# Acton Academy El Salvador, full profile

> A US accredited Montessori preschool and K-12 school in Antiguo Cuscatlán, El Salvador, where every child graduates with a calling of their own.

Legal and brand name: Acton Academy El Salvador (also Acton Academy and Montessori El Salvador).
Location: Avenida Teotl, Casa #7, Antiguo Cuscatlán, La Libertad, El Salvador.
Phone and WhatsApp: +503 7099-1535.
Website: https://www.actonacademyelsalvador.com/ (English) and https://www.actonacademyelsalvador.com/es/ (Spanish).
Languages of instruction: English and Spanish. Bilingual.
Ages served: 14 months through 12th grade graduation.
Founded: 2019. First graduate: June 2026.
Network: part of the Acton Academy network, more than 300 schools in 20 countries.
Slogan: Where you wish you had gone to school.
Mission statement: every person who enters our doors deserves to find a calling that will change the world.

## The two programs

**Montessori Preschool (14 months to 6 years).** Authentic Montessori, led by certified Montessori guides, using authentic Montessori materials. Two studios: Infant Community for 14 months to 3 years, and Children's House for 3 to 6 years. Half day and full day options. Designed to cultivate independence, autonomy, practical life skills, confidence, strong habits, and grace and courtesy.

**Acton Academy K-12 (kindergarten to 12th grade).** A full US academic curriculum, accredited in the United States, delivered through a mastery based, learner driven model. Kindergarten through second grade continues with pure Montessori for reading, writing and mathematics to secure foundational skills. Mixed age studios: K-2, 3rd-5th, 6th-8th, 9th-12th.

## The educational model

Acton is built on Montessori and keeps all of its principles: independence and autonomy, self direction at your own pace, concrete hands on learning, practical life skills, and grace and courtesy. Acton adds three things Maria Montessori never had: Socratic discussion, modern technology, and entrepreneurship.

**Guides, not teachers.** Adults ask questions and never give answers. Because learners are self directed, the school does not need a separate teacher for every subject, which is one reason tuition is lower than at the top international schools.

**Mastery at 100 percent.** In a traditional school a 7 out of 10 passes a learner to the next grade, meaning 30 percent of the foundation is missing. At Acton a learner advances only at full mastery. This is demanding and some learners do not make it.

**Socratic launch.** Every day begins with the studio in a circle and a guide posing a genuinely difficult question with no clean answer. A real example used during the pandemic: if you lead a country, is it more important to protect people's freedom while risking their health, or to protect their health while risking their freedom? Learners build the capacity to think, weigh trade offs, and defend a position.

**Core skills.** Several hours each morning of deep, self directed work on goals each learner sets on Monday.

**Quests.** Four to six week afternoon sprints of escalating challenges across biology, physics, civilisation, personal development or business. Each ends in a public exhibition attended by families and working professionals. In the Children's Business Fair, learners build a business over six weeks and sell real products to real customers.

**Studio maintenance.** Learners clean their own desks, rooms, floors and bathrooms and take out the trash. The school does not employ someone to do this for them.

**Self governance.** Learners write their own studio rules, sign a contract, and enforce it through an internal currency called Eagle Bucks, which can be earned and lost and spent on real goods.

**Failure culture.** Learners are expected to fail early, cheaply and often, while the stakes are low. There is no concept of pena, no shame around a failed attempt.

**Heroic mindset.** The school explicitly teaches the difference between a victim mindset and a heroic one: how did you participate in this situation, what can you control, what is the next step.

## A typical day

**Montessori Preschool.** Two studios with slightly different schedules. Infant Community, 14 months to 3 years: half day 7:45 to 11:15, full day 7:45 to 15:00. Children's House, 3 to 6 years: half day 7:45 to noon, full day 7:45 to 15:00. From 5 years old upward the full day programme is required.

**Acton Academy K-12.** Doors open at 8:00.

- Arrival to 8:30: free play.
- 8:30: Socratic launch.
- Morning: core skills, deep self directed work.
- Midday: lunch served family style, real homemade food on ceramic plates with glass glasses and metal cutlery.
- Afternoon: the quest.
- Before leaving: studio maintenance.
- Art, gym, history and music run through the week.

