One City Schools

We envision a Greater Madison community where all children are prepared to contribute and succeed as adults. Our mission is to prepare young children from birth to age 5 for success in school and life, and ensure they enter grade school reading-ready.

We achieve our mission by taking a two-generation community impact approach to cultivating young children. One City provides affordable, accessible, and high quality preschools and an elementary school that prepare young children for school success.

One City is accredited by the City of Madison (WI) Child Care Division and a 5-star rated preschool by the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families. Our goals for 2018-19 are to enroll 80 children, raise a minimum of $2.2 million in operating and start-up funds for three purposes: (1) to support our existing Junior Preschool serving children ages 1 to 3, (2) to launch phase 2 of our capital campaign to renovate our lower level and identify space for our new elementary school that we are applying for with the University of Wisconsin System, and (3) to successfully launch our new 4K and 5K public charter school in September 2018.

Learning at One City takes place in three ways at One City: (a) through guided project-based learning activities that are structured and led by a professional early childhood educator, (b) through hands on experience with other children, volunteers and One City staff, (c) through free play, and (d) by deeply engaging families in the education of their children. We offer a literacy-rich environment, where children are read to daily. They learn to initiate, discover, experience and analyze ideas, events, people, nature and things through self-guided and self-direct play, play sharing, play storying and other means of self-expression.

We prepare our children for success using a number of strategies. Our top three strategies are share below:

(1) An Educational Program focused on Complex Problem Solving and Innovation: One City offers the highly regarded AnjiPlay program for our Junior Preschool children and the award winning Expeditionary Learning (EL) program for children enrolled in our Senior Preschool. Both curricula support the learning, growth and development of young children through an emphasis on "deep learning": learning through mastery of knowledge and skills, character development and high quality student work, with a specific focus on critical thinking, design thinking, complex problem solving, collaboration and extended learning expeditions. One City is the first school outside of Mainland China to offer the AnjiPlay curriculum and will become its primary demonstration site in the United States. It's implementing a pilot EL school as well.

(2) Year-Round School with Longer School Days: Most preschools and day care centers provide year-round enrollment to children below age 4. However, One City provides a year-round school for 4 and 5 years olds as well. Children enrolled in our 4-year old (4K) and five-year old kindergarten (5K) attend school for 234 days compared to 180 days in traditional public schools. As a public charter school, our Senior Preschool offers a tuition-free full-day 4K program unlike our local public schools that offer half-day programs. Our children also attend school from 8:15am to 5:00pm daily. Presently, One City's Senior Preschool is the only public school offering an extended day and year option in Dane County.

(3) The One City FAST Program serves all children enrolled in our schools, and their families. FAST® is an internationally acclaimed parent engagement program that helps children thrive by building strong relationships at home, and between home and school. FAST includes an 8-week program where parents meet for 2.5 hours on one evening, every week, for eight weeks. Parents make meals, engage in scientifically proven engagement activities with their children, and with other parents. There is also time for children and parents to connect separately to play and discuss topics that are important to them. Parents and community members also help coordinate the program each week.

One City is supported by an 10-member Board of Directors that includes individuals with a range of knowledge, skills and personal and professional contacts that help the organization implement its mission and achieve its objectives. To date, One City has raised $4.35 million from more than 1,300 donors and 65 institutional supporters.

One City's founder and CEO, Kaleem Caire, is a highly respected education leader with 25 years of professional experience in business, nonprofit, public policy an community leadership. He has started, led and retooled three nonprofits into high impact national and regional organizations, and has management and leadership experience in public, private and nonprofit institutions.

We have a team and a Board of Directors that can help us produce positive results with children, parents and our school.

One City's Accomplishments:

1. Secured 501c3 status from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

2. Opened its first center in a temporary location on September 8, 2016.

3. Raised $4.35 million in charitable funding towards the project so far.

4. Completed a $1.2 million renovation of our current facility and moved into our permanent location on June 6, 2016. Purchased our facility with support from the City of Madison, Rennebohm Foundation and Forward Community Investments.

5. Our preschool achieved accreditation and is a 5-star (out of 5) preschool on Wisconsin's YoungStar Child Care Rating System administered by the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families.

10. Secured approval of our public charter elementary school which now enrolls 95 children in grades 4k to 1st Grade. We will continue to add one grade per year.