At a Glance
A tiny, family-style elementary program where every child is genuinely known by name.
Best suited for
Families with young children who want an intimate, play-based, individualized early-elementary experience within a culturally grounded Central Brooklyn community — and who are comfortable trading the breadth of a larger school for the warmth of a true learning family.
What stands out
- With only 13 students enrolled and a 6.5:1 student-teacher ratio, this is one of the most intimate elementary settings in the city — every family and child gets sustained individual attention.
- A genuinely flat $25,000 tuition across all elementary grades makes private school budgeting simpler and more predictable than tiered programs at larger schools.
- Play-based, hands-on, individualized instruction rooted in whole-child development — including a spiritual dimension that distinguishes it from both secular and strictly religious peers.
- A long-standing community institution with consistent parent praise (3.9/5 across 15 reviews) for providing a warm, loving, fun environment.
- Rolling admissions with no application deadline mean families can join mid-year when space allows, unlike most private elementary schools with rigid January cutoffs.
Things to consider
- With only 13 students total, peer interaction is necessarily limited — families looking for a robust grade-level cohort, full athletic teams, or wide elective offerings may want to think carefully.
- Public program descriptions emphasize the School Program (ages 2-5) and Pre-K through 1st grade most prominently; details on the upper elementary experience (grades 2-5) are sparser in available materials.
- The "spiritual but not religious" framing may read as warmly inclusive to some families and as ambiguous to others — worth asking directly how this is expressed in the classroom.
- The student body is heavily concentrated in one demographic group; families specifically seeking a racially diverse mix across many groups should weigh whether this profile fits.
- At $25,000 annually, this is well below the NYC private elementary median but still a significant commitment — and the small size means limited financial aid flexibility.
Identity
A nonsectarian, coed elementary program serving pre-K through fifth grade in a nurturing, individualized setting. The philosophy pairs play-based, hands-on learning with a holistic commitment to each child's intellectual, aesthetic, physical, and spiritual growth — creating a "spiritual but not religious" orientation distinct from faith-based private schools. The emphasis on forming close alliances between educators, parents, and students is core to the school's identity.
Community
The student body is 92.3% Black and 7.7% Hispanic, with 100% of students identifying as children of color — closely mirroring the surrounding Central Brooklyn community. The school's long tenure and rolling admissions suggest it draws multigenerational families, though its very small size limits the overall demographic mix. Parent reviews praise the warmth and personal attention rather than diversity in the conventional sense.
Neighborhood
Prospect Lefferts Gardens–Wingate is a working- and middle-class Brooklyn neighborhood with a median household income of about $73,000 and roughly 42% of adults holding a bachelor's degree or higher. The area has a roughly 16% poverty rate and reflects a strong Caribbean-American and African-American community character, with an increasingly mixed mix of long-time residents and newer families. Nostrand Avenue is a lively commercial corridor running through the heart of the neighborhood.
Winthrop St on the 2/5 line is about a 3-minute walk, with Sterling St (2/5) at 7 minutes and Church Av (2/5) at 11 minutes — three stops on the same line make the commute easy from much of Flatbush and beyond.
Notable Programs
What Parents Are Saying
3.9 rating from 15 reviews; described as providing warm, loving, fun environment with focus on educational and physical development
Synthesized from public parent reviews · Apr 2026
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Frequently Asked Questions
- Is MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY a good school?
- Published quality ratings aren't available for MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY yet on Motley. It's a private school serving grades Pre-K to 5 in Prospect Lefferts Gardens-Wingate.
- What grades does MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY serve?
- MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY serves grades Pre-K to 5.
- How do students get into MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY?
- MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY runs its own private admissions process — typically an application, a visit, and sometimes testing.
- Is MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY public, charter, or private?
- MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY is a private school.
- What neighborhood is MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY in?
- MARY BOBB LEARNING ACADEMY is in Prospect Lefferts Gardens-Wingate, Brooklyn.