On Taking Kids Seriously

We talk a lot at Primer about the idea of ‘Taking Kids Seriously’. Parents hear about it in our admissions process, our office has a giant neon sign with those three words across the wall, and it informs everything about our academic program and product.

Admittedly, it sounds great. Every parent wants their kid to be taken seriously. Every kid wants to be taken seriously! But what does it actually mean?

At too many schools, education is something that happens to a child. They have no agency – they are a passive recipient as the days and years pass by them. Somehow, someway, millions of children transform from eager Kindergarteners into apathetic high schoolers over the course of a decade and a half.
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But it doesn’t have to be this way. Our simple belief is that every child deserves to be an active participant in their education. They deserve to feel ownership over their academic outcomes. They deserve to be held accountable. They deserve to move as fast – or as slow – as they need to. They deserve honest, real feedback on how they’re doing. They deserve to be in the driver’s seat.

Everything we do at Primer, from the structure of our academic program to the design of our product experience. is meant to take kids seriously. To empower them to rise to the occasion. 

Because when we take kids seriously, they take themselves seriously, and learning to take yourself seriously – to truly believe in yourself – is the foundation of human flourishing.