The Greenwood School is a specialized boarding and day school for boys in grades 6 through 12. Greenwood is situated on a 100-acre campus outside the bucolic village of Putney, Vermont in the southeastern part of the state. The Greenwood School is accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), is approved by the state of Vermont, and is a member of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS).HistoryThe Greenwood School was founded in May 1978 by Thomas and Andrea Scheidler to carry on their ground breaking work in the field of education for children diagnosed with "learning disabilities". The Scheidlers viewed their students not as "disabled" but as uniquely gifted with right brain skills and they designed a curriculum to reflect and to serve their needs. The Scheidlers felt methods of teaching in mainstream schools disadvantaged students who had a different way of approaching learning: tying their academic progress to their weakest skill. With the support of a group of parents, educators and professionals in the field of dyslexia, the Schiedlers formed a non-profit institution. They rented, and eventually purchased a campus in Putney, Vermont. Tom Scheidler held master's degrees in psychology and philosophy, Andrea Scheidler, a Master's in education. Together they designed a structured curriculum that taught needed academic skills, but embedded those skills in a much larger program that stimulated and advanced students' knowledge in all academic areas. Tom and Andrea Scheidler were opposed to the institutional/clinical model for teaching normal children whose main obstacle to success in school was that they had a preference for oral and hands on learning. They believed that the education of children who were underachievers, who were diagnosed as "dyslexic" or as having "attention difficulties" was best addressed by giving them intellectual and creative challenge in the classroom using discussion and verbal instruction. Learning was accelerated by teaching to students' natural strengths and demonstrable aptitudes. Because the Scheidler's design for the school embedded a variety of learning experiences in a challenging pre-prep curriculum, Greenwood was not a "special school". It was an enriched pre-preparatory program tailored to meet the needs of a specific population of students.