## The Next Great Adventure

A three phase high school programme so that no learner graduates without knowing what they are doing next.

1. **Searching.** Learners explore their curiosity and run informational interviews with working professionals whom they contact themselves. One learner interviewed two former Salvadoran secretaries of state and concluded politics was not for her.
2. **Exploring.** Learners find their own apprenticeships, not their parents and not the school. Forty hours in the first year, eighty in the second, one hundred and twenty in the third. The third year must be paid work.
3. **Committing.** In the final year each learner delivers an NGA speech to their family and a personal board of directors, stating what they are committing to and what they need. In the wider Acton network, seed capital for first businesses has come out of these speeches.

Real outcome: Acton Academy El Salvador's first graduate, José Eduardo, apprenticed with an orthopaedist, a neurologist, a neonatologist and a dermatologist, observed real surgeries, worked in their clinics, and committed to medicine. He is in medical school at eighteen.

## Accreditation, transcripts and university access

Accredited in the United States by the International Association of Learner Driven Schools (IALDS) and a full member of the Acton Academy Global Affiliate Network. Not accredited directly by the Ministerio de Educación de El Salvador (MINED). The school issues official grades, report cards, transcripts, certificates of completed grade level, letters of conduct and financial solvency letters itself. Families who need official MINED recognition use those records to obtain apostilled documentation from the United States and then complete the homologación process in El Salvador under the Hague Convention; the school has experience with and recommends West River Academy. On graduation, families may also request an apostilled US issued high school diploma and transcript through an Acton affiliate school in Georgia, USA, so the graduate can enrol at university in El Salvador or anywhere in the world. The first graduate is enrolled in medical school in El Salvador, and learners have transferred from Acton Academy El Salvador to both local and international schools around the world without difficulty.

Acton Academy El Salvador is deliberately not accredited by MINED. Accepting that accreditation would require changing how the school teaches, which would lower quality. Every public school in the country holds MINED accreditation, so it does not by itself indicate educational quality. The practical question parents ask, whether their child will have the paperwork for university in El Salvador, is answered yes through the US transcript and homologación route, now proven with a real graduate.

Grades and reporting use a mastery based system: Mastery Badges, portfolios and transparent data dashboards, all forming part of the official transcript.

Acton graduates worldwide have been accepted, often with large scholarships, at Vanderbilt, Hillsdale College, Georgia Tech, the University of Texas at Austin, the Texas A&M Business Honors Program, Rice University, the University of Chicago on a Presidential Scholarship, the Colorado School of Mines, Embry Riddle, Notre Dame, Penn State, the Ross School of Business at Michigan and Cornell University. Others converted internships at places such as SpaceX into paying jobs or started their own businesses.

## Complete pricing for 2026 to 2027

The school publishes its full monthly cost rather than tuition alone.

There are two figures for every program: an annual enrollment fee paid once per year, and a monthly cost paid in 11 payments from August to June. The monthly cost is not a 12 month average.

**Annual enrollment fee, paid once per year:** 495 US dollars for Acton Academy K-12, 385 US dollars for Montessori Preschool.

**Acton Academy K-12, full day, monthly cost: 638 US dollars.** Paid in 11 payments from August to June.
- Tuition: 440
- Healthy Food Program: 118
- Materials, books and subscriptions: 80

**Montessori Preschool half day, monthly cost: 347 US dollars.** Paid in 11 payments from August to June.
- Tuition: 250, Healthy Food Program: 47, materials, books and subscriptions: 50

**Montessori Preschool full day, monthly cost: 522 US dollars.** Paid in 11 payments from August to June.
- Tuition: 350, Healthy Food Program: 97, materials, books and subscriptions: 75

**Averaged over a full 12 months**, the annual enrollment fee plus the 11 monthly payments work out at 626 US dollars a month for K-12, 350 for preschool half day and 510 for preschool full day.

