Montessori Schools of Maryland

What is Validation?  The Maryland State Department of Education has mandated the establishment of "Montessori Validating Organizations" which are responsible for informing the State as to which programs meet the criteria to call themselves "Montessori Schools."  Every Montessori School in Maryland must be Validated.

* Schools seeking Validation, please visit our Validation Process page.

In order to Validated, each school must meet the following criteria:

• The school must have a philosophical approach to education that is consistent with the educational methods and areas of instruction of Dr. Maria Montessori;

• The school must have a curriculum to implement Montessori instructional program for each class and age group taught;

• The school must have an established student teacher ratio for each age group for which they seek validation;

• The school must have at least one teacher with a full AMS, AMI, NCME, or MACTE age-appropriate credential assigned to each classroom.  School wide, at any given time during instructional hours, the applicant must have 80% of classes taught by a credentialed teacher;

• The school’s classes must be comprised of children representing appropriate mixed age groupings.  All classrooms should represent a mixed age group or have a plan to implement a mixed age group as soon as possible;

• Each class must have an age-appropriate schedule providing for large blocks of uninterrupted work time; 

• All teacher’s aides meet the minimum requirements as established by the Maryland State Department of Education;

• The applicant must meet all Federal, State, and Local regulatory and statutory requirements; and 

• All classrooms must have appropriate Montessori material in order to implement the instructional program.