Mission

Mission Statement: The High Meadows community celebrates and perpetuates each individual’s quest for knowledge and skill, sense of wonder, and connection to the natural environment. We empower each to be a compassionate, responsible, and active global citizen.

Mission Philosophy: High Meadows School provides an excellent education that is developmentally appropriate for children, grounded in awareness of and respect for our natural environment and human diversity.  We are committed to an interdisciplinary approach of exploration and discovery, enabling children to meet the challenges of the future by becoming creative problem solvers.  We foster a socially responsive community based on trust, dignity, and respect in which all members are active participants.

Through its inquiry-based academic curriculum and its co-curricular enrichment programs, High Meadows inspires children to:

	Think Critically
	Learn Creatively
	Act Globally
	Live Compassionately

Think Critically

Critical thinking implies analysis, synthesis, and evaluation of information.  High Meadows students are taught to look at a problem from multiple perspectives, recognize causes and consequences and support their opinions with evidence.  The foundation for this skill is established in preschool where children are encouraged to brainstorm a list of questions they have about an area of study, and then are prompted to explore various ways of researching the issue.  As children progress through the school, they consider more complex issues, which requires them to use increasingly advanced critical skills.

Learn Creatively

At High Meadows, the classrooms and the curriculum are designed to facilitate a hands-on, multi-sensory experience that promotes learning through discovery.  Thematic units are woven throughout the arts, language, math, science, technology and social sciences.  For example, a study of oceans might include mathematics to chart rainfall on a graph; language and technology skills to research a chosen topic and record findings; science to learn about food chains by chanting a song; and the arts to study anatomy of fish by creating a model of a fish.  Because the High Meadows "classroom" extends beyond the walls of the building into a 40-acre classroom, complete with meadows and children’s gardens, an ocean study could also include creating a water garden to observe a water habitat.

Act Globally

High Meadows recognizes that for children to succeed in a global environment, they need to complement their education with the international educational skills that allow them to understand and respect other cultures, languages and beliefs.  High Meadows creative approach to International Studies is reflected in the curriculum at all grade levels.  For example, preschoolers have corresponded with international pen-pals; the 2nd/3rd graders studied Japan and created a scale model of an authentic, furnished Japanese home; and Middle Years students each selected a country and then hosted a model United Nations Assembly, debating their positions on issues such as the environment, poverty and women’s rights.

Live Compassionately

High Meadows fosters a socially responsive community based on trust, dignity and respect in which all members are active participants.  Children are involved in a comprehensive character education program in which they explore valued character traits.  Beginning in kindergarten, children participate in classroom meetings in which they create classroom rules, discuss problems or conflicts, and devise solutions.  High Meadows also participates in community service projects at all grade levels and has actively supported organizations such as North Fulton Community Charities, the Atlanta Children’s Shelter, Plant a Row for the Hungry, Save Hyde Farm, Care International, and the Heifer Project.