Sierra School

I am a physician in Santa Clarita and my wife and I were looking for a good Montessori or preschool for our son for a long time. A close friend of mine who also is a physician recommended the Sierra School to us as both his kids flourished there. He told me that the level of dedication and nurturing the staff has is unheard of and that because of it’s director, Lalanie Herath, both his sons matriculated to kindergarten into LA’s top private schools. We decided to enroll our then 3 year old son into Sierra School on a trial basis. Since starting there, my son has made lots of friends, is reading and writing, has expanded his vocabulary considerably, and is generally thriving. He comes back from school talking about all the things he did that day and can’t wait to go back the next day. It’s to the point now where Friday is his worst day! We are so happy and relieved that we made the right choice for our child and he is now 4 and a half years old. We are in the process of applying to highly competitive private schools in LA for kindergarten and without the dedication, personal attention, and educational skills of the teaching staff at Sierra School our son would not be where he is today. Thank you Lalanie.

I have my 5 year old enrolled at this school and reading all the comments below I don’t under and how people can experience such bad treatment here. They have always been nice and helpful with my child and they have always helped me work together with them to reach my child’s milestones. Disregarding all the reviews below, my child is well taken care of and has done all and well since he’s been enrolled here.

We enrolled our 2 year old daughter here after checking out numerous other preschools in santa clarita. In the last 6 months she has developed great speech, learned her numbers, puzzles, how to interact with other children etc etc. She loves this school and so do we. The staff is very attentive and communicate very well about my daughters well being. Numerous times I have shown up unannounced, early etc and have seen a great staff hard at work making sure my daughter is safe, happy and learning. Great place and great staff!

A little bit of background to my review. I have a now 21 year old brother who went to Sierra as a little bit of a problem child. He was very rowdy and whiney and within months of him going to school here, his attitude was completely turned around. He was polite, attentive, disciplined, everything we didn’t expect him to be. He was beyond prepared for Kindergarten when he left here. I also have a now 15 year old sister who attended Sierra as well. Very shy little girl. After months of going, my parents noticed her behavior too. She became more outgoing, had a lot to talk about regarding her days at school. Basically, my parents loved this school and the way both my siblings were treated. Never had any problems and my siblings adored their teachers.
Fast forward some years. I was a stay at home mom with my first son until he started kindergarten. I was then in need of childcare for my younger sons and the only school that came to mind was Sierra. David, who in now going into 1^st grade was extremely prepared for kindergarten when he left preschool. There were times in the beginning of kindergarten he said he just wanted to go back to Sierra. That doesn’t sound like a kid who was mistreated, does it? My baby who is 4 is still at Sierra and I’ll admit, he’s just as rowdy as my brother was. Of course there are times a child will get disciplined and they’ll see it as the worst thing of their lives at the time. But people need to stop being so sensitive. No teachers over there would EVER be cruel to a child. I read some of these reviews and I’m shocked. One family who got over sensitive because their child got hurt and played the blame game. That’s unfortunate.
I love this school. My husband was happy with my choice from day one and my children loved it.

We are relocating to from San Francisco and considered a visit to this school, but after doing more research there is no way we would even drive by!
See link below:

