Lang School

The Lang School
Address
11 Broadway, 3rd Floor
New York, New York, 10004
United States
Coordinates 40°42′54″N 74°00′22″W / 40.7149°N 74.0061°W / 40.7149; -74.0061Coordinates: 40°42′54″N 74°00′22″W / 40.7149°N 74.0061°W / 40.7149; -74.0061
Information
Head of school Micaela Bracamonte
Grades K-12
Average class size 9
Student to teacher ratio 10:2

The Lang School is an independent not-for-profit K-8 school for gifted children with ADHD, dyslexia and other language-based learning differences, anxiety, sensory processing challenges or, simply, underachievement. For several years it was the only independent elementary school in the United States to serve the needs of "twice exceptional" (2e) students,[1] and the first on the East Coast. The only independent elementary school for twice exceptional students in the country prior to The Lang School was Brideun School in Lafayette, Colorado[2] (Brideun no longer operates as a school [3]).

Students

The Lang School serves the community of twice exceptional students. Twice exceptional students are both highly gifted and face certain learning challenges.[4] These students are often unable to access the curriculum in a traditional classroom; they can be bored and misunderstood by teachers, administrators, and peers.[5] Identifying 2e children is difficult because the gifted child's strengths often mask their needs, or their attentional and behavioral challenges might obscure their talents. Many of these children are eligible for special educational services under the IDEA Act, but they often face difficulties accessing those services because their needs can be difficult to recognize. In some states, giftedness itself is regarded as a difference that requires special services.[6]

History

The Lang School grew out of the founder's frustration to find an appropriate school placement for her son.[7] It officially opened its doors in September 2010.[8] The school expected to have two classes, with a capacity of 16 students, in the first year. As of June 2010, tuition was set at $42,000 annually. The first enrollees were mostly boys, ranging in age from 6 to 11.[9]

Name

The Lang School is named after Cyril Lang, the founder's tenth grade English teacher. Lang was a Rockville, Maryland, teacher who, in the 1970s, taught challenging material in unconventional ways, engaging his students in Socratic debates about Machiavelli’s The Prince and Plato’s Republic, texts normally limited to 12th-grade Advanced Placement classes. Although the school where he was working threatened to fire him if he did not comply, he persisted. “I made a premeditated, intellectual decision to continue teaching the way I had,” he said at the time. “There’s nothing wrong with the genetic makeup of these students. It’s the educational system that’s declining. We are bearing witness to the triumph of mediocrity.”[10]

References

  1. ↑ http://tribecacitizen.com/2010/04/27/nkotb-the-lang-school-and-the-quad-manhattan/
  2. ↑ http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20138770,00.html
  3. ↑ http://www.brideun.com/e-eureka_home.html
  4. ↑ http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/newsletter/spring98/sprng984.html twice exceptional
  5. ↑ http://www.ldonline.org/article/5914
  6. ↑ http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/2e.index.htm
  7. ↑ http://www.dnainfo.com/20101019/downtown/new-tribeca-school-serves-gifted-children-with-learning-disabilities
  8. ↑ http://www.thelangschool.org/AboutUs.aspx
  9. ↑ Nikki Dowling, No bullying, support for a new kind of school, Downtown Express ("The Newspaper of Lower Manhattan"), Volume 23, Number 6, June 18–24, 2010
  10. ↑ Time Magazine, Dec.15 1980
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