Frederick's first charter high school to open in Fall 2023

Dec. 7—Monocacy Valley Montessori Public Charter School, which currently serves students in pre-K through eighth grade, is set to move into a larger building and begin offering a high school program by next fall.

It will be the first charter school option for ninth through 12th graders in Frederick County.

The school, in Frederick, will phase the program in, MVM Principal Amy Dorman said in an interview Tuesday. Only 60 students — all ninth graders — will join MVM in Fall 2023, but new students will be welcomed each year until the program hits its limit of 240 students.

MVM first opened in 2002, making it Maryland's oldest public charter school. It uses the Montessori model of education, which emphasizes self-directed activity and hands-on learning, usually with mixed-grade classrooms.

Frederick County Public Schools officially announced the high school plans via a countywide FindOutFirst email on Tuesday, capping off a vision that has taken MVM employees more than a year to bring to fruition.

In February, the Frederick County Board of Education granted conditional approval to MVM's expansion plans, with the caveat that the school needed to secure a new facility first.

Frederick County's public charter schools are free for any student to attend. They receive a per-pupil allocation from the public school system, but must manage and finance their own facilities and maintenance.

Tara Dunsmore, president of Monocacy Montessori Communities Inc. (MMCI) — the nonprofit that manages MVM — said in an interview Tuesday that school officials were under contract to purchase a mostly vacant medical office suite at 915 Toll House Ave.

"I just feel like all the planets lined up," Dorman said Tuesday.

The school is currently housed in a 35,000-square-foot former church on Dill Avenue in downtown Frederick. The building was constructed in 1905 and expanded in the 1950s.

It's in poor condition, according to the MVM website, and needs more than $6 million in renovations.

The Toll House Avenue building, meanwhile, is substantially larger at about 52,000 square feet. Existing medical lab spaces can be easily converted into school science labs, and the building's floor plan lends itself well to a school, according to MVM's expansion application.

The application listed the Toll House Avenue building — just off West 9th Street near Frederick Health Hospital — as officials' first choice.

"The walking distance to downtown is really important for us. Our families have really gotten used to that," Dunsmore said Tuesday. "At this point, we feel like our school sort of is a downtown Frederick school."

The school will take out a loan to purchase the building, rather than leasing the space, like it's been doing with the Dill Avenue facility.

"Financing and paying a mortgage every month is actually less expensive in the long run," Dunsmore said. "The lease rates have gone up so much in Frederick County."

When the school submitted its application, the building was listed at $9 million.

MMCI hopes to close on the property in the spring, Dunsmore said, and complete initial renovations before school begins in August.

"We'll prioritize what has to get done so that we can open the doors for year one," she said. "And then over the course of the next few years, we'll probably do some additional renovations on the building."

Charter school enrollment in Frederick County takes place via a lottery system.

MVM eighth graders will be able to matriculate automatically into the new high school and without entering the lottery. Eighth graders at Carroll Creek Montessori Public Charter School, which is also operated by MMCI, will receive priority for up to 35% of the remaining seats.

Follow Jillian Atelsek on Twitter: @jillian_atelsek