Maplebrook School
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Maplebrook School is a small boarding school in Amenia, New York, that serves about 115 adolescents and young adults with substantial learning disabilities.
The school was founded in 1945 with the financial backing of George and Serena Merck, heirs to the pharmaceutical giant, Merck & Co., who themselves had a son, Johnny, with developmental disabilities. Maplebrook has grown over the years from a very small institution to one that serves more than 100 students in three programs.
Maplebrook students typically have IQs of between 70 and 90, so most of them do not technically suffer from mental retardation. But they do have a variety of significant learning and behavioral disorders, including language-based disabilities, auditory processing disorder, Asperger Syndrome, speech impairment, attention deficit disorder and poor social skills. In its literature and on its website, the school refers to its students as "slow learners."
With an annual tuition of about $49,000, a small endowment and a limited financial aid budget, Maplebrook primarily attracts students from well-to-do families. Even so, as much as 40 percent obtain full or partial funding for a Maplebrook education through their local school districts. Some students advance to higher education and a few have earned four-year college degrees. But for most, the goal after Maplebrook is to live independently and hold down a job.
Maplebrook's primary admissions competitor in the northeastern United States is Riverview School. Roger A. Fazzone, a former administrator at Dutchess Community College, has been president/headmaster of Maplebrook since 1988.
