Norwood School (Montgomery County, Maryland)

Program

A child-centered, project-based curriculum is delivered by exceptional faculty in two divisions: Lower school (grades K-4) and Middle school (grades 5-8). Students gain deep knowledge and valuable skills by exploring real-world questions, problems, and challenges. Child-centered instruction means using the child as the starting point for lesson plans and for developing curriculum. Head of School Matthew Gould says, “Within that is this notion of whole-child education, which means that we’re not just looking at children to fill up with academic information. We see children as whole human beings who have academic needs, social-emotional needs, physical needs, as well as the need for the development of character.”

In addition to core academic subjects, students take world languages (Spanish, French, Chinese, and Latin), art, music, drama, physical education, life skills, library and technology. Students in every grade level participate in at least one stage performance, including an annual fall play and spring musical for seventh and eighth graders.

Character education

Character education and service learning are integral parts of life at Norwood and have been so since the school’s founding in 1952. Frances Marsh started Norwood on the very idea that a school should stand for and teach a core set of values. She felt strongly that a school has a responsibility to help students “gain an intelligent awareness of the world around them; a sense of their own worth; and a recognition of the obligation to share that worth with society and the community in which they live.” Norwood has a “Value of the Month” curriculum and begins every day with a lesson about character. The school’s motto is “How you lead your life matters.” Service learning is integral to the Norwood experience at all grade levels.

Athletics

Athletics are an important part of Norwood’s physical education program. Students in grades K-6 take P.E. four times a week; fifth and sixth graders have the option to participate in interscholastic athletics in addition to their P.E. class. Seventh and eighth graders fulfill their physical education requirements by participating on an athletic team, in Norwood’s signature outdoor education program called Summit, or through other P.E. offerings such as strength and conditioning. Sports offerings include cross country, field hockey, soccer, volleyball, basketball, baseball, softball, lacrosse, and track and field.

Campus and facilities

Norwood's 38-acre campus is located in Bethesda, Maryland at the corner of River Road and Bradley Boulevard, less than a mile from the Capital Beltway. The property features two athletic fields for soccer, lacrosse, and field hockey, a baseball field, softball field, a smaller soccer field for the youngest students, outdoor education ropes course, archaeological dig site, and a learning garden and pond. Buildings include:

History

Norwood was founded as an Episcopal parish day school. In early 1952, in response to requests from parishioners, the rector of St. John’s Church, Norwood Parish, asked Frances Marsh, the director of the church’s Sunday School, to start a parish primary school. The Vestry Resolution founding the parish school indicated that preference would be given to families from the Norwood Parish and then, as space was available, opportunity would be given to other church families in the community. That fall, the Norwood Parish School opened in the basement of St. John's Church with four teachers and 40 children in grades K-2. Third grade was added the following year. As a church school, it held religious services led by the rector and operated under St John’s Vestry. The school prospered under Frances Marsh, though the small amount of space at St. John's limited both the possibilities for more school activities and the number of children who could attend. This led to the establishment of Norwood Inc., a non-profit corporation founded by Marsh and parents with the intention of finding a larger building.

Unhappy with this effort to relocate the school, the church vestry dismissed Frances Marsh as director of Norwood Parish School in March 1970. The families at the parish school helped Marsh establish the new Norwood School in temporary quarters for two years before its move to the current location on River Road in Bethesda in January 1972. Norwood has operated continuously since then as a non-profit, independent educational institution without religious affiliation.

Norwood moved to its current hilltop location in early January 1972. The Steuart Building, named in honor of Norwood grandparent Esther T. Steuart, first opened to students in January 1972. The following year, the Board of Trustees decided to expand the School through the sixth grade. A capital fund drive was launched for the purpose of erecting a new building to accommodate the School’s upper three grades, a science laboratory, administrative offices, and a multi-purpose gymnasium. The fund drive was a success and the new building was finished in 1975. It was named after Frances Marsh.

In August 1995 the School acquired the adjacent 16.7-acre (68,000 m²) estate which provided ample room for expansion. Subsequently, after two years of deliberation informed by Board committee work, faculty/staff planning, and parent meetings and surveys, the Board of Trustees made the decision in May 1996 to expand the School to include grades seven and eight. The first seventh grade class opened in September 1998, followed by the first eighth grade in September 1999. That same month, the school opened its new middle school and athletic buildings, which provided classroom space for fifth through eighth grades, a library, two science laboratories, choral and instrumental music rooms, two light-filled art rooms, lunch facilities, two basketball courts, a training room, locker rooms, and athletic offices.

Since its founding in 1952, Norwood has had five heads of school: