Core Values

When the school was founded, there were a few key beliefs that shaped it. These “non-negotiables” created a unique learning environment that our scholars, teachers, and families experience today. 

Year Round School
Mandela offers a year-round schedule that helps fight summer slide and provides more enrichment experiences for scholars in the summer months. Our school has approximately 200 scholar contact days, compared to approximately 178 days offered by the local public and private school systems. That’s generally 24 extra days of instructional time for scholars. The school year is organized into four traditional quarters and a fifth term, which takes place over the summer months. 

Family Engagement
Having our family members involved in school does more than just support the child; it lays the groundwork for a future where family, community, and learning are linked. 

Direct Reading Instruction
Our school uses phonics-based, direct reading instruction and multidisciplinary approaches to promote better reading outcomes. Teachers and paraeducators undergo an 80-hour professional development training in the Writing Road to Reading curriculum by Spalding International. The core tenants of the curriculum are: phonemic awareness, feature recognition, letter recognition, sound-symbol relationships (decoding), spatial placement, vocabulary, sentence structures (syntax process), and text comprehension (semantic process). Scholars learn how to read, write, and spell early on, so they can not only succeed, but also discover a sense of love for reading. 

Violin for Every Child
Playing the violin creates positive learning outcomes, including improving reading, language skills, building hand-eye coordination, and creating positive habits around practice and attention. 

Required Recess
Play is essential to building a child’s social-emotional skills. Scholars at Mandela have three required recesses daily, and recess is treated the same as any other academic practice. 

Restorative Practices
Our school uses restorative practices and a social emotional learning curriculum to help scholars resolve conflicts and restore relationships in positive and peaceful ways.