History

For the last twenty-five years, the Ashton School has been serving our community as a privately owned, independent Dominican/International school offering instruction in English, as well as Spanish, in the subjects required by the Dominican National Ministry of Education. The instructional program is geared to prepare students for university studies, maintaining high academic and personal development expectations, grounded in research-based practices and biblical principles.

The Ashton School was founded in 1998 with fewer than ten teachers and only 35 students in a one-family house, serving students in Kindergarten through third grade, inspired by the ideals, methods and techniques of the educator Sylvia Ashton Warner who dedicated part of her life to educate children, teaching them English as a second language, while respecting and maintaining their customs and cultural identities.

Today the school serves a population of 384 students ranging in grades Pre-Kinder through 12th grade. 74 % of our students are Dominican whose native language is Spanish and live in Spanish, monolingual speaking homes. The school is accredited by Cognia/The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) and recognized by the National Ministry of Education of the Dominican Republic (MINERD). Our English language arts and mathematics curriculum guides are primarily informed by the U.S. Common Core State Standards and the Next Generation of Science Standards in science, with biblical integration. Other subject areas are informed by or completely aligned with U.S. state standards that best meet the needs of our students. The process of delivering instruction, assessing and reporting in the core subjects is standards-based.

Students must balance a workload that meets both U.S. requirements to enter selective universities as well as meet the expectations of the Dominican program in Spanish, Sociales, French and in successfully passing 12th grade exit exams. Many of our students are also actively engaged in extracurricular clubs, athletic teams and service projects. Approximately 70-75% of our graduates choose to carry out their undergraduate studies in the Dominican Republic while the remainder go abroad to the U.S., Canada and increasingly to Europe. Those who complete their undergraduate studies locally often later enroll in European or U.S. graduate programs.

The school is governed by a Board of Directors that consists of eight members, two of whom are rotating members who serve as the president of the Ashton School Parents’ Association (ASPAS) and a student executive officer from the Student Council (STUCO.) The latter participates in one of the three to four meetings that are held per year, unless requested to participate more often. The Board sets, reviews and approves policies, while entrusting the general operation of the school to the head of school and the General Academic and Administrative embers (GAAM.)