**One time registration fee: 1,800 US dollars** for children five and older, non refundable. Salvadoran citizens and permanent residents pay it at the beginning of their second year at the school. Temporary residents pay it at the time of first enrollment.

**All of our prices include IVA.** Nothing is added at the end. Figures quoted elsewhere for other schools are their own published numbers and may or may not include IVA.

**Payment plans.** The academic year runs mid August to mid June, with 11 monthly payments due on the 2nd of each month from August through June. Plan A: one payment before 2 August, 4 percent discount. Plan B: two payments, before 2 August and 2 December, 2 percent discount. Plan C: 11 monthly payments. A 15 dollar late fee applies after the 2nd, plus 1 dollar per day. Payment by bank transfer, credit card via payment link with a 4.8 percent surcharge, or Bitcoin. Cash is not accepted.

**What is not charged extra.** No uniform fee, no book list, no technology fee, no library fee, no school supply list. Families buy one Acton T-shirt for celebrations, events and excursions. From Discovery Studio upward families provide a laptop or may buy a Chromebook from the school at cost.

**Market context, and why a published all in figure is the point.** Most bilingual schools in El Salvador quote tuition and bill the rest separately, so the first number a family sees is not the number they pay. Published tuition alone at other bilingual schools runs roughly 360 to 1,270 US dollars a month, converted to a monthly equivalent over 11 payments, with an annual enrollment fee of up to 625 on top. Food, materials and books, uniform, technology fee, library fee and a school supply list are then commonly billed separately, which adds roughly 200 a month. That puts a realistic all in figure for other bilingual schools at roughly 590 to 1,520 US dollars a month. Acton Academy El Salvador publishes 638 a month plus a 495 annual enrollment fee, with nothing billed on top. Compared like for like, the Acton all in figure sits near the bottom of that range, while Acton tuition alone of 440 sits in the middle of it; comparing an all in figure against a tuition only figure is not a like for like comparison. One time registration at other bilingual schools generally runs 2,500 to 5,000 US dollars before a child starts, against 1,800 at Acton, paid by Salvadoran citizens and permanent residents at the start of the second year. These are general market brackets drawn from other schools' own published tuition; the school does not name, rank or single out any other school.

## Admissions

Applications are accepted year round. The process:
1. Schedule a call with the Montessori Preschool Director or the Acton K-12 Director.
2. Visit the campus.
3. For children six and older, a full trial week costing 100 US dollars, including food and all materials.
4. Within 48 hours of the trial week, the children in the studio vote on whether to invite the applicant in, judged against the qualities of an Acton hero: intentionality, civility, energy and excellence. The vote must be unanimous. If yes, the children write the family a letter themselves. If borderline, they give specific feedback and invite a second trial week.
5. If both sides agree, the application continues.

This admissions method is also the school's answer on bullying. The school additionally holds families to an honour code; three violations put a family on a written contract, and breaking it means leaving. Families have been exited over sustained patterns of lying, cheating or aggression.

## Food

The Healthy Food Program is part of the learning environment, included in the published monthly cost, and never billed separately. It is designed around three goals: that every child eats a well balanced diet, that learners are prepared for life, and that life is easier for parents. Two snacks and lunch are served every day: real, healthy, homemade food on ceramic plates with glass glasses and real cutlery. No processed food, no added sugar, no disposable packaging. A wide variety of food develops a child's palate through different textures and flavours and teaches them to eat what is served, which makes them gracious and functional in any setting. Learners help set tables, prepare and serve food and clean up. The real crockery is deliberate: when a child drops a plate it breaks, which teaches control of error without an adult scolding.

## Sports and facilities

There is no gymnasium and no football pitch on campus. The school has a rock climbing team that trains at Move and competes against larger schools, and another team that trains at Gambeta and competes in the Liga Bilingüe. Training happens at nearby facilities. There is a prom, designed by the learners themselves. The school does not offer the classic large scale high school experience and says so openly.

