Quick Take
Several families told Lookout they're leaving Montessori Community School after the director this spring limited discussions of gender identity, religion and social movements in the classroom. Families and one teacher say three out of five teachers are also leaving because of the changes at the Scotts Valley school.
At least seven families are taking their children out of a Scotts Valley-based Montessori school and three teachers are said to be leaving after administrators removed several books mentioning gender identity and implemented a “neutral school” policy that limits or bans classroom discussions on hot-button issues like religion and politics.
In late March, Madelynn Van Den Heuvel, head of school at Montessori Community School in Scotts Valley, emailed families to say the school would be keeping various topics, including gender identity, religion and social/political movements, out of the classroom. In a later email on April 18, she sent families an updated parent handbook with the neutral school policy and said she removed books from classrooms.
The private school, one of several Montessori-based schools in Santa Cruz County, serves about 80 children – infants through 6-year-olds – and was founded by Van Den Heuvel’s grandparents (the Tershy family) and extended family in 2003. The school employs five teachers, called lead guides, and 11 assistants, according to its website.
Van Den Heuvel’s policy, added to the employee and parent handbooks in April, states that “all families’ beliefs and values will be respected, and we will not infringe on the right of the parent to pass along their own beliefs to their child.” The policy goes on to say that adults at the school will be “neutral in their beliefs” and provide facts to students only after students initiate a conversation.
The policy is separated into three sections: religion, gender identity, and social/political movements. It includes rules like requiring that adults in the school use pronouns for children that match the child’s anatomy at birth. In the parent handbook, Van Den Heuvel updated that specific rule to later add that adults could also use pronouns to match the parents’ preference for the child. The employee handbook still holds that adults use the pronouns assigned at the child’s birth.
“We will not promote one way of thinking over another and not introduce the concept of transgender or non-binary, and all that encompasses it, to the children,” a portion of the policy states. “That is the responsibility of the parents to do so if they see fit and how they see fit.”
Van Den Heuvel declined repeated requests for comment for this story: “As the leader of our school, I have a duty and responsibility to respect and maintain the privacy of our families and community,” she wrote. “Interviewing with you does not align with that responsibility.”
She didn’t respond to questions about where the neutral school policy comes from or who created it. However, families provided Lookout with emails she sent directly to the school community.
In them, Van Den Heuvel said that after a “couple staff members” discussed wanting to talk about gender identity with the kids, she wrote up the school’s official position on that and other beliefs. Not all of the teachers were actively having discussions mentioning topics like gender identity, and not all the teachers had books related to gender identity.
She told families that little would be changing but that the school would choose “more season-themed songs” as opposed to religious songs, it would no longer have a Christmas tree, and that she had removed several books from some classrooms that she said weren’t “developmentally appropriate.”
Those books include: “Being You: A First Conversation About Gender,” “It Feels Good to Be Yourself: A Book About Gender Identity” and “Every Body: A First Conversation About Bodies.” Van Den Heuvel added that she considers gender identity “as a belief” while those who disagree with her position see it “as a fact.”
Three families who spoke to Lookout said they’re taking their children out of the school because of Van Den Heuvel’s policy and her lack of willingness to discuss it. They say she canceled two parent education nights and turned down multiple requests from parents to hold community meetings or discussions to better understand the policy.
They say they’re heartbroken and disappointed to be leaving the school as the guides are “lovely people” who built strong relationships with their children.
“If we are paying our money and giving the most important things in our lives, which is our children, to a group of individuals that seems to have opinions on certain things and will not allow other people to express their opinions,” said parent Tyler Evans, “that is not a place that we could, in good conscience, have our children spend their formative years.”
Evans, who previously served as the chief medical officer for both the County of Santa Cruz and New York City, said he sent a lengthy email to Van Den Heuvel in May citing the statements by eight different organizations, including the American Psychiatric Association and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, on gender and gender-affirming care.
Gender identity is “fact, that’s not an opinion,” Evans told Lookout. “We’re not in Texas or Indiana [states with bans on gender-affirming care]. We’re in Santa Cruz – Scotts Valley in California, where we should be able to have an open discussion.”
Lookout reached out to three families who wrote schoolwide emails in support of Van Den Heuvel and the policy, but they didn’t immediately respond. They wrote in their emails that they love the school, support Van Den Heuvel’s position and will continue to enroll their kids at the school.
