Frequently Asked Questions

Each charter school has a unique mission and vision. To make the best decision for your student, we encourage you to explore your options and select the school that best meets your student’s unique learning style.

At New Roots Charter School, we offer an interdisciplinary academic program featuring hands-on, community-based learning that supports students in learning 21st century skills.  All students earn college credit while in high school through our concurrent enrollment classes.

We invite you to contact us to set up a tour of New Roots to find out if our sustainably minded program is right for your student.

Our core curriculum is designed around essential questions and themes so that, at any given time, the topics studied in different courses are related to each other. Courses are inquiry-oriented and focused on critical thinking. We are a small public school that provides personalized accountability to all students. Students work closely with faculty members who supervise their academic progress and engagement.

We are very proud of our FREE Farm to School breakfast and lunch featuring healthy “teen comfort food” for ALL enrolled students!

We’re part of an innovative initiative across the country connecting school lunch programs & hands on learning with local farms. Understanding the impact of healthy nutrition on a student’s ability to think creatively and contribute powerfully at school is an important part of the New Roots experience. Our Farm to School meal team strives to serve a variety of local whole foods daily.  We do not use processed, packaged, or pre-made foods, and are committed to keeping sugar, additives, and preservatives out of our food.

Students contribute to the community through service learning projects, where they apply their learning to projects outside of the classroom. Students use an extended campus that includes our main building, TC3’s downtown campus, area farms, businesses, organizations, and natural areas.

Research demonstrates that students who attend smaller schools are safer, have better attendance and behavior, demonstrate higher achievement and engagement, and are more likely to graduate. Smaller high schools improve achievement because they include a culture of caring, greater student contact with teachers, greater parent involvement, and more meaningful and engaged curricula. Small high schools have been shown to reduce the graduation gap between various demographics.

Our main campus is in the heart of downtown Ithaca. We have been in the historic Clinton House since our doors opened in 2009.  We recently expanded to occupy the entire first and second floors! Some of our new  spaces include a music studio in the historic Mural Lounge, a yoga studio, and an a new art room with abundant natural light.  All renovations were mindful of the historic character of our unique school building.

Our downtown Ithaca campus provides us with many great spaces to support our school program while enhancing the community-based education that New Roots is known for. We cook and serve lunch in the beautiful social hall of the Greek Orthodox Church, hold community meetings in the auditorium of the Community School for Music and Art, and use facilities such as the gym at Southside Community Center, City Health Club, and Ahisma Yoga Studio for diverse physical education activities.  Students have many opportunities to walk out of the Clinton House and engage the wider community and its facilities through our programs, which enhances the school’s collegiate feel.

New Roots is an independent public school, and is not part of a school district. Each student’s district of residence collects federal, state and local funding on the student’s behalf.  When the student chooses to attend New Roots or any other charter school, the district of residence pays the charter school a portion of their funding at a rate determined by the New York State education department.

Our school day starts at 9:00 am and ends at 4:00pm with extended class periods that allow teachers the opportunity to get students out of the classroom and into the community. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday classes focus on core academic subject areas. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, students apply academic learning to labs, field studies, and service learning.

If you live within 15 miles of Ithaca, your home school district will provide busing for you to get to our campus. Eligible students may also receive a school-provided T-CAT bus pass.

Our local Board of Trustees, with expertise in education, organizational management, and sustainability, reports to the State University of New York, the NYS Education Department, and the State Comptroller. Our Board is responsible for strategic planning, fiscal and academic oversight, and for hiring and supervising the Principal and Superintendent. The community is welcome at the Board’s monthly meetings.

Sustainability is defined as meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. Sustainability education at New Roots prepares students to organize their communities to promote a long-term, high quality of life for all people and preserve the natural systems that support us.

Charter public schools are academically accountable in two ways. We are held accountable by our authorizer and, most importantly, by the families we serve. We defined our academic goals when we submitted our charter petition. To be authorized, the goals must be rigorous, and to stay open, we must demonstrate that students are reaching our academic goals. We were recently renewed for another 5 years based on our academic achievements without conditions, the best possible outcome for a charter renewal process.

Yes.  New Roots students must meet or exceed New York State graduation requirements, in addition to meeting New Roots graduation requirements.  These include graduating with college credit through our concurrent enrollment program with TC3,  demonstrating mastery of essential skills and knowledge areas through the creation of an online digital graduation portfolio and a senior team capstone project.

Yes, our students graduate with a Regents diploma, which requires that they take 5 Regents exams, one science, one math, one English, and two social studies.  Students take a core curriculum sequence of four years of science, math, Social Studies and English featuring interdisciplinary connections, problem-based learning and a global perspective. Students learn Spanish as the foreign language requirement.

Through the CollegeNow program at Tompkins Cortland Community College (TC3) and the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University, New Roots students receive college credit for concurrent enrollment courses successfully completed during junior and senior year. Research demonstrates that students who graduate from high school with college credits are more likely to apply to and graduate from a four-year college. Our goal is to prepare our students for the next level of education and empower them with the tools for success.

Two approaches that inspired the New Roots model are Environment as Integrating Context for Education (EIC) and Expeditionary Learning Schools (ELS). Both approaches improve both achievement scores and student engagement.

As a New York State charter school, we are open to all high school eligible students who live in New York State, regardless of school district of residence, space permitting.

Students in 9th through 12th grades are eligible to enroll at New Roots. Any student eligible to attend public school in New York State may apply. Please go to the “Enroll” or “Inquire” options at the top of this page and fill out an online interest form.

New Roots is designed as a small high school for up to 40 students per grade, or 160 overall.  The actual number enrolled at each grade level fluctuates depending on the courses that students at that level need and the size of the classrooms that hold them. Our enrollment continues to grow year after year, so we recommended enrolling as early as possible to secure your place in our school community.