The Kurt Hahn School, located in the Samuel J. Tilden Educational Complex in East Flatbush, Brooklyn, serves approximately 350 students in grades 9 – 12 and has an individualized focus on academics, student leadership, and digital media.
The school is named after Kurt Hahn, the founder of Outward Bound and a renowned educator who emphasized experience-based learning approaches that incorporate adventure, service, and opportunities for intellectual development, character growth, and the exercise of leadership. In addition to preparing its students for college and careers, Hahn, in keeping with its namesake, aims to prepare them to become informed, skilled, and courageous civic leaders.
At the Kurt Hahn School, students learn by leading – and leading means doing. The school pushes students out of the classroom and into the action of solving real community problems, which invests students in their own neighborhoods, teaches them the values of community leadership and service, and prepares them for leadership in media, government, law, medicine, education, business, and other fields.
Like many NYC Outward Bound Schools, instead of taking the Regents exams in high school, students must complete four Performance-Based Assessment Tasks (PBATs) for which they propose a topic, conduct independent research, and write a paper which they publicly defend to a panel of faculty, peers and visiting experts. (Kurt Hahn students are still required to take English Regents exams).
At Kurt Hahn, sophomores and juniors complete 50 hours of community service, a requirement that has helped earn the school a School of Distinction honor from New York Cares. This program places students in organizations across the community where they can develop professional relationships, land internships, and experience the joy that comes from serving others.
For more information about Kurt Hahn or to enroll your child, please visit the school’s official website.