Ok so I get that a lot of parents are upset about my review of this school. Please don’t take it out on me as a caring parent. You don’t have to take your kids out if you don’t want to. My posting is based on facts and data.
Fact# 1: My child was injured at this school (regardless as to how she got injured) and the school did not call me or my wife to let us know (which they said they would when we first signed up with them if this was to ever happen). They instead waited 49 minutes for us to show up and pick her up at the end of her school day (half day).
Fact#2: When we showed up to pick up our child at 12:30 she was eating lunch. Since this school cares so much about the children, why would you have a child with a head injury eat food. Medical professionals say no food, water, sleep after a head injury.
Fact#3: When Lalanie was questioned as to why we were not contacted immediately after the injury, her response was «I got busy with feeding the other kids lunch».
Fact#4: Any parent that is taking their child to this school should know that you are taking your child to the second worst preschool in California.
All these violations were not the result of one or two families complaining. They were the results of State inspections over multiple years.
Fact remains, you are the second worst preschool in California.
Funny how the most recent review mentions the exact teacher that my child claimed hit her.
Although I appreciate your apology, it is certainly not accepted.
Here is a recent article published by the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR). They did their own investigation state wide and here is what they had to say about this particular school and 9 others state wide. You can read the entire article at
When Mazen and Holly needed day care for their 2-​year-​old daughter, they wrote three pages of questions for staff at the facilities they visited. They wanted to know not only about the curriculum and recent accidents, but also how far the fire department is from the facility. In the end, they chose Sierra School in Santa Clarita, California, for its strong academic focus.
Less than two months later, Mazen and Holly’s daughter had a black eye when they picked her up at school. A teacher had hit her, she said. The local sheriff investigated, but no charges were filed. The Baayouns pulled their daughter from the school.
What Mazen and Holly didn’t know when they enrolled their child at Sierra, despite their questions and research, was that the facility already was on probation after racking up dozens of serious violations issued by state inspectors. Problems included leaving children unsupervised and using illegal electrical wiring that children could touch.
Sierra is one of 10 day care centers in California with more than two dozen serious violations in the past five years. All of them still are licensed and operating, despite their checkered histories. A few facilities, including Sierra, have had such intractable problems that state regulators have tried to shut them down.
But the state doesn’t tell parents about the problems. California relies on day care center administrators — even those who operate facilities with troubling records — to inform parents of serious violations or when the center has been put on probation.
Besides Mazen and Holly, other parents were unaware of Sierra’s problems as well. When reporters from CIR spoke with five different parents outside the center, none of them said they knew the school was on probation.
Lalanie Herath, director of Sierra School, said she has disclosed the issues to parents as she is required by the state to do. State law requires child care centers to have parents sign forms acknowledging that they were informed that the school is on probation or has recent serious violations. As proof, a regulatory compliance consultant for Sierra faxed 40 forms, signed by parents, to CIR.
One of the forms had a signature for Mazen dated in July 2014, nearly two months after he removed his daughter from the center. He disputes its authenticity. In a Nov. 2 email to the California Department of Social Services, he wrote: «In July of 2014 our daughter had already started going to a new facility and we had cut all ties with Sierra School.» He added that the signature at the bottom of the form does not match his handwriting.
«We believe the form was fabricated and false,» he wrote.
When a reporter attempted to contact Herath about the form, she hung up. Her consultant referred us to her lawyer, who did not return multiple calls for comment or respond to a letter sent by certified mail.
In October, the Department of Social Services took legal action…

My 3 year old son has been attending this school for about 6 months and I’m extremely pleased. My son has a great relationship with his teachers, Ms. Lalani and Ms. Oshy! There has not been one day that I have left my son crying or not wanting to stay at school. I have watched my son grow and I look forward to what the future holds here for him at Sierra Montessori Preschool.
I highly recommend this school to anyone looking for a family setting preschool to take care of your little one.
Thank you, Sierra Montessori for being a part of my son’s upbringing!

My twin boys have attended this school for two and a half years, and now our 2 y/​o son has been going there for about 2 months. We absolutely love this school. The staff is caring, loving and experienced.
We took our twins out of a different school with teachers who for the most part, were very young and did not have children of their own. What a breath of fresh air this school was! Ms Lalani is so caring and patient with our boys, though I know they are a handful!
I have watched them change and grow at this school. Last week my son recited all of the countries in South America while pointing to their locations on a blank map. They are reading and doing addition and subtraction. All of this by age 4. They are in the kindergarten class, but doing at least 1^st grade work. My little one (who doesn’t have much language yet, though already improving since he started at this school) lights up when he sees Miss Nancy in the morning and can’t wait to go in and start the day.
My twins tell me all the things they did during the day on our ride home in the car (planting tomatoes, doing their workbooks, a new art project, playing outside).
On the rare occasion that one of our boys gets so much as a mild injury, we get a written report and also an explanation in person from the teacher who saw it happen. What the teacher tells us and what my boys tell me at home has always been the same.
Above all, this school has been a nurturing, enriching, and safe environment for our precious children. They are happy here, and they love their teachers. Ms Lalani and the other teachers have instilled a love of learning in our boys that will serve them well in life.

I don’t know what kind of experience the other poster had but my son attended this school for 3 years and loved every minute of it! The staff was warm and caring and very open. As a parent I had access to class rooms and spent much time during pick up having my son show me what he learned that day.
He was always happy to be at school and made a few great friends there. Mrs. Lalanie is awesome and has won numerous awards for her facility. I would highly recommend this school.