Back in 2002, when I proudly accepted the position as Wheeler’s Head of School, I did so for both personal and professional reasons. Like many educators around the country, I admired Wheeler’s reputation as a progressive, dynamic institution embedded in a fascinating, up-and-coming city. But equally important, my wife and I knew that working at Wheeler meant that our two young children, then aged six and four, would have the opportunity for a truly extraordinary education. Seven years later, our lives and the life of the school seem entirely, and happily, entwined.

So, admittedly, I’m an invested booster of this 120-year-old institution, and I hope this website will help you understand why. Perhaps, through your computer screen, you can sense what happens when nearly 800 highly energetic students, ages 3-18, and 125 extraordinary full-time teachers, are condensed into one city block in the heart of the College Hill Neighborhood of Providence. I hope you can feel the palpable “buzz” of excitement and possibility, the creative friction, which defines the Wheeler School.

This school is noted for, and this website will indicate, a powerful academic program and a rich array of co-curricular offerings. Our students and our graduates can boast an almost embarrassing range and depth of accomplishment and achievement. But at this school’s core is something that cannot be measured or understood by extravagant SAT scores, rarified college acceptance lists, athletic championships, or innovative curriculum all of which are abundantly manifest everywhere one looks. Rather, we strive to live by a value system we inherited from the school’s remarkable founder — an artist, feminist, intellectual educator and ethical example of tremendous potency. Mary C. Wheeler cared about passionate curiosity, about innovation, about a flexibility of mind, about rigor, and about caring for one’s fellow man and woman. By some good fortune and much hard work, her priorities are alive and well in our community and remain central to our mission.

As you navigate through these pages, we hope your curiosity is piqued, whether you are a graduate of the school, a student, a parent, an applicant, or simply a connoisseur of fine websites. Please contact us by telephone or email, or better yet, visit. What is impressive on the Internet is surely compelling in person.