Westwood Montessori, Starwood Montessori, Good Shepherd Montessori-- Opinions?

Hi I saw this a little late but if you are still interested I thought I would give feedback on Westwood. My sons attended the school from toddler thru K and we loved many many things about the school. It is absolutely family friendly and my kids thrived there socially and emotionally...especially my older who was quite shy. The school became very expensive in the last 2 years and frankly for what they are charging IMO were not delivering enough extras to justify it. Basically the increase in tuition is going towards the upper school and the new high school and the preschool gets little of the benefit. Also the class sizes in preschool are quite large...or were last year bc they seemed to be really trying to get more students and tuition dollars in...unfortunately this backfired a little bc some of the classes got to be too big for comfort and we were one of the families that wanted to leave for a smaller class size....it was 26 in preschool last year though I have heard the sizes have fallen since then. Now if your child is coming from montessori and has done well in it and you are comfortable with the philosophy past K then your child will most likely do well at this school. One of my boys needed more structure and we felt the traditional method was a better fit for him past K so we are at another private school now not montessori. Their tuition is almost on par with St Alcuin and frankly their physical campus is nothing to brag about that they charge as much as they do. Its nice large classrooms but they are in a converted warehouse building in the middle of warehouse/business addison! There is a smallish play area and open field. they do well with what they have but our sense was that if they plan to grow the school in the same location I have a hard time understanding where they plan on putting the high school...it is pretty tight.

I have little information on the middle school and up other than that the class sizes there are pretty small!
Good luck!
A

I haven't had any personal experience with the above ones, but I LOVED Richmond Hill Montessori in Plano. It has been several years since attended there, but was VERY PLEASED.

Two of my three children go to Starwood Montessori- they are 4 and 3. We LOVE it there. We have been happy since day one. As soon as I leave my kids, I know that they are in wonderful hands and for me, that says a lot!! Good luck!

Hi M., my children both go to Dallas North Montessori off of Arapaho in Richardson. It is near 75 and Arapaho. I have one in preschool and one in the elementary. The owners of the school are the teachers and they have been there since the early 80s. It is a wonderful school. The montessori method works great for my kids because it is self paced. My older son is now 8 and only has one more year at DNMS. He really wants to go to Westwood because most of his friends are going there, but it is very expensive and located right in the middle of a very busy business area so we will probably try for a magnet school.

I have lived here for about 40 years and have heard good things about Good Shepherd. North Dallas is not exactly like it used to be, many of us have moved further north to the Lewisville or Carrollton areas. I would suggest you dropping in without calling of course. Maybe lunch time.

I'm a single mother with 4 children, 2 grown (thank goodness), 2 younger at home. I'm also a Loan Officer and do residential and commercial mortgages if I may be of any assistance during your move. D. R.