A history of working together: Building bonds from early on at Northport Nursery School

The sales pitch is easy: a standalone building on 2.5 acres of private wooded property complete with a spacious playground, outdoor classroom and hiking trail. A cooperative preschool where parents participate in activities and contribute to the school’s success by volunteering their skills. A true sense of community nurtured by the presence of caring teachers, many of whom began their time there as parents and didn’t quite have it in them to leave.

And then there’s the history (80-plus years and counting), which has at its roots the purpose of helping out fellow community members – providing that coveted “village” – during early parenthood and beyond.

Take Northport Nursery School’s director, Casi Flynn. Her son started in the school’s 3s program in 2006, and her daughter the following year. Flynn was a nursery school parent for four years, serving three of them as a school board member. She took a year off when her daughter started half-day kindergarten but, as a former elementary school teacher, wanted to get back in the classroom. When she asked Northport Nursery’s then-director for a reference letter, she was offered a job instead. Flynn taught the 4s class for two years before taking over the director position in 2013. This year marks the seventeenth year she’s been involved at NNS. It’s not unusual; currently 14 out of the school’s 15 staff members have sent their children to Northport Nursery. 

“This is truly a home away from home for our students, our families and our staff,” Flynn told the Journal during an interview at the school earlier this month. “Everybody is really vested in everything about this school. I can’t imagine my family’s life without it.”

A history of helping out 
According to a 2004 Northport Journal article written by George Wallace, Gladys Dittmer, a former nurse in Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and New York City, moved with her husband Dr. Lyle Morris to Northport when he got a job as the district’s second superintendent, serving from 1930 until 1946. 

In the ’30s, Gladys held a playgroup in her home for local children and eventually grew it into the Northport Cooperative Nursery School, which opened on the strength of her BS degree in teaching from Columbia, earned in 1940, Wallace wrote. In 1941, the school was certified by the N.Y. State Department of Education, the first of its kind in the county. It was housed in the East Northport Grammar School building, on the site now occupied by the East Northport Public Library.

Initially, 25 children were enrolled for five mornings a week, with Grace Leone Farrell as teacher and two mothers as helpers. Tuition at the time ranged from $1 to $8 a month, depending on ability to pay. The difference between the cost paid and the $8 maximum rate was made up by work for the school at a rate of fifty cents per hour. The students’ mothers participated by working for two weeks at a time.

World War II inspired a big change for the Morrises; Lyle Morris joined the Navy, and became a commander in charge of the U-12 Navy program in Gonzales College in Spokane, Washington. Gladys followed, and became a staff nurse in the same town while her husband headed the Navy’s U-12 unit.

In 1942, the school offered the only Civilian Defense Child Care course in Suffolk County, which fostered the establishment of several other cooperative schools in both Nassau and Suffolk counties.

The war year of 1943 saw an effort to relieve the home work of mothers active in the home front industrial effort. To assist the local community, Northport Nursery School offered an all-day program including hot lunch, nap, and supervised activity for its students.

According to the Hofstra Chronicle, Gladys attended an educational conference at the college in 1943 to discuss “The Responsibility of Education Toward Children in War Time, Especially as Regards Nursery Schools and After-School Care.”

“War has brought with it a condition not only of education but to community life as a whole that demands deliberation. It is probably not one that will end with the termination of the war, but one that will reach into the future,” stated Hofstra Dean William Hunter Beckwith at the time.

That cooperative spirit 
Northport Nursery School was a child of the depression, surviving largely because of its cooperative spirit. Teachers took on many roles: accountant, plumber, floor cleaner. Parents who could not afford the tuition contributed hours of work to keep the school running; Farrell, the organization’s first full-time teacher, at times took no salary so that the childrens’ programs wouldn’t be interrupted, stated a 1969 article in the Northport Observer. 

While the school moved locations throughout the years, it found its permanent home on Laurel Hill Road in Northport in 1966.

In 1968, a new building was built on the Northport property. Designed by James Van Alst, one of the school’s grandfather alumni, and constructed by alumni fathers in various trades, the building was the culmination of fifteen years of fundraisers and the tremendous dedication of former nursery school families.

