North Star Academy Charter School of Newark is one of New Jersey's very first charter public schools, and after fifteen years has also become one of its most celebrated. North Star Academy, winner of the 2011 National Blue Ribbon Award for Excellence, has recently been featured in the New York Times, Time Magazine, and on PBS. We currently serve nearly 3,500 students in grades K-12 across ten schools: five elementary schools, four middle schools, and a high school. Mission To serve Newark children by building an uncommon school where students partake of a rigorous, 10-month, extended day academic program that gives them the means to beat the odds in school and life. To shape an intimate, supportive, engaging school community where classes are small and personalized; where parents are partners; where teachers teach with passion and commitment; and where all the adults model—and all the students develop and live—the values of caring, courage, justice, respect, and responsibility. To generate for students a transformative experience at an age when they are forging their very identities and lifetime aspirations and to cultivate in them the belief that they are the masters of their own destinies: each one worthy of greatness and goodness, each one capable of—and responsible for—serving the community and the world around them.