Releasing Potential
Transforming Childhood
Changing the Conversation
The time is right for Montessori education . . . for all families
After more than a decade of efforts to improve schools by focusing exclusively on a narrow definition of student achievement, Montessori education is capturing the attention of a growing segment of parents, leaders, and educational reformers seeking a better way to educate our nation’s children.
Since 1907, when the first school opened as part of an urban renewal project in the tenements of Rome, Montessori has played a role in serving our most vulnerable families. Today, there are more than 22,000 Montessori schools worldwide on six continents. The US is the world leader with more than 5000 Montessori programs—just over 500 of these schools are public, able to serve all families. Montessori is now recognized as a time-tested, developmental, and research-based educational approach that, unlike many current reform efforts, attracts families from all ethnicities, social classes, and cultures.
The case for Montessori education—that children educated in fully-implemented Montessori programs gain superior intellectual and social capacities—is grounded in an increasingly compelling research base. We now have conclusive evidence that children learn best in environments that are highly enriched, student-centered, and structured. Just as compelling is a research base that demonstrates the link between self-regulation, independence, collaboration, creativity, and respect for self and others and real success.
The time is right to move the national conversation away from tinkering with a fundamentally broken system and toward a vision of education that is unrelentingly committed to the developing mind, body, and spirit of all our nation’s children. The time is right to operationalize a vision of school reform that matches the schools reformers themselves choose for their own children. Research provides the evidence. Montessori educational theory and practice provides the blueprint. The time is right for Montessori for all children.
The Cycle of
Usable Knowledge
The Center’s mission of supporting the development and sustenance of excellent public Montessori programs is enacted in four primary clusters of work:
- Advocating for new and existing public Montessori programs;
- Providing technical assistance for public Montessori practitioners;
- Ensuring quality programming through research and evaluation; and
- Disseminating accurate information related to Montessori education in the public sector.
Together, these four areas of activity form a continuous cycle of generating and applying usable knowledge.