Parents of children with disabilities have found that many early childhood education programs in San Antonio lack the expertise, staff and resources to provide meaningful educational experiences for their children.
Among them are Carter and Taylor English, who discovered those obstacles when they sought to find child care for their daughter Isabelle, who was born with Down syndrome.
“When Isabelle was born, all we wanted was to find the best possible resources to support her growth and development,” Carter said in a statement announcing the school’s opening. “We soon realized that the resources were difficult to access and the childcare we needed didn’t exist.”
Knowing other families were likely facing the same issues, the family came together with others to start the Rise School San Antonio, the newest school in a network focused on preparing children from a young age for success in kindergarten.
The Rise School’s new campus at CHRISTUS Children’s Hospital in downtown San Antonio will welcome two classrooms of 12 students in August, each serving half typically developing students and half those with special needs.
In-classroom support
Unlike typical early learning special needs programs, which pull students into separate rooms and away from classmates, the new school’s approach involves therapy of various types embedded in each classroom and lesson, according to Vanessa Hurd, the founding director of the nonprofit private school.
“We start from the very beginning, and we integrate all of the therapies; physical, occupational, speech, and music, with the learning environment with the teaching curriculum,” she told the San Antonio Report. “So that looks like hiring really highly qualified teachers, terrific therapists, training them from the get-go so that they work together to constantly be thinking about, what does each of their particular kids in the classroom need?”
In addition, teachers educate all the students together, a model known as full inclusion.
“The program is a full-inclusion model, which basically means half of the kids have developmental delays, like Down syndrome, or cerebral palsy or spina bifida or autism, or seizure disorder … and half are typically developing,” she said.
Jonathan Surls, who has twin children, one with Down syndrome and one typically developing, sees the growth and benefits experienced by both children of playing and learning together every day.
“Having a set of twins where one has Down Syndrome and the other one doesn’t, I see every day, how they mirror each other and encourage each other in different ways,” he said. “So knowing that that is a microcosm, in my household, I thought it was an awesome thing to be a part of, to help kind of get as a resource for the city of San Antonio.”
Surls and his wife Katie are both excited about the model and plan to send the twins, James and London, to Rise when it opens. James was born with Down Syndrome, while London is typically developing.
Jonathan Surls, who works with English and connected with him over being a parent of a child with a disability, said he is excited for what both of his 19-month-old children will get out of the experience.
“My daughter is going to be exposed to a world that is going to allow her to flourish as a leader and allow her to see folks outside of herself,” he said. “There are countless stories out of the Rise program where neurotypical kids benefit just as much as neuron delayed kids.”
The full-inclusion model is also important to parents like Madison O’Brien, who plans to enroll her typically developing daughter, 11-month-old Eloise, into the school when it opens.
“My adopted sister is severely disabled, so we’ve always wanted to foster an environment that is accepting and kind and embraces differences and encourages people to just be who they are, regardless of if that’s a disability or an identity,” she said. “So when we heard about the Rise School and their dedication to inclusivity in the classroom, we wanted that type of environment for our oldest daughter, Amelia.”
Amelia, who is also typically developing, attended a Rise School in Corpus Christi from the time she was 1 and a half until she was 4.
O’Brien was impressed with the knowledge, vocabulary and communication skills Amelia learned while at the school.
“You could just see the progress that they were making, even see their mind working as they tried to figure out different problems or kind of really have a conversation piece to it,” she said.
The price to attend the San Antonio location, which is $1,250 a month, is well worth it as her younger daughter prepares to begin her education and development, O’Brien said: “We’re going to make it work, because this is something that we believe wholeheartedly in.”
Hurd said the school is working to build a large fund for scholarships and financial aid, adding that families from all economic backgrounds should apply if interested.
A school in a hospital
With the campus opening on the only freestanding children’s hospital in San Antonio, Rise students and families will benefit from the knowledge and expertise of CHRISTUS Children’s staff and researchers. The hospital will provide three of the four therapists planned for the classrooms, Hurd said, helping keep costs low and ensuring the school has “a really high-quality therapy team.”
Moving beyond the students in the program, Hurd said the school hopes to foster partnerships with teacher preparation programs, allowing students to learn from the unique model so they can take lessons into their careers.
The Rise School of San Antonio is the ninth school in the Rise network and the fifth location in Texas, with locations in Dallas, Houston and Austin.
According to a press release, the first Rise School was founded 50 years ago at the University of Alabama, with football coach Gene Stallings helping to expand the program to Texas in 1995.
Online enrollment is now open for the school, which is under construction, with an anticipated completion in August.
