FAQs About Academics West
Choosing the right school for your student is an incredibly important task, regardless of the stage of their academic, social, and emotional development. Students deserve to learn in an environment suited to fully develop their talents and that provides the support needed to overcome their unique challenges.
To find out whether Academics West is right for your student’s learning journey, we invite you to contact us with any questions you have or to get to know us better by scheduling an information session by phone or an in-person tour of our campus.
For background information and to provide a basic understanding of what we offer, here are some general answers to questions we receive most frequently.
overview
How are you different from a traditional school?
A traditional school offers a limited number of set programs and places students in them in a way that it thinks best fits the student’s needs or the school’s available resources.
We take the opposite approach.
We begin by assessing a student’s needs and goals, and then we develop a program specifically tailored to those needs and goals. Unlike traditional schools that remove students from class to receive specialized assistance, we build support services directly into each student’s schedule so there is no disruption in learning and no sense of being singled out. We recognize that all our students have gifts that should be nurtured and needs that require assistance, and we customize each student’s program to provide the optimum level of instruction, encouragement, and support.
How are you different from a school for gifted students?
Many students with tremendous talents in academic subjects or artistic skills require support and assistance that are not well understood by schools aimed solely at pushing students to excel in their areas of strength. Gifted students may struggle with aspects of executive dysfunction that interfere with their ability to organize information. They may need assistance with social-emotional learning to better understand themselves and work collaboratively with others. The bottom line is that they have needs that go unaddressed in advanced learning institutions as well as traditional schools.
Many schools that cater to “gifted students” focus only on a student’s strengths. At Academics West, we integrate therapeutic support into academic programming to help students not only reach great heights but also overcome the valleys that they need to traverse on their educational journey.
What is the class size and student-to-teacher ratio?
Individualized instruction and support are key components of our program, so our staff-to-student ratios are far lower than in most schools. We have a student capacity of 88, but our admission process is selective, so the size of our student body tends to average between 75-80 students distributed among our Lower and Upper Schools.
In the Lower School for younger students, our student-to-teacher ratio averages 5:1:1. The student-to-teacher ratio in our Upper School for middle and high school students is 10:1:1. Classes in both schools utilize both a lead teacher and a focus teacher. In addition, our student-to-counselor ratio is 5:1, ensuring appropriate support for all students.
What extracurricular activities do you offer?
Our pro-social programming is an essential part of the educational process at Academics West, and this includes mentorship and governance programs that foster leadership skills, but also a variety of engaging activities intertwined with the curriculum and extending beyond it. Our students’ interests are the driving force behind the establishment of extracurricular activities, so these may vary each year. Examples of extracurricular activities include sports programs, including our track team, theatre and dance programs, creative arts such as graphic design and photography, and clubs where students share their love of shared interests such as anime, intellectual puzzles, storytelling, and role play.
Do you offer summer programs?
We offer two types of programs during our six-week summer semester. For students in our Lower School, our summer program provides a blend of academic enrichment and prosocial activities that aim to prevent the learning regression that so often occurs during summer break and to enable students to continue developing their ability to self-regulate.
The summer program for students in our Upper School incorporates a rigorous academic curriculum that allows students to recover credits to keep on track for graduation. Our dedicated learning specialists work with students to strengthen essential learning strategies and integrate therapeutic supports to strengthen emotional well-being alongside academic success.
While our summer programs accomplish key goals for students, they are also designed to be fun. Students who work hard in the summer deserve an enjoyable and unique experience, and that is just what we try to deliver through field trips, challenging games, and more.
admissions
What grades do you serve?
Because our programs are customized to address students’ needs and goals, every student’s academic program may not necessarily fit into traditional grade classification. Students receive research-based instruction aligned to skill levels rather than age. Our Lower School offers programs generally aimed at students in kindergarten through grade six, while our Upper School provides a curriculum for middle and high school students.
Can students enroll at any point, or are there set admission times?
Because academic and therapeutic services are customized for each student, our school is able to operate on a rolling admissions basis to meet the needs of students and families as they arise. Although we follow a typical school admissions process, where we invite families to learn about the school and apply during one semester for enrollment the following semester, we also know that the desire to change schools doesn’t always coincide with the pre-established dates on an academic calendar. We invite you to schedule a discussion to learn more about how the timing might work in your family’s particular situation.
Do you accept students with ADHD? Anxiety? Non-verbal learning disabilities? Neurodiversity? Obsessive-compulsive disorder?
