Dalton School

Dalton School
Go Forth Unafraid
Address
Middle & High School: 108 East 89th Street First Program: 53 East 91st Street Physical Education Center: 200 East 87th Street New York, NY
Information
Type	Private, day, college-preparatory
Established	1919
Founder	Helen Parkhurst
CEEB code	333580
Head of school	Ellen C. Stein '65
Faculty	Approx. 250
Grades	K–12
Gender	Coeducational
Enrollment	Approx. 1300
Campus	Urban
Color(s)	Royal blue and white
Mascot	Ivan the Tiger
Accreditation	NAIS, NYSAIS
Newspaper	The Daltonian
Endowment	Estimated at $65 million
Affiliations	NAIS NYSAIS New York Interschool Global Online Academy
Literary magazine	Blue Flag
Political journal	RealPolitik
Website	dalton.org

The Dalton School, originally the Children's University School, is a private, coeducational college preparatory school on New York City's Upper East Side and a member of both the Ivy Preparatory School League and the New York Interschool. The school is located in three buildings within Manhattan.

The Dalton School, originally called the Children's University School, was founded by Helen Parkhurst in 1919. It was a time marked by educational reform. Philosophers, teachers, and child psychologists identified as "progressives" began to question the conventional wisdom of the day which held that education was a process of drill and memorization and that the only way to teach was to regiment children in classrooms. Their natural instincts to play, to move, to talk, and to inquire freely were suppressed.

The name "Dalton" refers to Dalton in Massachusetts, where Parkhurst frequently visited. Progressive educators believed that the development of the whole child is of primary importance; that children are social beings and that schools should be communities where they can learn to live with others; that these communities should devote themselves to the total enrichment of mind, body, and spirit.

After experimentation in her own one-room school with Maria Montessori, Helen Parkhurst visited other progressive schools in Europe including Bedales School and its founder and headmaster John Haden Badley in England. She developed what she termed the Dalton Plan which called for teachers and students to work together toward individualized goals. The Laboratory Plan was first put into effect as an experiment in the high school of Dalton, Massachusetts, in 1916. The estate of her benefactor Josephine Porter Boardman, was also near the town of Dalton and from this beginning the Laboratory Plan and school eventually took their names.