Foote School

The Foote School is a private K-9 co-ed day school, founded in 1916, located in the East Rock neighborhood of New Haven, Connecticut, United States near Yale University. The current Head of School is C.Dary Dunham. The school's motto is "Laete cognoscam et laete docebo" meaning "Gladly will I learn and gladly teach."

Applications are due February 1st of each year and notification occurs on March 10th. Most students come to Foote in Kindergarten.

Foote School history

The school was founded in 1916 by Martha Babcock Foote and was located in a former stable on St. Ronan St. In 1958, the school moved to its current location at 50 Loomis Place. In 1972, the school purchased Highland Heights, across the street from the main campus, which it developed eight years later as an additional sports field. In 1986, a new middle school building was dedicated, followed by a lower school building in 1990. One year later, the expanded Frank M. Perrine Library was opened. The newest additions came in 2001 with the creation of a new black box theater, named for long-time drama teacher Robert Sandine, and an addition to the Hosley Gymnasium.

Student body and faculty

The school currently has 475 students from 20 surrounding cities and towns. There are 120 faculty and staff members, making up a 6:1 student-to-teacher-ratio. The school has two divisions - the lower school, with grades kindergarten-5 and middle school with grades 6-9. Lower school tuition for 2007-2008 is $16,900 and middle school tuition is $19,650. Tuition is all-inclusive. The school is committed to diversity with 20% of the student body receiving financial aid and 29% of the students being of color. 45% of faculty have advanced degrees. After school, vacation, and summer programs are also offered.

After Foote most students go on to attend private high schools, with about 62% attending as day students at schools such as Choate Rosemary Hall, The Hopkins School, and Hamden Hall, and 20% attending boarding schools such as Westminster School, The Taft School, The Hotchkiss School, and Phillips Academy. About 19% continue their education at local public high schools, including Hamden High School and Wilbur Cross High School. [http://www.footeschool.org/admissions/admissions_highschls2.html] According to data maintained by the school, the universities and colleges enrolling the largest numbers of Foote alumni as freshman between 1997 and 2006 were Yale University, Harvard University, George Washington University, Brown University, New York University, Cornell University, and the University of Connecticut. [http://www.footeschool.org/admissions/admissions_colleges.html]

Campus

The campus covers 14 acres and has 10 buildings, including a library, a theater, a gymnasium, music rooms, computer and science labs, three playing fields, two art studios, an activities center, and a tree-filled area for outdoor activities. The campus is split into two sections, one for the lower and one for middle school, with the main building, known as the Common Unit, located between them. This contains the library, music rooms, the art studios, offices, the front desk, and classrooms.The Foote School integrates technology across the curriculum and also several computer labs and [http://www.footeschool.org/academic/computers/computer.html technology services]

Curriculum

The lower school curriculum is made up of language arts, mathematics, science, French or Spanish, social studies, art, computer , drama music, and gym. In the fourth grade, students move to the middle school building and get to choose whether to continue their studies in either French or Spanish, which they will keep studying for the rest of the time they are at the school.

The middle school curriculum consists of humanities, which is studied until seventh grade and then split into two classes history and English, math, which becomes pre-algebra in seventh grade, then algebra in eighth and geometry in ninth. Students also take science, which becomes an IPS course in eighth grade and biology in ninth, French or Spanish, Latin, starting in grade seven, music, which becomes instrumental elective in seventh grade, in which students can choose to do African drumming, guitar, or handbells, art, gym, and drama. In sixth grade, students also have library and computer classes.

Classes and schedule

Classes at Foote are usually small, with about fifteen students per class and three classes in each grade. Grades one and two are combined into one grade called MAG with equal numbers of first and second graders in each class. In the ninth grade, the classes tend to get smaller. In the middle school there is an advisory system, in which students meet with an advisor once a week during lunch. School starts at 8:10 and ends at 3:00, although on Fridays, lower school students up to grade three get out at 12:30 and grades four-nine get out at 2:15. For middle schoolers, there is a short homeroom period until 8:30 every day. Then there are two classes, a snack recess of fifteen minutes, two more classes, a flex time for lunch and recess, two more classes, and a study hall until 3:00. Classes last forty-five minutes. The school uses a six-day A-F day schedule, so as to be able to spread out the classes. There are all-school assemblies in the gym every Monday from 8:10 to 8:30.

Activities

Middle school students can join activities, such as Student Council, Community Service , Spi (the school newspaper), Environmental Action Group, Foote Steps (the school yearbook), Footenotes (the school literary magazine), Amnesty International, and others. The heads of these activities are usually ninth graders and at least one or two teachers help out. The activities take place during Flex Time or Study Hall.

Sports

Students in grades seven through nine can participate in sports teams that play other teams in the area. During the fall, there is a boys soccer team, girls soccer team, and field hockey team. During the winter, there is a boys basketball team, girls basketball team, and swimming team, which is also open to sixth graders. During the spring, there is a boys baseball team, girls softball team, boys lacrosse team, girls lacrosse team, and tennis team.

Alumnae and alumni

Foote gradautes have distinguished themselves in a variety of areas from education to science to the arts to public service. A sampling across the years:

Hanna Holborn Gray '43 President Emeritus, University of Chicago. Former Provost of Yale University.

Ted Sizer '45 Director of the Coalition of Essential Schools. Former Dean of Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Guido Calabresi '46 Judge, Second Circuit Court. Former Dean of the Yale Law School.

Anne Tyler Calabresi '48 Social anthropologist and community activist. A founder of New Haven's International Festival of Arts and Ideas.

Bertil Hille '54 Biologist.
Chase Twichell '64 Poet and publisher.
Brooks Kerr '66 Jazz pianist.
Louise Vietor Oliver '68 Permanent US Representative to UNESCO.

Gerry Hemingway '69 Jazz composer and percussionist.
Marcus Stern '75 Associate Director of the American Repertory Theatre.

Ben Allison '82 Jazz musician and composer. Winner of the 2005 Bird Award.

Paul Giamatti '82 Golden Globe-winning actor.

Jay Lender '84 Animator. Writer for the original animated television series SpongeBob SquarePants.

Elisha Cooper '86 Writer and illustrator.
Huckleberry Fox '89 Child actor and biologist.
Caitlin Cahow '00 Member of the US Women's Ice Hockey Team that earned a Bronze Medal at the 2006 Olympics.

Other programs and traditions

The school encourages bonding between middle and lower schoolers through a buddy system, in which each student is given a buddy in a grade higher or lower than their own. During vacations, the school has a vacation program for students and during summer there is a camp, with participants ranging from three years old through teens. There is also a Footebridge program during the same time for underprivileged children to come and learn and play. Foote participates (and raises founds for) in a STARS program with other schools in the area, in which there are different workshops for writing, art, and other things.

Yali Middle School in Hunan province in China is the school's sister school and every year a teacher from Yali comes to Foote for the fall semester and occasionally, one of Foote's teachers will go to China. Every spring, some of the Foote ninth graders go to Yali. In fall 2007, a delegation of Yali students and faculty visited Foote.

Foote traditions include an annual Field Day. The school is divided in to grey and maroon teams (siblings are always on the same team) and the teams compete in running, tug-of-war, and other activities to see which team gets the most points. The school also has a May Day once a year in which students do traditional dancing, including the Maypole and Sword dances. Lastly, all ninth grade students are required to play a role in the annual play and participate in an internship week with a person in the field of their choice.

External links

* [http://www.footeschool.org/ Foote School Web Site]