Franklin Academy
Wednesday, November 24th, 2004
Franklin Academy
106 River Rd.
East Haddam, CT 06423
860-873-2700
www.fa-ct.org
Sanford Shapiro’s Review of Franklin Academy
Schools with Services for Language-based Learning Disabilities (LLD)
Schools with Services for Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Schools with Services for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
Once you visit, you’ll know there are better options out there for your NLD child. Find them.
Hi Susan. Where have you gone to that you think are good options for a student with NLD?
Did your child go to Franklin?
What other others options for a child with NLD in New England of average intelligence?
I attended this school for a brief period of time, so I would have first hand experience.
Let me tell you this is by far the worst LD school. Public school worked much better for me. My advice to parents who are considering Franklin Academy is to look elsewhere. You’ll be saving yourself a lot of money and hope if you put your child in public school with special support classes.
I agree with Lewis. FA has the potential of damaging your child severely.
Like Sarah, I attended the school for little over a year, and it was the worst year of my life. The school has NO idea what they’re doing and they don’t help students–it is essentially babysitting. No social, life or organizational skills are taught, and the academic rigor is nonexistent. While I was there, a substantial portion of the school population was on the lower end of the autism spectrum, leading to a very frustrating boarding experience (try living with people who fail to see the social advantages to showering regularly… not fun). Some of the staff are well-meaning, but when it comes down to it, they’re just downright incompetent.
The school has a VERY high turnover rate in both students and teachers, which should tell you something about the quality of the school right there. The vast majority of students I knew at the school (I attended 2 years ago) have transferred out, as have all but one of my teachers.
You’re best off finding another school if you have the best interests of your child in mind.
thought I should perhaps expand a bit more on what made the school bad rather than just saying “didn’t do this and this and was terrible.” Assuming they haven’t made any drastic changes to the system, my experiences should still stand.
The academics were, to put it lightly, odd. They graded based on effort, segregated the kids by sex and grouped kids together based on ability level. Each ability group would attend all of their classes together… good if you got along with your group, horrid if you didn’t (mind you, you were also living with these same people). The academics were basically a joke; the homework, if assigned, was very light at best, and I never spent more than a half-hour total on homework in one night. I can’t remember ever having a single test, either.
Math was not traditional; it was some special program called “Integrated Math” that basically meshed all sorts of different math concepts into one program. I suppose integrated math wouldn’t have been so bad if the teacher didn’t teach the material so slowly. We would literally cover ONE concept for five weeks before moving onto the next one, and considering there are only 27 weeks in the school year, I think you can gather how little we covered in one year. Moreover, math was complicated by the differing math levels of people in the group–I had people in my ability group who were crippled by dyscalculia and couldn’t even do simple multiplication without the aid of a calculator, and then we had other people in the group (like myself) who were of normal mathematical ability. (Hilariously, when parents complained about the lack of math being taught, the administration literally told them to hire a math tutor if they didn’t like it. Way to give the finger to your customers when the school costs $60k)
Science was split up between biology and chemistry–half a year of each (which ended up screwing me over royally in credits when I switched into another school… had to repeat both courses). We did a few labs here and there, but there was very little taught and we ended up covering very little. English was just writing paragraph prompts over and over… I don’t recall ever reading anything in the class, nor did we ever get critique on what we did write. Then I&C… supposedly it was supposed to be our life skills class, but instead it inevitably always turned into a bitch fest where we would LITERALLY begin screaming about how much we hated the school or our irritations with each other. We never accomplished anything productive in that class, either.
Living situation was terrible. The boys were at least segregated by age, but all of the girls lived together on one floor, and we had a HUGE mismatch of social and intelligence levels. We ran into lots of problems the year I was there… a girl consistently stole food and money the entire year, someone kept vandalizing the toilets, people got into physical fights over boyfriends, people got into screaming matches… on and on, and the staff did NOTHING. Their policy for handling those things were “well, it’s a learning experience, and they’ll learn social skills from each other.” Uh… what? These kids have a learning disability. If they could just pick up social skills from being with other kids, they wouldn’t have a disability. Some of these kids have to be explicitly taught not to commit certain social faux pases.
