A unique and important educational experience for our students with myriad opportunities for academic and social growth.
As we embark on this enriching journey together, I extend a heartfelt welcome to each of you. I am honored and delighted to work as the middle school director at Friends Select. The middle school is a vibrant and community-centered division. Our curriculum reflects our commitment to nurturing holistic growth, which aims to inspire curiosity and critical thinking, and spark a lifelong love of learning. Our Quaker values serve as anchors and connect to the core of everything we do at Friends Select while fostering an environment of inclusivity, empathy, and respect.
Friends Select’s middle school program offers a unique and important educational experience for our students with myriad opportunities for academic and social growth. Our curriculum is intentionally designed to fit the developmental needs of adolescents in fifth through eighth grade. Middle school is a time for students to explore the ways they learn best. Students are exposed to a variety of teaching methods and learning modalities. The goal of the middle school program is to build both content knowledge as well as academic skills. Students work on developing their critical thinking as well as their collaboration skills while also developing as readers, writers, researchers, mathematicians, and scientists.
At Friends Select, we work to support “the whole” of every student. As such, a broad program is offered incorporating academics, activities, athletics, service, and other areas. In addition, areas of student support are available covering students’ learning and social-emotional needs. Middle school is a time for many new experiences and expectations in a child’s life. Here a student transitions from being in a self-contained classroom to switching classes, maintaining materials and workload, all while navigating new social dynamics. With this transition and transformation, it is not uncommon for students to need and benefit from services that support their success in different areas.
“We believe that every child should be known by caring adults who guide them to think for themselves. This is a time for them to question, to explore, to figure things out. Teachers spark a love of learning and creative ingenuity that students will carry with them into upper school.”
Desiree Harmon P’19
Middle School Director
Our Voices
“It is a powerful thing to be known over time as you grow...”
“It is a powerful thing to be known over time as you grow. Lower school is quite different from middle, and middle from upper, as Friends Select pays such close attention to students’ changing developmental needs. Spending 12, 13, or even 14 years in one community is the kind of experience we don’t often get. I built a solid foundation by growing and changing over time in this one special place.”
