Two curricula. Both essential. Both required.
Most schools call sport, art, and making extracurriculars — a word that implies the mind is the real work and everything else is dessert. We reject that frame entirely. The Telluride School runs on two curricula, equal in weight and different in purpose. The First builds the mind. The Second builds the body, the hand, the team, and the courage.
A child who can read a balance sheet but cannot read a mountain is half-educated. A child who can ski a black diamond but cannot defend a thesis is half-educated. We are built so neither child walks out our door.
The shape of the Second Curriculum
The mind is built in the morning. The afternoon belongs to four streams. The Mountain and the Rink are the physical anchors of the year and flex with the calendar; the Workshop and the Enrichments run across all four quarters and quietly re-theme as the world outside the window changes.
The Mountain
Snow, water, rock, and trail. Skiing and alpine literacy in deep winter; the river and the high country in the shoulder seasons. Taught by individual progression — not age.
The Rink
Skating and hockey — speed of decision under contact, true team interdependence, and the instinct to fall, get up, and keep skating. Beginner and competitive cohorts run in parallel.
The Workshop
Robotics, code, woodworking, and applied making. Every child sets a year-long maker goal in autumn and ships a real, working project by spring.
The Enrichments
Music, art, dance and gymnastics, theater, writing, language, debate, and chess — running all year and building toward the spring Showcase.
The shape of a day
The week is full — 8:30 to 3:30, five days — and the rhythm is consistent so the structure itself does some of the teaching:
A morning gathering, then a concentrated first academic block. A late-morning physical block — roughly 9:00–10:00 — that flexes with the season: the river, the ice, or the skis. Then lunch and free play, a midday rotation, and a 1:30–3:30 Second Curriculum afternoon for the Workshop, the Enrichments, and fieldwork.
We ski when it’s earned and the conditions are good — not on a clock. The mountain sets the schedule; we listen.
The season sets the lesson
We lead each quarter with what is in season — and let the rest move underneath it. The shape of the year:
Autumn
Late September the river runs gold and the cottonwoods turn. We settle in, set the year-long maker goal we will finish in May, and learn the river’s discipline — read the water, stand still, pay close attention. The Workshop runs heaviest now, and the Rink wakes once the ice is in.
Early Winter
First turns and first whistles. Skating is a foundation skill, like reading; from there, hockey — speed, team, and the habit of getting back up. The Workshop comes indoors for the bench season, and the Enrichments deepen toward performance.
The Mountain
Deep winter, and the longest stretch of the year to get good at something hard. We ride powder and good snow — not the clock. Hockey is at its height, the maker’s project advances toward the Showcase, and structured, age-appropriate avalanche training, Nordic skiing, and ice fishing round out the season.
The Go Quarter
The world becomes the classroom. Each child carries a mission and becomes the family’s planner — research, budget, and itinerary — during the district’s spring break. Capstones are finished and shipped, and the whole year comes home for the Showcase.
Expeditions, the Go-trip & the Showcase
The Expeditions
Autumn, early winter, and deep winter each close with a school-paid, driveable Expedition the cohort takes together — an overnight for grades 3–4, a multi-night weekend for grades 5–8. Parent chaperones welcome.
The Go-trip
In spring the family takes the lead. Timed to the district’s two-week break, each child plans and leads a family journey around a real mission — then brings the work home.
The Showcase
The year ends the last week of May. Children stand up and present what they built, wrote, and learned. Learning to be heard is, quietly, one of the most important things this school teaches.
How it actually runs
- A target of roughly seven children to one guide on snow, ice, and water — tighter for beginners and technical terrain.
- Families provide each child’s own gear — skis or board, skates and helmet, rod and waders, layers, and a lift ticket or pass. The school provides instruction, coaching, and supervision.
- Safety is part of the curriculum, not an afterthought: helmets always, conditions-led sessions, and structured age-appropriate avalanche training before any backcountry.
Four quarters, two curricula, one education.
Woven into the week, not bolted onto it. A child who lives inside this rhythm for a few years becomes a different kind of person — someone who can defend a thesis and read a mountain, ship a real project and stand on a stage and be heard. The detail — how each season actually runs, week to week — is something we walk founding families through directly.
Discere et facere. — To learn, and to do.