From the outside, Sorenson Early Childhood Center looks like a familiar Northshore School District facility and at first glance it would be impossible to tell the humble building holds one of the most specialized schools in the district.

It is staffed by an energetic and highly trained group of professionals, many of whom have been with the school for ten years or more.

Doreen Milburn has headed the Bothell school over the past three years.

“What we try to do is have a continuum of services for students to meet their individual needs,” she said. “One of our primary goals is for our kids to leave with a functional communication system.”

While many of the nearly 180 children, ages 3 to 5, are typically developing the school focuses on children with special education needs. Many of these children need extra help developing fundamental skills due to developmental delays, particularly involving communication skills.

“You’ll have kids who come in without saying a single word, and leave and go into general education,” said teacher Molly Knapp, giving an example of the progress the staff has seen with students.

“Seeing that growth over a few years is really awesome as well,” said teacher Tammy Baker-Laws.

Staff at the school say the environment for both students and faculty is a cut above, with many educators holding bachelors or masters degrees.

Teamwork plays a critical role at Sorenson. Teachers communicate and collaborate with each other to design programs which are tailored for each students individual needs. Activities and performance are recorded, adjudicated and either repeated or passed based on an intensive data-driven records system.

But as the preschoolers assemble magnetic towers, sort items with tongs and play games with each other, it seems unlikely they know these activities are tailored to improve fine motor skills. Various rooms hold equipment ranging from installed swings and slides, to coloring boards and climbing towers, all designed to help improve students physical, mental and emotional abilities.

Both special needs and typically developing children attend Sorenson, which has three overarching programs. A developmental preschool classroom is made of around 11 students, with the the majority of them having special needs. A Ready Start classroom has an even split ratio, and finally, a peer model program where typically developing students work with students with special needs. Special needs students attend Sorenson at no cost when they are referred from various schools throughout the district while typically progressing students pay $150 a month.

For some children at Sorenson scheduling and time management can be a source of confusion and stress. Many activities at the school are laid out in a visual form, consisting of a pictorial representations of each activity and the order in which it occurs, from circle time to washing their hands. These implements are described as visual rich environments and allows students to pick up on concepts visually with which they may otherwise struggle.

“These visual cues or visual imagery makes that connection with them,” said teacher Martina Andela.

Milburn said the school enjoys a strong parent-teacher relationship. Parents are encouraged to become active participants in their children’s education, and staff members host events year-round to educate parents on how to work with their children at home in skills from communication to reading.

“They really give back, and they give a lot of time and energy into their children’s preschool experience,” she said.

Many parents take this opportunity to engage with the school community, including the mother of one student, who stuck in Baker-Laws mind.

“(She) saw such a great change in him that she went and pursued her masters degree and did her student teaching in my class,” she said.

For parent Jackie Dierksen, Sorenson was the difference between her son being able to attend preschool or not. Her son is in his third year at the Sorenson, before which she said he was enrolled in community preschool. Days after he started, his teachers approached Dierksen saying they didn’t have the resources to teach her son, and recommended she take him to Sorenson. Her decision to enroll her son at the school has proven to be life changing.

“It’s been wonderful, it’s made a huge difference,” she said. “Anything we did need, the teachers were there.”

She said Sorenson not only supported her son, but she and her husband too, creating a communal atmosphere.

“We’re a community, the parents [who] you get to know, the teachers [who] you get to know,” she said.

Her son was helped in particular by an extended day program, where students attend both morning and afternoon sessions instead of the usual two-and-a-half hour classes. This year is her son’s last at Sorenson, after which he will move on to kindergarten.

Dierksen doesn’t know if he will move into a general education school, or require further specialized education yet, those decisions will be made towards the end of the school year based on evaluations and cumulative data.

Dierksen believes that, either way, Sorenson was the right fit for her son, and that other special needs children and their parents can benefit too. She’s even thinking of sending her younger son who hasn’t shown signs of special needs to the school because of the positive experience her first son had.

“I’d say get in the school if you can,” Dierksen said. “It makes a huge difference.”