way she teaches and encourages them to be independent. He is now almost ready to transition into the primary class and I'm sure he is going to miss his teacher a lot. Overall we are very happy and feel safe sending him to the Growing place Montessori. Thank you to all the staff for making this a wonderful place for our kids !

My daughter has been going to Growing Place Montessori since she was ten months old. She started at the infant class and is now in the pre-primary classroom (18mo-3yr age range). Their teaching structure is fabulous from sign-language to learning everyday tasks. The teachers are so caring and loving and spend quality time and effort with each kid. They help the children beautiful crafts almost every day and gifts for us (the parents) on special occasions (e.g. Christmas, Mother's day, etc). The management and administrative staff are also very friendly and involved with each child and the parents. They actually started a whole new part-time pre-primary program (three days a week) because we didn't want our 20mo daughter to go to school everyday! We definitely felt heard and cared for and confident that our daughter is in good hands. The admission rates are also very good for the quality of education they provide.

I attended this school when I was a child and I loved my experience. I constantly excelled in class and most importantly I was excited to learn. I remember doing workbooks and wanting to stay inside during recess in order to finish and get to the next book. It was like a game to me, I just wanted to be the best! Learning skills like pouring, and cleaning in the class made that easy to apply at home (which was also a Montessori environment). At home I learned essentials like doing laundry and how to take care of my surroundings. Not only that but I distinctly remember at TGPM how teachers would help me when I had conflict with friends. Teachers would encourage me to be kind when I communicated, even when I was upset with my friends and I felt like my anger was justified. I've always had a spot in my heart for the TGPM staff. Everyone is warm and welcoming, and make you feel as though you are apart of the community. If it wasn't for my foundation in Montessori, I wouldn't have the well-rounded skills that helped me to get into 10 colleges and receive scholarships that almost pay my tuition. I am forever grateful towards this The Growing Place and I cherish the relationships that I developed there.

This place is a huge, profound disappointment. We have a four year old boy who is rather adventurous and spirited, and can sometimes be a bit of a handful. We shared these concerns with the owner Dilip, and he assured us that the school had lots of experience dealing with high-energy kids, and would be more than capable of caring for our son and helping him thrive in their environment. We still had a few reservations about the dated facility and somewhat dour staff, but ultimately decided to enroll. That turned out to be a huge mistake. From almost day one we started getting incident reports about our son. These reports ranged from the wholly pedestrian "didn't lay down and sleep quietly during nap time" (when we expressly shared that our son was over napping, and had been told he would be able to play quietly during nap time instead)-- to the pedantic "wanted to play in the big kids playground, rather than be confined to the toddler area" (he's four, and probably one of the oldest kids in the class). We've had our son in other preschools, and were frankly shocked at both the volume and raw triviality of these "incidents" they kept reporting. After a couple weeks, it quickly became clear that the teachers had singled out our son, and were working together in concert to build a case to expel him. From there they proceeded to offer banal reports of him being "generally disruptive" (it's a preschool, geniuses, four-year-olds tend to 'disrupt' things sometimes), and continued to show a total and absolute lack of interest in working with him or helping coordinate around a solution. Ultimately, they called us in four weeks into his tenure and told us they were kicking him out. Here's the thing: If you have a placid, docile little lamb of a kid, you'll probably do fine at this school (congrats, by the way). Their teachers should be able to keep up, assuming your kid is compliant and largely willing to sit in a corner for eight hours a day. If you have a kid with a modicum of energy, however, I'd run screaming from this place. If you value energy and creativity over torpid compliance, do yourself a favor and burn rubber.