By NJAIS COMMUNICATIONS | OCTOBER 2, 2026

NJAIS Welcomes New Provisional Member: The Bridge Academy of NJ

NJAIS is delighted to welcome The Bridge Academy of New Jersey (Lawrenceville, NJ) to NJAIS Membership as a Provisional Member school, with an eye on NJAIS accreditation.

The Bridge Academy is the only Orton-Gillingham accredited school in New Jersey, and only one in 15 in the United States. This multi-sensory teaching approach, coupled with a low student-teacher ratio of 3:1, helps ensure that a student’s learning potential will be maximized. Small classes, hands-on techniques, and directly taught organization and study skills help ensure that students succeed.

Welcome to the NJAIS community!
By NJAIS COMMUNICATIONS | SEPTEMBER 25, 2026

NJAIS Welcomes New Provisional Member: Acorn Montessori School

NJAIS is delighted to welcome Acorn Montessori School (Lebanon, NJ) to NJAIS Membership as a Provisional Member school, with an eye on NJAIS accreditation.

Founded in 1984, Acorn Montessori School is a close-knit community of passionate, deeply invested
educators and families, united by a shared commitment to nurturing each child’s development and love of learning through the Montessori approach. Acorn Montessori School is an early childhood, independent Montessori School for children ages 15 months through age 12, affiliated with the American Montessori Society, and a member of the New Jersey Montessori Administrators Council.

Welcome to the NJAIS community!
By NJAIS COMMUNICATIONS | AUGUST 30, 2026

NJAIS Welcomes New Provisional Member: Hilltop Country Day School

NJAIS is delighted to welcome Hilltop Country Day School (Sparta, NJ) to NJAIS Membership as a Provisional Member school, with an eye on NJAIS accreditation.

Since 1967, Hilltop Country Day School has been Sparta, New Jersey’s foremost PS-8 independent day school, serving families throughout Sussex County by fostering academic excellence and character growth through focused education.

Welcome to the NJAIS community!
By NJAIS COMMUNICATIONS | MARCH 27, 2026

NJAIS Executive Director Featured in MoonshotOS Podcast

The Executive Director was a recent guest of Peter Baron for a MoonshotOS podcast on mergers and acquisitions in independent schools.

For many boards and heads, the word "merger" enters the conversation far too late, loaded with fear, myth, and misunderstanding. In this episode, Kevin J. Ruth, Executive Director of NJAIS and a Certified Merger & Acquisition Advisor®, pulls back the curtain on what mergers actually look like in the independent school world, and why the schools that navigate them best are the ones that start the conversation before they have to.

Kevin breaks down the full arc of a school merger: from the strategic rationale that must anchor every serious conversation to due diligence, legal counsel, board governance, faculty contracts, and the loaded question of who leads the merged entity.

This is not a theoretical conversation. It is a practical, honest look at what it takes to merge two institutions thoughtfully, and what goes wrong when schools wait too long, move too fast, or skip the hard internal conversations about identity, mission, and culture.
Associate Membership | New Members
By NJAIS COMMUNICATIONS | January 24, 2026

NJAIS Welcomes 5 New Associate Member Schools

NJAIS is delighted to welcome five new schools to membership via its Associate Membership program--our very first Associate Members! As Associate members, these schools have a select slate of benefits that give access to our network, professional learning, resources, insurances, and more. This category serves to increase NJAIS's inclusivity, expanding access and opportunity across the Garden State. We are excited to welcome the following schools that serve students in highly individualized ways in vibrant communities: