By Dana Zakshevsky

Atlanta has many great things to offer families, including a multitude of innovative, award-winning schools. If you’re moving to Atlanta with a family, or about to start a family, you’ll be glad to know your children’s education will be in good hands. Along with the public and private schools, Atlanta has many diverse schools to fit your child’s every need. From boarding schools, to charters and schools focused on children with special needs, here are a few non-traditional schools that are a cut above the rest.

Atlanta Girls’ School
Atlanta Girls’ School is a middle and high school for girls that emphasizes the ability to learn and adapt academically. The school also believes that girls-only education is an important way for young women to learn in today’s world. With a strong college prep curriculum, the students at Atlanta Girls’ School are in an environment designed to foster the potential of each student and enable her to contribute to society. Atlanta Girls’ School boasts their use of technology as part of the learning process, including a one-to-one program in which all students have an Apple Macbook laptop to access curriculum resources, software and more.

Atlanta Girls’ School is located in intown Atlanta.For more information, visit atlantagirlsschool.org or call (404) 845-0900.

Atlanta International School
Atlanta International School, or AIS, is a school based on international education and is one of only 10 schools in the country that offers the full continuum of the International Baccalaureate curriculum for grades K4 through 12. The school’s mission is to give students the intellectual and cultural confidence to succeed in a globally connected world. AIS also has award-winning theater and robotics programs with a new cross-curricular arts, sciences and design building opening soon.
AIS is a kindergarten through 12th grade school for both American and international students. Current enrollment is approximately 1,000 students, with 50 percent being American and 50 percent international. At graduation, students take a test to receive a prestigious International Baccalaureate Diploma.

Atlanta International School is located in the heart of Buckhead. For more information on AIS, visit aischool.org or call (404) 841-3840.

Atlanta Speech School
The mission of the Atlanta Speech School is to help each student develop his or her potential through language and literacy. The Atlanta Speech School has four schools, five clinics and a professional development center to train teachers in partner schools. The school’s focus is helping young children develop language and become proficient readers, despite any learning obstacles they may face. Students include those who are deaf or hard of hearing, have learning disabilities and have speech and language disabilities, as well as typically developing children. Atlanta Speech School serves around 4,000 students ranging in ages from infants and toddlers to preschoolers, elementary-age children, middle-school children and even teenagers and adults. Atlanta Speech School offers special academic and clinical programs, including the Katherine Hamm Center, a listening and spoken language program, and Stepping Stones, a preschool program providing therapeutic education for children with speech and/or language difficulties.

Atlanta Speech School is located in Atlanta. For more information, visit atlantaspeechschool.org or call (404) 233-5332.

Brandon Hall
Brandon Hall is a coeducational day school and boys’ boarding school for students in fourth through 12th grades that focuses on the individual student. With small group or one-to-one class instruction, Brandon Hall emphasizes organization, structure, accountability, compensatory skills and more. The school also offers ESL (English as a Second Language), postgraduate and summer school programs. Within the prep school setting, Brandon Hall offers traditional and special programs, including a learning differences program where students with learning differences are in monitored programs. Their college prep curriculum includes multi-sensory and differentiated instruction, supervised study at the end of each class period, applied study habits and more. Enrollment is approximately 130 students.

Brandon Hall is located in north Atlanta. For more information, visit brandonhall.org or call (770) 394-8177.

The Cottage School
From humble beginnings—a one-room office with a lone set of table and chairs and one teacher—The Cottage School has grown into a dynamic school community on a 23-acre campus with five cottage-style classrooms. The Cottage School began as one teacher’s dream to help academically frustrated students. The school planted its roots as a tutorial after-school program, but quickly parents requested full-time education. In time, The Cottage School evolved into a fully accredited middle and high school with a curriculum designed for hard-working students with learning differences. Many of the school’s students have become discouraged in traditional academic settings—The Cottage School finds that these students often flourish within its cottage-style classrooms and its specialized curriculum.

The Cottage School philosophy teaches students basic work skills that they can implement as confident and productive adults. The curriculum is also designed to uncover each student’s individual talents, helping each one develop a path for success beyond graduation. In addition to its specialized curriuculm, The Cottage School offers a diverse athletic program, arts education, career and post-secondary preparation, tutoring and much more.

The Cottage School is located in Roswell. For more information, visit cottageschool.org or call (770) 641-8688.

Heron Bay Academy
Heron Bay Academy is a charter school opening in the fall of 2011. The school’s mission is to create an ideal environment in which students will have the opportunity to strive for academic excellence, explore a diverse curriculum, prepare to succeed in a global environment and develop into lifelong learners and responsible stewards. Heron Bay will have a rigorous college prep program and will engage in Paragon, a humanities program based on the history of great works, people and ideas in world culture. The school will open with 400 students in kindergarten through sixth grades and will expand to 560 students and add two more grade levels by the fourth year of operation. This school will also have a strong focus on the environment through a use of indoor and outdoor classrooms, walking and biking trails and a focus on environmental sustainability. This school will be the focal point of the community and will use its location as a great way to bring the community together.

Heron Bay Academy will be located within the Heron Bay Development, in Locust Grove. For more information, visit heronbayacademy.org.

The Friends School of Atlanta
The Friends School of Atlanta is a school based on the Quaker values of truth, simplicity, peace, integrity, community, equality and stewardship.

The Friends School is a diverse school for children in elementary and middle school. The school provides small classes to help the success and quality of each student’s education. Classes range from nine students (with the youngest students, age 4) to 16 (the maximum number of students per class) in the middle school. Multi-age classrooms are offered at The Friends School where students are grouped by age (one-and-a-half to two-year age spans) instead of grade level to provide a supportive learning environment.

The Friends School of Atlanta is located in Decatur. For more information, visit friendsschoolatlanta.org or call (404) 373-8746.

The Howard School
The Howard School is a K-12 independent school for children with learning differences and language learning disabilities. Howard offers integrated programs including the integrated use of technology with a full assistive technology program, a full-time math lab specialist, art and music, physical education and athletics.

Last year’s enrollment was made up of 232 students age 5 through 12th grade. The school has 47 teachers, including six speech language pathologists, five literacy specialists and 28 faculty members with advanced degrees. In 2009, the percentage of graduates who went on to post-secondary institutions was 93 percent.

The Howard School is located in Atlanta. For more information, visit howardschool.org or call (404) 377-7436.

Mill Springs Academy
The traditional classroom with a blackboard at the front of the room, desks in rows and one teacher to deliver instruction just doesn’t work for every student. Mill Springs Academy offers an environment designed to nurture students who haven’t realized their full potential in a typical school setting. The academy, located in Alpharetta, welcomes students in first through 12th grades.
Learning strategies are developed for each student through information collected from psycho-educational evaluations, previous school records, diagnostic skills assessment and observations and communication with the student’s current and previous education professionals. Students take part in a structured curriculum that includes the academy’s community levels system, daily values groups and life space interview techniques.

Mill Springs Academy takes a total-child approach to providing an atmosphere where students can thrive academically, socially and physically. For more information about Mill Springs, call (770) 360-1336 or visit millsprings.org.