Countryside Day School is internationally recognized in the professional community as one of the leading Montessori schools worldwide. Countryside has maintained an uncompromised adherence to the authentic Montessori method, as all of its teachers are AMI trained. Our rigorous approach to academics has consistently produced graduates of above-average academic ability, maintaining demonstrably higher academic performance than district schools. Our unique emphasis on character, demonstrated by students who are respectful, responsible, resourceful, and who can both lead and cooperate in community is well known among Countryside parents and their circles. Countryside’s assumption that education includes parenting in the context of a partnership with the school community has liberated and inspired families in today's overly anxious parenting culture. The most important factor in Countryside’s success has been its single-minded commitment to one mission--respect, responsibility, and resourcefulness--that has, and will, set the tone for all its development, decisions, expansion. In 1967, Franklin C. and Annette B. Kulle founded Countryside Day School, starting operations in Glenview. In 1971, the school purchased the property at 1985 Pfingsten Road, Northbrook, its present location. In the spring of 1993, a year-round All Year Montessori Program was added. A new addition housing a two-story gym, four classrooms, offices, parent meeting rooms, and a basement for storage was completed in August, 1995. Sections of the original building were re-configured to serve a larger toddler class, the Care Club and create a dining room in the original gym. In 2012, a Middle School program was added and, one year later, CMS purchased two adjacent properties and broke ground for a new Middle School building. Today, Countryside has an enrollment of over 180 students.