Chelsea Academy in Front Royal, which teaches grades 4-12 in the Catholic liberal arts tradition, will add kindergarten through third grade for the fall of 2022. The expansion will make it the only independent K-12 Catholic school in the Shenandoah Valley.
“Many existing families who desire earlier educational options for their kindergarten through third graders are faced with the dilemma of starting their younger children in a different local school, and then pulling their child away from that school after a year or two to attend Chelsea in grade four,” said Douglas McCarthy, chairman of the board of directors.
In order to meet that need, Chelsea’s administration is planning a curriculum and preparing for the addition of younger faces to the student body.
The Shenandoah Valley has experienced remarkable growth in the last year, and Chelsea Academy’s enrollment numbers reflect that change. The school, founded in 2008, currently has 170 students. There has been a record number of applications for next year. Some families commute more than an hour to send their children to Chelsea.
Chelsea strives to meet the challenge set forth by St. John Paul II in his observations about American Catholic schools: “The greatest challenge to Catholic education in the United States today, and the greatest contribution that authentically Catholic education can make to American culture, is to restore that culture to the conviction that human beings can grasp the truth of things, and, in grasping that truth, can know their duties to God, to themselves and their neighbors.” The school is excited to expand its service to the Catholic community of the Shenandoah Valley.
Waters is director of admissions at Chelsea Academy in Front Royal.
Find out more
Contact Catherine Waters, [email protected], or go to chelseaacademy.org.