That sense of community, the passion of parents and teachers, has kept Northport Nursery School afloat during its most challenging times. The community Gladys Morris built from the ground up, the importance of being a contributing member of that educational village, was brought further to life by Farrell, who devoted her time to the same type of fundraising activities that maintain Northport Nursery School today.

Nowadays, at least one parent of all students enrolled at the school commits to serving on a committee, from technology and hospitality to maintenance and health and safety, the adults bringing to the table their unique skill sets. “The key to our success over the years has been the special dedication of a great many parents who have found as much personal satisfaction in working with the school as their children have gained in personal development,” the school’s handbook states.”This mutual benefit is one of the greatest values of our cooperative venture.”

Parents, grandparents and caregivers also have the unique opportunity to live a day in the life of their nursery school student. “The beauty of this school is participating in the classroom,” Flynn told the Journal. Once a month, on a round-robin basis, parents of students in the 3s and 4s program come into the school to shadow their child. “And you don’t have to think about laundry, your to-do list, the phone ringing… You are just with them,” she said. “And you can’t always do that at home. But here you can. You’re with them and you’re doing what they’re doing.”

While at the school, parents will also help the teachers, setting up art projects, tidying up the room when the kids leave, and just being present in their child’s school day routine – with the extra benefit of getting to know the staff and their child’s friends really well, Flynn said. “And where else can you do that?”

The great outdoors
Originally a one-room schoolhouse, Northport Nursery expanded in the ’80s to include an annex that has evolved from community room to classroom. And the school keeps growing, even outside of its brick and mortar building.

A longtime vision for Flynn came to fruition in 2017, when the school unveiled its brand new outdoor classroom. The 2,500-square-foot space has become a focal point of the preschool and includes areas for meetings and story time, art, music, movement, building, free exploration and water play.

“I always knew that nature would have a place in my classroom,”  Flynn said. “I never imagined that nature would one day be my classroom.”

The creation of the space would not have been possible without the hard work of the school’s Ways and Means Committee and, once again, the support of NNS families, alumni and friends. The outdoor classroom proves, Flynn said, “that many hands make light work.”

More recently, a bit of serendipity was responsible for another addition to the school, a hiking trail now used for class walks, special events and after-school playdates. In casual conversation, a student mentioned to Flynn that his dad “cuts down trees.” Flynn made a phone call to the parent, to tell him she was thinking about making a trail in the woods. It turned out that dad creates and maintains the hiking trails in the Town of Huntington.

Within a month, Northport Nursery School had its own hiking trail in the wooded area just off its parking lot, complete with the well thought-out challenge of a little incline when you first start the trail, rounded bends, and places to sit. This past year, staff installed the first story walk on the trail and often light it up (think carved pumpkins) for holiday-inspired outings.

Completing the trio of community-supported outdoor improvements will soon be a new playground climber, with a clubhouse retreat roof and three slides.

All in a day’s work
Flynn lights up when she talks about a day at Northport Nursery, how the child-centered, play-based curriculum empowers students to become independent learners, to have the freedom to choose their paths, if just for a few moments during free work time. “We call it free work because it’s work,” Flynn said. “Their play is work and they are working hard.”

When kids come into the classroom, they’ll wash hands before getting right into free work. They may spend their time painting at easels, playing dress-up, or at a sensory table. One child, Flynn said, builds a zoo out of wooden blocks and other classroom items every single day, and every day it’s a little bit different. She encourages him to use his imagination, knowing every new detail is a spark in creativity.

Teacher-directed activities centered around a theme incorporate arts and crafts, a story, and music and movement. The kids snack together, learning from an early age to be self-sufficient (“1, 2, 3, that's enough for me” when pouring water, for example, and other lessons parents can incorporate at home) before spending quality time outside.

“It’s two and a half hours but it is packed,” Flynn said.

Parents of NNS students range from full-time working parents to stay-at-home parents, work-from-home parents and first-time parents to those sending their third or fourth child to the school – people who fit into their busy schedules a monthly visit to learn alongside their children, and volunteer spare time to the school so that both their family and future families can continue benefiting from the unique experience Northport Nursery offers them.  

“It’s an amazing community,” Flynn said. “I’m really proud of this place.”

Open enrollment is currently underway at Northport Nursery School, with limited spaces available in the 2s, 3s and 4s classes for the 2024-2025 school year. For more information on the half-day programs, visit the school’s website or call 631-261-6586.