The question of what should and shouldn’t be discussed, often about gender and race, in the classroom is part of a growing debate that has been taking place in schools across the country over the past several years. Since 2017, the Washington Post reports, dozens of states have passed more than 120 laws that either expand or limit what can be taught.
In an April 18 email to families, Van Den Heuvel emphasized that the neutral school policy has been the position of the school since it was founded and “is the stance of a traditional AMI Montessori school.”
Educator Maria Montessori began developing her teaching philosophy in the early 1900s, a philosophy that has survived for a century, and which emphasizes learning led by the children’s pace and interests, with mixed-age classrooms. She founded the Association Montessori International in 1929.
But while Van Den Heuvel says her policy is in line with Montessori classrooms, several families told Lookout they think the neutral school policy contradicts Montessori values of diversity and inclusion and goes against their values of diversity and transparency.
Kim Saxton, head of Santa Cruz Montessori, another independent, private Montessori school with two campuses, said she has never heard of the neutral school policy.
“It feels so against everything that we stand for, from my feeling of it,” she said, adding that she hasn’t read the policy but has heard second-hand from employees of the Scotts Valley school that it has upset families and employees.
She said that at least one of the books removed at Montessori Community School was on shelves at hers, calling “Every Body: A First Conversation About Bodies,” a “well loved” book.
“We have all kinds of books that represent all different kinds of families,” she said.
Saxton, who started working at the Santa Cruz Montessori school in 2001, said all of its teachers have been trained by Association Montessori International. She said in total at both of its campuses, Santa Cruz Montessori employs 50 staff and has 220 students from as young as 18 months up to 14-year-olds.
The fallout continued at Montessori Community School as the school year wound down in Scotts Valley.
Families and one teacher say that three of the school’s five teachers – known as lead guides – are also leaving because of the policy.
One lead guide, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of impacting her career, said she broke her contract last month to leave the school because she disagrees with the policy and how it was implemented. She’s taking a $20,000 pay cut for a similar teaching job locally. The guide said she was aware of two others who are leaving the school because of the policy as well.
Montessori parent Joelle Mulligan said she feels that “books should be a mirror and books should be a window.” For example, she said she feels her kids should have books that show families that look like theirs and families that show them what different families out in the world look like. She’s disappointed that books like that were removed from the school.
“The books are really good at representation. They have Black kids, they have white kids, disabled kids, trans kids, they have all great representation in these books,” she said. “The books are just saying that you have a right to be happy with yourself and to be welcomed and to be loved.”
While she agrees that at least one of the books that was removed was beyond her 2-year-old child’s comprehension at this age, she “didn’t find them objectionable books.” She said the books are wholesome and talk about how all bodies are good.
“It’s OK if they don’t understand, but I want it to be there for when they’ll be ready to understand,” she said. “That’s absolutely the lesson I want my kids to learn.”
In her opinion, Mulligan said, the books are loving and accepting, and their overall message is, “There’s nothing wrong with you.”
Like Evans, Mulligan said she’s also taking her youngest child out of Montessori, while her oldest is old enough for transitional kindergarten at a nearby school.
Montessori parent Roxanne Tracy said she’s also taking one of her children out of the school because of the policy and how Van Den Heuvel handled the change. Tracy said the policy fails to prepare the children for a world of diverse people, and that removing the books and any discussion of diverse identities doesn’t serve anyone.
“The whole Montessori philosophy is to guide children into becoming people in the real world,” she said. “What this school and Madelynn is doing is not that. They’re trying to create a strange bubble which does not include diverse people – and it’s not beneficial to anyone, no matter what your beliefs are.”
She provided Lookout with a list of seven families, including hers, that she’s aware are leaving the school because of the policy.
Tracy and Evans said they attempted to talk to Van Den Heuvel but she refused to meet and discuss the policy. In her email response to Evans on May 29, she said she understood where he was coming from.
“This is the approach I am taking and the stance of our school,” she wrote. “If you do not like it, I fully understand, and there are many different options for schooling that will align more with your views.”
Evans said he now sees Montessori Community School as a school that celebrates diversity, equity and inclusion, but then “tries to silence opinions on exactly that topic.”
To read the policy in full on the school’s website, click here.
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FOR THE RECORD: This story has been updated to link to Montessori Community School’s Neutral Learning Environment policy.
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