The Mary Lyon Model School provides educational services for students with serious emotional disturbances in a regular classroom setting. The purpose of the program is to demonstrate that regular education students grouped in integrated classrooms with seriously emotionally disturbed students have the same or better academic performance than their peers grouped homogeneously. Had they not been enrolled in the Mary Lyon Model School, the students with special needs would have been sent to private schools for students with serious emotional problems. Each classroom is designed to accommodate 10 regular education students and 5 students with special needs. All of the students are challenged at their own developmental level in reading, math, and social skills.
Every class has a teacher, an assistant teacher, and an after-school teacher.
All students work in the computer room three times per week with a full-time computer teacher on special projects linked with their classroom work. In addition, a full-time clinical coordinator offers counseling. The Mary Lyon School has not been formally evaluated. However, there are several indications that the program is effective. The school was over-chosen by white, black and other minority parents for regular education seats for the past three years.