BROWARD COUNTY, Fla. — On this week’s Mom to Mom, Local 10’s Nicole Perez sat down with the administrators of a school offering South Florida middle and high school students a different approach to their schooling.
Shiren Rattigan is the founder of Colossal Academy. It is a fully accredited private school from children in grades six to 12.
Core classes at the academy in Fort Lauderdale can include cooking, gardening, fashion design and even surfing.
“They’re building their own businesses and making their own profits and learning how to be financially literate,” said Rattigan.
The fifth-generation educator said she has worked at private, public and Montessori schools throughout her career. She said she felt like she could not find what her children needed, so she created it.
“So, they take the shoes off when they come in, they change into indoor shoes. We get rid of the technology, and they talk and interact with each other. We start our base curriculum in the mornings from nine until 12. That is where we do the anchored academics and, in the afternoons, when we have all this time to do our passion projects and our entrepreneurship and our cooking,” said Rattigan.
A unique style of education, rooted in learning by example and soulful experiences, Rattigan says Colossal Academy is a sanctuary that approaches its curriculum through a humanistic lens.
Colossal Academy offers a traditional full five-day school experience, a 3-day hybrid experience and virtual school.
“They’re learning how to make natural dyes and paint out of the butterfly pea. They’re learning herbs and how to make tinctures and different shelves and lip balms and apothecary. They learn how to cultivate and be stewards of the land. The juxtaposition between these beautiful buildings that are being developed and our tiny and mighty garden space is really a wonderful thing, ” said Rattigan.
For more traditional parents, looking for English, math and science classes, Rattigan says the curriculum is balanced.
“So we really deeply balance rigor with real world, so our students are doing algebra geometry and language arts and their learning biology and chemistry some of it is within context of gardening right, but the academic anchors are absolutely rigorous,” said Rattigan.
Madeline Moorman has been attending the school for a few years and is now in the eighth grade. She says the school is the perfect mix for her and she’s grateful for her freedom.
“It feels good to like to use my hands and like have tactical things to do throughout the day because I can’t sit still personally and I fidget a lot. I like going outside. I like having fresh air,” said Moorman.
Her mother, Alana Dola, spoke Mom-to-Mom with Nicole and told her what ultimately led to her enrolling her daughter at the academy.
“We’d spend hours sitting out in front of classrooms with her crying, not wanting to go. She wasn’t talking and she wasn’t thriving, and she was always upset. She was failing her courses and I’m like there’s something happening,” said Dola.
Before Colossal Academy, Moorman went to public school, but when COVID hit, she tried home schooling.
Statistics from the Florida Department of Education show more than 155,000 students were homeschooled in the 2023-24 school year. In the last five years, that number has increased by 46 percent.
“I knew that I couldn’t put her in somewhere where she was being forced into a box. Colossal, with the way that the school is structured allows her the freedom she needs to be who she is while also accomplishing what needs to get done,” said Dola.
The private school does charge a tuition fee. It also accepts Step Up and AAA scholarships.
For more information about Colossal Academy, click on this link.
To learn how to apply for Step Up for Students, click on this link.
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