History of The Center School
The Center School was founded in 1981, under the umbrella non-profit organization, Northeast Foundation for Children. Sharing a desire to create a new educational model, the founding members—including Ruth Charney, Marlynn Clayton, Jay Lord, and Chip Wood—all pooled their time, resources, and energy to create the first Center School class.
The guiding philosophical belief was that social, emotional, and cognitive development at different ages of childhood should be the key factor in deciding what and how to teach each age group. Inside the Conway Street building, all classes were mixed-aged groupings with the now characteristic Center School names: Pre-Primes, Primes, Middles, and Uppers.
As the school and staff developed, so did the education model. Soon, the demand for information about this education philosophy grew as well. The staff began developing and offering workshops on literature, block-building, room design, and classroom management. Several teachers published books on these topics and the Center School’s work began to gain a wider audience.
To help share their educational philosophy with the wider world, a publishing division was established. The first book to be published was A Notebook for Teachers by Marlynn Clayton, followed by Ruth Charney’s book, Teaching Children to Care, and Ellen Doris’ book Doing What Scientists Do. All met with great acclaim.
By 1989, the three different types of work—consulting, publishing, and classroom teaching—began to crystallize into three distinct divisions. Over the next 10 years, the foundation grew, purchasing the Abercrombie School in Greenfield and the ‘Yellow House’ (an adjacent building on the property), and eventually building The Marion Bliss Finer building on campus to house classrooms and an all-purpose room for assemblies and school functions. It was fertile ground for the 8th grade plays, AP’s, and integrated theme projects. The huge All School room was just what we needed: safe enough to light a peace candle, big enough to paint an MLK mural, and international ceiling tiles. We had acres and acres of woods to explore, Mountain Day, the big hill, playing fields, soccer practice, local field trips, and enough space for huge Capture the Flag games. Our once-barren campus was transformed by Grounds Days, a parent initiative that brings the community together in fall and spring for campus beautification. Our well-honed developmental tradition of learning about home, classroom, school, and community expanded. Picture us in Greenfield and Northampton marching for climate justice, LGBTQIA+ rights, and racial justice. Picture children of every age learning that their actions matter, and that they are agents of innovation, involvement, and change.
In 2001, the Northeast Foundation for Children and the Center School separated into two independent entities. The Center School was incorporated as a non-profit in January of 2002 under Laura Baker’s leadership and purchased the school buildings (Brick Building, Finer Building, and Yellow House) from NEFC.
In 2009 Charlie Spencer became Head of School and the innovations continued. Our Preschool was created, piloted, and expanded. In 2015, we worked toward, and received, our accreditation from the Association of Independent Schools of New England (AISNE). In 2019, the Forest K/1 program was born. In August 2020, during a worldwide pandemic emergency, Charlie, administrators Amanda Richard and Lauren Obregon, and the entire teaching staff transformed Center School into an exciting outdoor and hybrid program. Meanwhile, work on our new campus moved along without missing a beat! Growth and change is the one thing you can always count on at the Center School.
Our new campus as of Fall 2021
In the fall of 2021, we brought our cherished memories, and the values they represent, to our new green campus. They’re currently growing, thriving, and continuing to evolve amidst cleaner soil and air, opportunities for in-depth, project-based learning indoors and out, stewardship, sports, and play, exploration of the vast conservation lands that border us, community service, a thriving summer camp featuring vibrant, week-long sessions, and other opportunities yet to be discovered.
Our wonderful alumni, in a tradition that continues to this day, often join us as teachers and staff. We want to give a big shout out to Kim Hake, current Support Services Coordinator, and Vanessa Ricketts, current Uppers teacher. We are also so grateful to Ella LaMee, Sisi Richard, Jude Spencer, and Henry Spencer, all more recent alums who have returned as substitutes and After School teachers. We have also been honored to work with Darius Marder, Erin McLaughlin, Arieh Dwelley-Blowers, Becky Hawes-Sivitz, Jonah Kaplan-Wolner, and Jon Bander. Alumni Kirsten Bergstrom, Sam Plotkin, and Michael Skillicorn currently serve as Board/committee members. Our extended community continues to move forward as we’ve always done: with hope, unity, courage, and a desire to make the world a more just and equitable place for all.