Pond Brook School
At a glance
For an in-depth look at Pond Brook curriculum and semester cycles, view the links below.
OVERVIEW
Pond Brook Project is an approved independent school pursuant to 16 V.S.A. § 166 (b).
Embedded in the natural and human communities of Vermont, the Pond Brook Project inspires adolescent learners to cultivate their relationship to self, society, and the natural world.
During each semester at Pond Brook, 12 to 15-year-old students embark on different interdisciplinary explorations of science, society, mathematics, culture, art, literacy, technology and health through the lens of the Vermont landscape. Students spend much of their time in hands-on engagement with the natural world as well as in a variety of creative projects, problem-solving challenges, community service and team building activities. Classes take place around a fire, in woodland yurts, in repurposed school buses, in libraries, on town greens, or around a table in the woods. We see our niche as the space between the individual and society and between humans and the rest of the natural world.
Early adolescence is a time of changing priorities and allegiances; of developing social consciousness and the ability for abstract thought; and of some amount of emotional turmoil. At Pond Brook we are committed to honoring this time of life with all of its opportunities and challenges, helping to provide a supportive space to explore and be heard. We engage students in an authentic way, developing a learning community where students have agency and their individual voices build a collective from their own creativity, passions and connection to the world around them.
Pond Brook is committed to actively including and supporting students from traditionally marginalized communities to help fill the opportunity gap for accessing experiential and outdoor programs. We embed diversity, equity, inclusion and justice into all aspects of our program, from recruitment to curriculum and pedagogy to student agency in the co-creation of our community. We are committed to working collaboratively with public school districts in our area. We hope that all students at Pond Brook find a community that cultivates their expression and identity, physical and mental health, sense of belonging, and academic empowerment.
Pond Brook Project admits students and families of all socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, and disability.
If your child requires assistance to participate fully in our programs please reach out to schedule a call with us.
APPLICATION PROCESS
Once we receive your application, we will email you a registration form to complete enrollment!
Note: Students will be admitted on a first-come first-serve basis and admission is capped at twenty. Students may attend multiple semesters and years.
Please email us at pondbrook@willowell.org if you want more information.
Calendar
The school 2024-2025 calendar will be updated as it becomes available.
Please note: We follow MAUSD’s calendar and guidance for in-service, holidays, and inclement weather closures.
Tuition
Pond Brook is a VT approved middle school and our tuition is based on the average cost paid per student by our state public schools. Students who live in “school choice districts” have their tuition fully paid by their district directly to Willowell Foundation.
We offer scholarships to students who do not live in a “school choice district,” where this public support is not available to cover full tuition costs.
If you reside outside of a school choice district, complete our financial aid application below and we will calculate your family’s tuition. No family or student will be turned away due to lack of full funding. We are committed to every student and family regardless of financial status in accessing our program.
Scholarships
We are working to make the program accessible however we can, including reaching out to public schools for collaboration in making this program a public/private hybrid. We plan on a large fundraising effort to make this program available to anyone who wants to attend, regardless of ability to pay.
If you are need of financial assistance, please complete our online Financial Aid Application.
Teaching Team
Addison Tate
Teaches: Social Studies, Literature, and Music
Addison’s work with youth in ecology, agriculture, and social systems took him from the lakes and forests of the Champlain Valley and the Adirondacks, to the Hudson Valley, to the rocky coast of Northern California, and back home to Addison County. He graduated Vassar College with a degree in Environmental Studies, which grounds his work in global intersectional environmentalism. He loves scale-surfing from everyday micro-moments to broader contexts in order to find the emergent patterns that connect us to our world. He brings lenses of Nonviolent Communication and Emergent Strategy to his work in community in the hopes that trust, healing, and intention at internal and interpersonal levels will radiate out into our social-ecosystems. Addison’s last two years as an AmeriCorps member at the Walden Project led him to his current roles at New Roots and Pond Brook. His work at Willowell is multi-sensory, musical, somatic, student-centered, and driven by curiosity, play, and humor. He enjoyed coordinating the planting of Willowell’s Edible Forest Pathway, and continues to engage youth in its stewardship and culinary bounties.
Casey Burger
Teaches: Art, Social Studies and Health
Casey is thrilled to be collaborating with Willowell, growing a nature-based-educational response to the social and environmental changes rocking our world today. Gardener, musician, craftsperson, and carpenter, Casey has worn many hats throughout her career as a human being and is dedicated to sharing her passions and knowledge with children. She has been running nature-based craft and cooking camps with the Willowell Foundation for the last 6 years. Originally from the Northern Catskills of New York she ventured into the NYS Public School System working with children with special needs. She went on to co-create a full time nature-based elementary curriculum at Hawthorne Valley Waldorf School in Columbia County NY and worked as a teacher there before moving to Vermont in 2015. Casey holds a B.A. in Integral Sustainable Development from Warren Wilson College; a Certificate in Biodynamic Agriculture; and is a Trained in Inclusive Social Development through the Camphill Village Academy.
Eric Warren
Teaches: Science, Health and Literature
Program Director
B.A. in Community Studies from The University of California, Santa Cruz; M.A. in Social Ecology from Goddard College; Vermont Teaching Licensed in Middle Grades Science
Eric has taught science, health, outdoor skills, tool use and building design to young people since 2001, with a focus on fostering a connection between students, the natural world and the communities they are helping to build. He is happiest mucking through swamps, following a compass bearing or rigging up some wild contraption out of parts and pieces of old machines to study the workings of the universe. He also loves to sit around a fire, talking about ideas, understanding and inspirations. Student empowerment, creativity, exploration, and a strong connection to everyday life are as important as an adherence to good science and evidence-based belief in his class. Above all, he believes that a teacher’s main job is to help connect each student with their own, unique brilliance and passions.
Ethan Mitchell
Teaches: Math
Ethan Mitchell brings over 15 years of teaching experience to the program through his involvement in the Walden Project, the New Roots co-director, and with various other programs throughout the state. Ethan’s focus is on history and mathematics, but he likes teaching a wide variety of subjects and is particularly skilled at pivoting from traditional teaching modalities toward more integrated and embodied approaches to learning. Ethan is an innovator; he's also a dad, an essayist, a researcher, and a dreamer. When not working with children, he spends a lot of time cooking, canning, coding, and doing construction.
Matt Schlein
Teaches: Language Arts, Social Studies
Matt Schlein is a former actor, writer, and director who currently serves as Founder and Director of The Willowell Foundation. For the last twenty three years, Matt has been committed to the consilience of arts, education, and the environment, with an emphasis on connecting youth to the ecology of the Champlain Valley. The success of the work of Willowell has been documented locally, nationally, and internationally in film, newspapers, movies through the success of its programming that enables youth to connect with the environment, themselves, and each other. Matt is passionate about writing and voice and embeds the humanities into all of his work. He has received Dewitt Wallace and NEA fellowships and in addition to his work at both Willowell and The Walden Project, he serves as President of The Vermont Council of Teachers of English and Language Arts and as a senior member on the coordinating committee for The New England Young Writers Conference. Matt holds a B.A., an M.A., and an M.S.W. from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. He lives in New Haven with his wife Meghan and has three adult children.
Pete Housekeeper
Teaches: Language Arts, Social Studies
Peter has 6 years of experience in the field of education. He graduated from the University of Vermont with a B.A. in English, and went on to teach in a variety of settings ranging from arts and music to autistic education. After completing his Master’s in Liberal Arts at St. John’s College, he took the position of head high school English teacher at a classical charter school. He briefly taught ELA at a small cooperative middle school before receiving his Vermont educator’s license with an endorsement in high school English.