Longview School is a pre-K through 12th grade private school located in the village of Brewster in scenic Putnam County, New York.
Longview School is a pre-K through 12th grade nonprofit, NY State recognized, private school located in the village of Brewster, New York.
Longview combines rigorous academics in the traditional curriculum with electives hardly ever seen on the pre-K to 12th grade level.
Some of our electives include:
- computer programming
- game design
- visual basic programming
- debate
- sociology
- anthropology
- Japanese
- philosophy
- improvisation
- graphic design
- engineering
- construction
- business
Longview’s small, personalized environment supports both academic learning and social development. Longview makes life real for our students in a number of ways:
- Classes are taught so that learning is relevant to the students’ lives
- Students share the real work of operating the school through clerkship positions
- Students share the responsibility of working out conflicts in the school Judicial Committee
- Students share the power in making the rules by which the school is governed
- Students are encouraged to complete internships in job settings they consider as potential future professions.
Students with special needs
Although we are not a school specifically for students who have special needs, we have always incorporated these students seamlessly into our community, with them typically comprising 30% to 50% of our total student body. Our school is truly an inclusive environment where the needs of special ed students are met in the same classes with our more traditional learners with the use of:
- small classes
- differentiated teaching techniques
- hands-on instruction
In addition, these students have 1:1 or 1:2 classes with our special ed teacher for both direct instruction, program development and support.
At Longview both day and boarding students are introduced to an enriching school experience that allows them to thrive in an alternative academic setting. It is our goal to have students feel empowered at school rather than have their power taken away from them.
Numerous students simply fall through the cracks in public schools and start to feel like they cannot be successful in their education. Many of those students find a new home at Longview School.
Longview is a democratic school with aspects based on the Sudbury Schoolmodel. Democratic schooling means that the students have direct access to andcontrol over their environment. This in turn leads to a sincere investment incontributing to their surroundings, their curricula, and their community. Theschool is run by a democratic meeting of the staff and student. Much like theold-fashioned town hall, issues are raised and discussed, and solutions areproposed, voted on, and enacted by majority support. By teaching our studentsthat they can alter their environment, we are engaging them in higher-levelthinking about their education, their autonomy, and their roles in the community.This is a lesson they then take with them into the wider world as capable adultsready to acknowledge, address, and find solutions for the problems they encounter.
