Lighthouse Academy of Fredericksburg

We had a miserable experience at this school and cannot in good faith recommend it to anyone. We feel we were misled by the school’s website and things that were said during our tour into believing that it is an academically-focused, Montessori-method school. After two years in both lower and upper elementary classes, this was not our experience at all. In fact, we found the academics here to be sorely lacking, with very few materials or resources, limited instruction time for students, a curriculum that does not resemble the one posted on their website), no record-keeping or progress reports, and minimal communication with parents.

The Lower Elementary Head Teacher and Owner of the school refused to communicate with us and in fact treated us as a nuisance every time we attempted to ask her questions. When we expressed concern that our daughter in her first grade class was not learning to read, we were told that she must have a learning disability. We had her evaluated and no disability was found. We then discovered that this teacher/owner was actually leaving the classroom on a regular basis to go work out at the gym, and having the school’s Office Manager (who has absolutely no experience or training) give our daughter lessons. When we expressed disapproval over this, we were met with anger. Furthermore, we immediately put our daughter in private tutoring and she was reading within a few weeks. This is just one example out of many that led us to conclude that Lighthouse Academy is not what it pretends to be.

After vocalizing our very real, very justified concerns, we felt mistreated and vilified by most of the administration We found the owners, teachers, and administrative staff to be immature, unprofessional, and disinterested in improving what is a poorly run operation. We finally had no recourse but to pull our children out and homeschool them for the remainder of the year.

We are filled with regret that we did not do our due diligence and better research whether this school has the proper accreditation and teacher-credentials to deliver what they promote. The truth is that Lighthouse Academy has no accreditation whatsoever, not through the American Montessori Society, not through the Virginia Council for Private Education, and not through the National Council for Private School Accreditation. They operate as a for-profit business and therefore are not monitored or regulated by any governing agency, board of directors, or department of education. We feel they are exploiting the Montessori reputation in order to charge higher tuition rates, while in the classroom, a true Montessori method is used sparingly if at all. Furthermore, only a handful of the teachers here even have a college degree.