The staff, for the most part, were incompetent. Only a select few of the teachers actually had degrees in special education, and a number of teachers didn’t even have regular teaching degrees. The counselors there were disgustingly incompetent as well, among the worst I’ve come across. The one to which I was assigned was among the most patronizing people I’ve ever met, and I can’t fathom how anyone could reap any benefit from talking to her. Her methodology for fixing problems, like everyone else in that school, was in a nutshell “it’s not that bad, think happy thoughts. Don’t think negatively.” Nice philosophy and all, but it doesn’t help when you have an actual problem. The best part was they used that tactic no matter what the problem was, and by doing so essentially said, “Your problems and concerns aren’t real or worth our time.”
I won’t say everything there was all negative. I gained friends, something which I sorely lacked in mainstream schools, and with that came an explosion in psychosocial development that changed me from a very immature, socially awkward 14/15-year-old to a more socially aware, mature person I am now. Living with other people, even if I hated some of them with an utter passion, taught me to be more self-aware of what I did and how I acted, and dealing with the school’s incompetent staff taught me some things about how people work and how to approach people with a problem.
But would I say that the things I learned were worth attending the school? I’d have to say no; if given the chance, I would have attended 10th grade elsewhere. But what’s done is done; no good will come of lamenting.
Just do your kid a favor and don’t send him there. Trust me. There are good schools out there your kid can do well in, but this school isn’t one of them.
This school is just awful. The comments above really describe it. The facilities are not at all pleasant, and the staff is completely inept. Most od the students hate this school… many leave after a year or less. My daughter spent 2 agonizing months at this dreadful school. $70,000+ per year– the headmaster, who is bereft of any special education expertise, is raking it in while the students suffer miserably. They’ll sell you a bill of goods to get you in the door… then sell your kid down the river.
Yes, Franklin Academy is THAT bad.
Dear Parent,
Terrible that you and your daughter had such a lousy experience. Since some parents and kids seem to stay and like this school, opinions like yours are very important.
That being said, your feedback would be so much more credible if instead of signing an anonymous “Parent” there was a name attached. Seeing your signature makes me wonder slightly whether “Parent” is a current student who doesn’t like the place.
Also, are you saying all staff are “inept?” Statements that are blanket indictments of an entire group feel less credible (to me at least) than specifics (without necessarily mentioning names)with descriptions of behaviors.
No disrespect intended to you, just my opinion about how to make an impact on other parents’ decisions, if that’s your intention.
My daughter has just begun attending Franklin about a month ago so far she has had a pretty good experience. She is the happiest in this school setting that I have ever seen so far. I am keeping my fingers crossed that this continues. So far, I have been very pleased with the school.
I would just like to share with you our overall experience with Franklin Academy. Our daughter, Caitlin, who has NLD has been there 2 1/2 years and is graduating in June. She has just thrived both socially emotionally and academically. She took advantage of every opportunity that Franklin had to offer. She was president of the student body, manager of the school store, an RA, a intern in admissions, made lifelong friends, learned how to live on her own and finally learned to accept herself for who she is and what she has to offer. The teachers and staff and head master at Franklin Academy look at every child individually, offer much emotional support and take their jobs very seriously. What works for one child doesn’t neccessarily work for another. For Caitlin, Franklin changed her life. She was accepted into the college of her dreams, Emerson College and is looking forward to using all the skills she learned at Franklin in college! She has shown us all just how brightly she can shine!! Thanks to Franklin Academy!
Judy, thanks for writing in. Congratulations on your daughter’s growth and success. What will she be studying at Emerson?
She plans to major in creative writing and minor in photography.
Good luck to her. Always liked the work of Dr. Anthony Bashir of Emerson. He’s a great supporter of students with learning differences.