Why Gateway?
Gateway develops within each student the capabilities that lead to success in mainstream classrooms and in life, thereby transforming the lives of its students and their families. Students become skilled, strategic learners and confident self-advocates able to produce academic work that is truly reflective of their intellectual potential. Dedicated to early intervention, skilled in direct, explicit, multisensory instruction, and attuned to the individual needs of its students, Gateway helps its students grow academically and socially and transition to mainstream settings when they can do so successfully.
Enrollment
Gateway enrolls approximately 160 students. Those ages 5 to 9 are in our ungraded Lower School; those ages 10 to 14 are in grades 5th through 8th in our Middle School.
Students from throughout Greater New York come to Gateway. While the majority of Gateway students live in Manhattan and Brooklyn, many travel to our West 61st Street campus from Northern New Jersey and Westchester.
Excellence in Teaching
Gateway attracts lifelong learners interested in contributing to the ongoing development of effective, research-based instructional programming for students with learning disabilities. Gateway’s teachers participate in an ongoing professional development program that focuses on the practical application of contemporary research in child development, language, literacy, and learning for the purpose of realizing the potential within each student to navigate school and life successfully.
Most teachers hold a master’s degree in special education and/or an advanced degree in a subject domain. Our Reading and Learning Specialists, Language Therapists, Psychologists, and Occupational Therapists hold advanced degrees in their respective fields and the required certifications.
Independent, Integrated, Individualized Curriculum
Our independent school curriculum weaves together the skills and strategies necessary for learning academic content that students require to successfully participate in general classrooms, including college preparatory high schools.
The Program
Gateway takes all aspects of a student’s development into consideration, in particular how language affects the student’s thinking, feeling, and learning. Taught according to a defined curriculum and in small classes, students participate in group learning led by faculty skilled in direct, explicit, and multisensory instruction and able to individualize instruction in response to a student’s needs.
- The Orton-Gillingham-based Reading program begins with Preventing Academic Failure by Phyllis Bertin and Eileen Perlman and is followed by a structured program for teaching reading comprehension.
- Writing according to The Writing Revolution by Judith C. Hochman, Ed.D., is employed in all subjects, with students learning to write in a dedicated Writing class and reinforced by writing in the subject classes.
- The scope and sequence of Singapore Math has been adapted for our students and is augmented by math enrichment.
- Classroom Language Dynamics, developed by Lydia H. Soifer, Ph.D., guides our faculty in how to use language to teach students with language impairment and attention deficit.
- A team of therapists provides in-class and small-group instruction in Language, Occupational Therapy, and Social Development.
- In Social Development, students learn how to overcome the impact of their difficulties with language and attention by addressing hurdles in their social communications and interactions with peers and adults.
- Through the Arts program, students learn alternative ways of expressing concepts introduced in the subject areas.
- In Technology and Research, Middle School students learn how to employ technology to manage long-term projects and write research papers.
- An after-school program features athletics and a selection of extracurricular activities.
Placement
The Placement Office guides and supports the parents and student through a year-long process of identifying and making the right match between the student and a post-Gateway school. Gateway’s recommendations incorporate the perspectives of the entire team that works with a student. The Associate Director of Admissions and Placement works with each family from initial school tours to test prep to interviews and the submission of applications.
A few of the schools to which Gateway students have been accepted in recent years are:
For a more extensive list of schools to which Gateway students have been accepted, please visit our Placement page.