Families often have specific questions about the types of students we accept into our programs, because we are selective. We view that question not so much as “who do we accept?” but instead as “who are we equipped to help?”
Our programs meet the needs of students struggling with anxiety, school refusal, ADHD, OCD, NLVD, high-functioning autism, defiant behavior, mild to moderate learning differences, and other academic, social, or emotional challenges. New York City offers a vast array of private schools tailored to specific needs. The needs we are not equipped to address will be the focus of another excellent program in our area.
Do you serve twice-exceptional (2e) students?
Because of our unique, individualized approach to programming and our proprietary Clinically Informed Academics® approach, Academics West is ideally situated to provide the support and encouragement to enable 2e students to thrive. We work to develop students’ strengths while building and reinforcing social, emotional, or intellectual skills that require further maturity.
Social-emotional learning is critical for all students, but particularly for twice exceptional students, and we incorporate work to build these skills throughout the learning process in our Lower and Upper School programs. Our academic curriculum and social programs integrate seamlessly to prepare 2e students for the myriad challenges of college and other aspects of life after graduation.
How do you apply?
Our school uses a web-based admissions and enrollment system to host our application. This system is known as TADS (which originally stood for “Tuition Aid Data Services.”) The service helps private schools keep certain data organized so that our staff can focus on students rather than paperwork.
To apply, you need to create a user account with TADS, which requires a fee. Then you follow the directions in the Academics West portal on TADs to submit an application.
academics
Do you follow the New York State Next Generation Learning standards?
Our team of special educators selects and develops individual curricula to ensure each student receives an education that adheres to the Next Generation Learning standards (formerly called the Common Core standards of New York State). For students in our Lower School, our program uses the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt “Into Reading and Into Math” curricula, and students are also instructed on targeted learning strategies grounded in the Response-to-Intervention model as well as multisensory reading instruction methods based on the Orton-Gillingham approach.
The curricula developed for each student in our Upper School are rigorous, yet creative. We continue to use a variety of approaches to foster mastery of problem-solving abilities, communication skills, and specific academic subjects.
What academic services are available?
Our highly educated and experienced teaching staff are able to provide a range of services for students. A few examples include:
- Project-Based Learning
- Discussion Driven Instruction
- Cross-Curricular Activities
- Multi-Modal Lesson Plans
- Differentiated Instruction
- Literacy Support & Interventions
This is not an exhaustive list of all potential support here, so if you are seeking services not listed, we invite you to contact us for more detailed information.
Do you prepare all students for college?
We believe that, no matter how many challenges a student faces, college is always a very real possibility if the student gains the right support and remediation. In the Upper School, the academic curriculum is geared toward college preparation, and every senior takes a college transition class to prepare them for the transition to life beyond secondary school.
Every one of our seniors who has chosen to pursue post-secondary education has been accepted into a four-year college or university. Our college guidance counselor specializes in helping students find schools with specialized resources to meet their continued academic or social needs.
supports
How do you address academic and social challenges?
Many students struggle because of problems with executive functioning that are not recognized or addressed in traditional schools. When these basic building blocks are not solid, even students who are quite bright have difficulty accomplishing tasks involving organization, communication, and other skills.
The unique learning profile that we prepare for each student often includes coaching on executive functioning, but it could include a variety of other support interventions to aid in academic and social development. We assess needs and provide support that fit. The assessment process is ongoing, and our individualized focus enables us to make adjustments frequently as appropriate.
What therapeutic services are available?
With a dual emphasis on academics and therapeutic services, our staff is able to integrate many different types of services into a student’s regular schedule. These include:
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
- Individual counseling
- Art therapy
- Personal training
- Social skills development
- Occupational therapy
- Mindfulness training
- Speech and language therapy
- Group counseling
- Canine therapy
Again, this is not an exhaustive list of every potential support here, so if you are seeking services that are not listed, we invite you to contact us for more detailed information.
We Are Happy to Answer Your Specific Questions
Our school provides individualized educational programs for each student, and every student’s experience at Academics West is unique. We welcome the opportunity to provide more specific answers to your questions, so do not hesitate to contact us.
Many families find that a tour or a half-hour private phone session provides a great opportunity to learn more about the programs we offer and the benefits your student could gain from our unique high-support educational environment. We look forward to speaking with you about the ways we may be able to help your student reach their full potential.