"When we walked in the door it just felt like the right place." - ARS parent
About Us
Welcome: Letter from Headmistress
“I want the best for my child.”
Every parent says that a thousand times and every parent struggles with it because there is no one and only “best.” Each child deserves what is best for him or her as a unique individual.
We do our best for your child at Alexander Robertson School.
We focus entirely on the elementary-school-age child. At the age of five children are ready to join the wider world in all kinds of ways. The elementary school years are a stunning time of development and growth. We enjoy the luxury of childhood and let it be what it will be over the next several years. We rejoice in each milestone and never hurry. I observe that our students, while achieving high levels of excellence in academic and behavior standards, remain comfortably children.
In this small environment, each individual is cherished and known. A person of any age feels at home and secure where everyone is known by name. Everyone is a big fish in this pond; and ARS children are not intimidated by the bigger ponds to which they progress. They are confident.
“We are the world.” We believe it is essential that children know, not only intellectually, but from lived experience, how interesting, fun, surprising, and smart all kinds of people can be.
Alexander Robertson School is owned and operated by Second Presbyterian Church, which provides the foundational convictions in the school in a non-sectarian setting. We do not formally teach religion. We proudly affirm the school’s heritage and guide the children to be open, informed, responsible citizens of the world.
Our Vision
At Alexander Robertson we envision a school which strives above all else to instill a love of learning, and one which prepares students to become thoughtful, successful learners, leaders, and problem solvers.
Our goal in all we do as a community is to instill ethical and moral principles which are modeled, encouraged and practiced daily, leading to responsible, sensitive interactions with others.
Our Mission is
- To promote self-confidence that comes from mastered skills
- To provide sufficient intellectual challenge through robust curricula
- To stress high standards in all activities while using developmentally appropriate practice
- To encourage and involve the students in opportunities for service
- To provide structure in the daily schedule and in the curricula
- To utilize the cultural resources available in New York City
Schools Attended by ARS Graduates
- Bank Street School for Children
- The Brooklyn Friends School
- Claremont Preparatory School
- City and Country School
- Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School
- The School at Columbia
- The Dalton School
- Fieldston Middle School
- The Dwight School
- Horace Mann School
- Manhattan Country School
- Marymount School
- Nightingale-Bamford School
- The Packer Collegiate Institute
- Professional Children’s School
- Riverdale Country School
- The Rudolf Steiner School
- Saint Ignatius Loyola School
- St. Hilda’s and St. Hugh’s School
- The Studio School
- Trevor Day School
- Trinity School
- United Nations International School
- York Preparatory School
Our History
It is no accident that Alexander Robertson School was founded in 1789 by a Scotsman and merchant, Alexander Robertson, and the Scots Presbyterian Church. Scotland had the highest rate of literacy in the world in the mid-Eighteenth Century. Robertson and the Presbyterians were determined to provide educational opportunities for the children of “common folk,” farmers and trades-people, as a way to check the power of former British elites in the newly created United States of America. For them, the only honorable route into the power structure was through education.
There is a long tradition in Scotland, too, of the belief that education is not morally neutral; that children need ethical guidance along with the power that results from knowledge. In 1750’s Scotland, therefore, each parish had its own school, presided over by its pastor.
After more than two hundred years, the ethos of Alexander Robertson School today continues to meld these themes into a coherent educational philosophy, one which emphasizes inclusive community, conviction or high vocational purpose, and an enlightened commitment to social responsibility at all levels.
