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Each parent wants the best for their child. Some parents braved chilly weather and lived out of tents for more than a week, just to be the first to hand in their applications.
[0]CSAS
Jammaal Flanagan, "It wasn't that bad this year."
Jammaal Flanagan slept here for two nights, he says its worth it to enroll his daughter in kindergarten at the Chattanooga School of the Arts and Sciences.
Flanagan, "For her to get the best education I'd rather come out here and spend a week to make sure that she gets in than not, because the alternative is to come up with 500 or 600 dollars a month for private school or send her to a school that's failing."
CSAS Principal Steve Ball greeted tired parents and took 75 applications, each stamped with the date and time.
[0]CSAS
Steve Ball, "There'll be some others that will turn theirs in later in the week, it's not a requirement to stand in line or camp out I think sometimes people think that's the case, like anything if you want to stand in line you can."
Ball says everything went smoothly and many parents bonded over the past week. He's glad they think so highly of the schools curriculum which is founded on the Paideia philosophy.
Ball, "We do a lot of critical thinking a lot of Socratic seminars where the students discuss things, write about things, really at an in depth level."
That curriculum is what impresses Jammaal Flanagan.
Flanagan, "I believe that the teachers here and faculty here demand a little more from the students and the parents."
CSAS is K-12 and has three kindergarten classes, each with 19 students, while CSLA has two kindergarten classes.
Some of those kindergarten slots are already filled, since both schools give preference to kindergarten-age siblings of existing students.
Children of staff members are also given preference.
There are only 95 slots available.
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