38°47′55.9″N 77°5′45.8″W / 38.798861°N 77.096056°W
| Burgundy Farm Country Day School | |
|---|---|
| Location | |
 | |
3700 Burgundy Road Alexandria, VA 22303 | |
| Information | |
| School type | Independent Progressive |
| Established | 1946 |
| Head of School | Jeff Sindler |
| Grades | JK-8 |
| Enrollment | 275 |
| Student to teacher ratio | 7:1 |
| Accreditation | VAIS |
| Website | www.burgundyfarm.org |
Burgundy Farm Country Day School is an independent school on a 25-acre (100,000 m2) campus in the Rose Hill census-designated place of Fairfax County, Virginia,[1] with an Alexandria postal address, and 611 acres (2.47 km2) in West Virginia.[2][3] It serves students in grades Junior Kindergarten through Eighth Grade.
History
editThe school was founded in 1946 by a group of concerned parents, which included some Quakers and also included noted CBS broadcast journalist Eric Sevareid[4] and his wife Lois. In 1950, Burgundy became the first school in the Commonwealth of Virginia to racially integrate and worked actively to attract non-white students.[5] Camay Calloway Murphy, daughter of Jazz bandleader and singer Cab Calloway, became one of the first African-Americans to teach at a white school when she accepted a position at Burgundy in the early 1950s.[6][7]
Campus
editThe school's main campus is located on a former dairy farm just outside the Washington, DC/Northern Virginia beltway. In 2018, the school renovated the commons and added an arts building known as The Loft.[8]
Center for Wildlife Studies
editBurgundy's second campus, a 524-acre (212 ha) wildlife preserve in the Appalachian Mountains in West Virginia called the Burgundy Center for Wildlife Studies, is commonly referred to as "the Cove."[9] All classes, beginning with first grade, visit the Cove for intensive study in science and natural history biannually.
The Cove recently acquired another 24 acres (9.7 ha), from landowners surrounding the property. The funding for the purchase of these extra 24 acres came from "The Big Hike", in which a Burgundy teacher, sometimes accompanied by students, hiked from his home in Alexandria to The Cove.
Summer Camps
editThe two campuses both offer a summer camp with open enrollment. The main campus is a summer day camp for 3 years, 8 months to 12 years old. The Burgundy Center campus hosts primarily sleep-away nature-oriented summer camp programs for 8 to 15 year olds and adults.
Notable alumni
edit- Alex Albrecht, television personality, actor and podcaster
- Robert C. Michelson '65, Principal Research Engineer Emeritus, Georgia Institute of Technology; Recipient of the 2001 Pirelli Award and the first €25,000 Top Pirelli Prize; progenitor of the field of aerial robotics[10][11][12][13]
- Jim Sanborn '59, sculptor best known for creating the Kryptos sculpture at the CIA headquarters[14]
- Samira Wiley '01, actress known for Orange is the New Black[15]
References
edit- ^ "2020 CENSUS - CENSUS BLOCK MAP: Rose Hill CDP, VA" (PDF). U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved 2022-09-11. - Compare with the school postal address.
- ^ "Burgundy Center for Wildlife Studies – Our History". Retrieved 12 September 2022.
- ^ "Burgundy Center for Wildlife Studies | Find a Camp". find.acacamps.org. Retrieved 12 September 2022.
- ^ Reed, Douglas S. (2014). Building the Federal Schoolhouse: Localism and the American Education State. OUP USA. p. 101. ISBN 978-0199838486. Retrieved 15 January 2016.
- ^ "A Lesson in Tolerance". The Washington Post. 2000-06-15. Retrieved 2018-07-12.
- ^ "Camay Calloway Murphy's Biography". The HistoryMakers.
- ^ Pryor-Trusty, Rosa (2013-05-09). African-American Community, History & Entertainment in Maryland. p. 402. ISBN 978-1-4836-1234-8.
- ^ "Burgundy Farm Country Day School". Turner Brooks Architect. Retrieved 13 June 2019.
- ^ "Burgundy Farm Campuses". Retrieved 2008-06-11.
- ^ "About Robert C. Michelson". Georgia Tech Research Institute. Archived from the original on 1997-06-03. Retrieved 2007-03-07.
- ^ "Education Section and Pirelli Top Prize". 2002-05-10. Archived from the original on 2012-02-08. Retrieved 2007-10-18.
- ^ "Robotics Guru Saw Uses Early On". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 2004-07-26. Archived from the original on 2006-10-16. Retrieved 2010-10-10.
- ^ "AUVSI Honors Industry Leaders: Pioneer Award-Robert Michelson". Unmanned Systems (the Magazine of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International). Vol. 16, no. 3. Summer 1998. p. 22.
- ^ "Oral history interview with Jim Sanborn, 2009 July 14-16". Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 12 September 2022.
- ^ "Samira Wiley, Class of 1999 - Nannie Helen Burroughs School". Classmates. 2004-04-01. Retrieved 2018-06-27.