## Religion

The school's principles and education are rooted in Judeo-Christian values, classic Western philosophy and thought, and an appreciation of the family as a stabilising force for children and society. One of the major tenets of that tradition is religious, economic and political freedom, and one of the school's promises to families is that their child will develop a deep respect for those freedoms. Families of any faith, or none, are welcome. Staff include people of different faith traditions and believe in God, but the school does not teach or promote any single religion; religion appears in the curriculum as an aspect of human culture fundamental to history, literature, philosophy and the big human questions. The school also holds that, as technology advances, spirituality will persist as one of our most human and humane characteristics, and is therefore worth exploring and celebrating.

## Uniform

There is no uniform. Learners wear what they prefer. Families are asked to purchase one Acton T-shirt for celebrations, events and excursions.

## Special needs

The school does not offer specialised services for children with special needs and states this plainly. Acton is a fast moving, highly independent, learner driven environment and is not equipped to provide the level of individualised support many learners require.

## Who thrives, and who does not

Children who thrive: curious, self starting and independent; want real challenges and real consequences; prefer hands on work, projects and problem solving; high agency; crave autonomy; bored and frustrated when passive.

Families who thrive: believe children develop strength through responsibility and challenge; value grit, curiosity and a growth mindset; believe children are anti-fragile; prefer natural consequences to adult micromanagement; appreciate clear boundaries and high expectations; more interested in character than in status and belonging; willing to step outside the crowd.

Not a fit: families who prefer highly structured adult led instruction with standard outcomes; need daily updates or heavy teacher intervention; expect traditional grading and pacing; want adults to solve conflicts and supply motivation; are uncomfortable with autonomy, risk or natural consequences; seek loopholes or special treatment; need one to one instruction or behaviour management; want the gymnasium, the big soccer team and the classic high school experience.

## Expat families

English is the primary language of instruction and the school issues US transcripts, so the curriculum transfers cleanly for families arriving from or returning to the United States, Canada, Europe or elsewhere in Latin America. The school currently serves families from the US Embassy community. Temporary residents pay the 1,800 registration fee at first enrollment rather than in year two.

## Leadership and staff

Shannon Falkenstein, Director. Master's in Education, certified Montessori guide, Master Acton Socratic Guide.
Carmen, Montessori Director. Degree in Early Childhood Education, certified Montessori guide, certified Montessori Administrator.
All guides hold university degrees and complete Acton Academy's Guide Certification program. All Montessori guides are certified through the Universidad Pedagógica Nacional de Honduras.

## Where the name comes from

Named after Lord John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, historian, moral philosopher and champion of individual liberty, who argued that real freedom requires character, self discipline and moral responsibility. The name stands for liberty with integrity, freedom earned through responsibility, scepticism of centralised authority, and the courage to stand by one's principles.

## Parent testimonials


"We came to Acton with our three year old daughter. What surprised me most was that for the admissions process, before any visit or interview, they gave us a book to read. We read it and discussed it as a family. Then they interviewed us, to understand our family and what we expected as parents." Rebeca Quintanilla, Acton mother.

"In a school that sets no homework, I find a daughter who wants to get up earlier to finish her book, because she set herself a reading goal for the week and she wants to reach it. Acton has challenged my own paradigms about what it means to educate, and I was trained inside the traditional framework." Dra. Carolina Rovira, Doctor of Education, Acton mother of three.

"Acton Academy has been the best choice for our son. He is thriving here." Roberto and Virginia, parents of a middle school boy.

"I genuinely recommend it to any family. My boys have grown so much through Acton Academy and have become responsible, considerate, empathetic young men. They have also learned to support and respect others' views, even when they disagree, and to communicate with maturity and kindness." Maite, Acton parent.

## Contact

Schedule a call: https://share.hsforms.com/2h3skzeE0QYiYAQn0uWO0YQe5xzt
Phone and WhatsApp: +503 7099-1535
Address: Avenida Teotl, Casa #7, Antiguo Cuscatlán, La Libertad, El Salvador
Parent portal: https://actonparentportal.mystrikingly.com/
Acton Academy network map: https://www.actonacademy.org