What you need to know about the Roosevelt Island Day Nursery...

The Roosevelt Island Day Nursery provides part-time and full-day preschool programs for Roosevelt Island families. Organized in 1975 by a group of Island parents and incorporated as a not-for-profit corporation in 1979, the school is run by a Parent Board of Directors with a professional teaching staff.

All head teachers have New York State certification and have master’s degrees from the Bank Street College of Education. Co-Director, Diana Carr, is also a graduate of Bank Street and has been at the school since 1995. Co-Director Mandi Ridler, a staff member since 2007, graduated from Hunter College with a master’s degree in Special Education and has extensive experience working with young children.

The goal of the school is to help children grow emotionally, socially and intellectually in a warm and supportive environment which reflects the best features of our ethnically, culturally, racially, and economically diverse Roosevelt Island community.

The aim of the preschool program is to provide young children with well-supervised work and play experiences that will prepare them for kindergarten. The curriculum stresses the development of of concepts and skills that will be needed for the formal learning of reading, writing, math, science and social studies. Art, music and physical education are an integral part of the curriculum.

Come See...

If you were to visit one morning, you would see parents greeting each other in Spanish, Serbo-Croatian, Korean, Japanese, or any one of the many languages spoken on the Island. You would see young children eagerly entering their classrooms and greeting their friends.

You would watch the children using materials that encourage discovery, exploration and learning. They would be painting, building elaborate block structures, or playing counting and patterning games with math materials.

You would see children working with their teachers creating their own books about themselves and their families. You would also see them interacting in dramatic play, or observing and feeding the class pets. They might be cooking applesauce and charting who liked it and who didn’t.

Every day children participate in a meeting time when they have group discussions, movement and singing, or hear a story read aloud. Groups of children visit the school library weekly to read and borrow books. Every day, children have an active physical playtime.

All this activity would be going on in a spacious, bright and well-equipped classroom, with the spectacular backdrop of the river and its constant parade of tugboats, tankers and barges.

Support in navigating the Kindergarten admissions process is available for all families within the RIDN community. Some of the fine schools our graduates have been accepted to in recent years include:

• The Andersen Program (PS 334)
• The Caedmon School
• Convent of the Sacred Heart
• Friends Seminary
• The NYC Lower Laboratory School (PS 77)
• Manhattan Country School
• Marmount School
• Midtown West School (PS 212)
• Philosophy Day School
• St. Bernadette School
• St. Bernard’s School
• Trevor Day School
• Tribeca Learning Center (PS 150)
• UNIS

If you are considering enrolling your child in preschool, you are welcome to visit the school and meet with our Directors to discuss which programs would best suit your family’s needs. Registration begins in mid-March for our five-day a week programs.

Our parents tell us they value...

"...the international environment"

"...the exposure to different cultures"

"...the commitment to quality education"

"...the caring, nurturing atmosphere"

"...teachers treat children as if they were their own"

"...it’s like an extended family"

"...teachers show a lot of love and joy"

"...my child loves school!"

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