Nursery School Recommendations?

[gosling]

We are in the process of finishing the application for our first choice nursery school for Squiggle. It occurs to me that we probably should apply elsewhere as well, as they get *a lot* more applications than they have places. (Why yes, one does have to send out applications approximately a year in advance for most programs.) Is there somewhere local you love? There are programs that sound good from their websites, but hearing from parents or other folks who have actually been directly involved with the school is highly useful.

[Given the by no means certain prospects of replacing our ancient Subaru when it is no longer with us, it should probably be places within a mile or two of our house or with relatively easy public transit access. My definition of easy public transit access is probably a bit more complicated than most folks, but I do want something we can get to with no more than one bus transfer from the 89 or 80 buses or that is within a mile or so of the Red Line. Anywhere in Camberville, Medford or Arlington within a couple miles of our house works fine too; Benjamin's last school was slightly over a mile away in Medford and easily walkable.]

Comments

[gingicat]

The school girlochka attends has a 108 bus stop in front of it. :) If you've ever ridden the Orange Line between Wellington Station and Malden Center, you've seen their playground.

Cons:
The school is owned by a corporation (http://www.cdedu.us/pages/centers.html) and it's in a strip mall on Middlesex Avenue.

Pros:
They've done AMAZING things with the space and there are several classrooms, including three toddler classrooms that are clearly isolated from the preschool classrooms. And the teachers are, well, awesome.

The tuition as of next week for preschool is $240/week; toddler is more, but I don't know what it is right now.

Also, I have a note to myself (from months ago!) to tell you that our favorite CDC teacher, Miss Janet, left CDC in the summer and is now starting the preschool program at Busybodies, which had previously been only infants and toddlers.
http://www.littlebusybodiespreschool.blogspot.com Well, that's not the correct URL - that's not in Somerville MA!
http://www.angieslist.com/companylist/us/ma/somerville/little-busy-bodies-reviews-7186271.htm is the best I can find.

what does nursery school mean?

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

Are you looking for a part-time, few-days-a-week sort of school, or more days/hours than that, or specifically *not* mroe days/hours than that?

We did really like the Open Center for Children for K, but it's not a nursery school, it's a full-day daycare that you can attend 3 (full, till 4-to-5pm) days a week instead of 5 for "part time". Which is still a lot of hours away from home and a lot of money to spend on those hours.

[spinrabbit.livejournal.com]

Back in the day, Snert had a good time at Moppets at Alewife, and they dealt pretty well with her medical care. Take it for what it's worth, since this was six years ago and I'm not 100% certain it still exists. As for access, it's right in the Alewife T Station complex, and on the Minuteman bikeway, but getting in and out of that complex by car at rush hour is total mess.

It's still there, I think....

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

Their reserved parking sign is still up in the parking lot, anyway. There are a couple of mothers bringing small children to Alewife on the bus on a regular basis, too.

Re: what does nursery school mean?

[gosling.livejournal.com]

Very part time, probably minimal hours. Ideally two or three mornings a week.