Bill Vesterman, owner of Montessori Country Day School in Flower Mound, was recently honored with a Community Builder Award at the Scottish Rite Cathedral in Dallas.
The Community Builder Award was designed to formally recognize outstanding citizens who have distinguished themselves through service to the community, local, state or national government, church or synagogue, or to humanity as a whole for the greater good.
The award was presented to Vesterman on July 16 for not only his military accomplishments as a US Marine Corps Infantry Officer, but also for his contribution to early childhood, primary, and secondary education in America and, most recently, in his local community.
Montessori Country Day School is a private school that was established in 1987. The school has set the standard in academics for young children in Flower Mound and the surrounding area for 23 years. Montessori Country Day School has classes for children starting at age 2. Its preschool prepares children to read before kindergarten and there is an elementary school for Kindergarten – 5th grade students that provides advanced academics with individualized instruction.
After receiving a BA from Harvard in 1991, Vesterman worked as an investment banker in New York and in Hong Kong and for an options trading firm at the New York Commodities Exchange in the World Trade Center. Vesterman decided to focus on a career in education when he helped build a K through 12 program for a charter school in the Phoenix, AZ area.
As he continued his efforts in the field of education, Vesterman enlisted in the US Marine Corps to train part-time as a reservist, graduating from boot camp with honors. Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, he volunteered for active duty as a Marine Corps Officer and achieved expert status in marksmanship and physical fitness during officer training. Volunteering for the infantry, he served in Iraq as a Platoon Commander and an Executive Officer, carrying out over 60 combat missions. Commanding up to 235 Marines in conjunction with US bases on the Iraqi-Jordanian border and in Fallujah, his efforts in Fallujah contributed to the success of the full-scale invasion of the city in November 2004, earning Vesterman a Combat Action Ribbon.
Following two tours in Iraq, Vesterman returned to the homeland and continued to serve his community at one of its greatest fundamental points of impact, by returning to a career in early education when he began operating the Montessori Country Day School in 2006. He and wife Lisa, who also plays an integral role in the school’s operations, reside in Flower Mound.
Since taking over operations at Montessori Country Day School, Vesterman has added several innovations to a school that already enjoyed the reputation for having the premier academic program in the local area.
He developed a program for two-year-olds that focuses on the many facets of learning during a child’s second year. This program began enrolling children in January 2010 and has already expanded to include a second teacher and classroom.
He also started a new program called Mommy Montessori for children younger than two who are accompanied by their mother, so that while the child is learning their mother may observe how teachers use curriculum to teach young children.
He engineered the first partnership between a local school and the Win Kids Sports and Learning Center of Flower Mound, to bring Win Kids coaches to the school, and he also sponsors classes at the school every Tuesday by Kindermusik with Heidi. He has developed a summer program and an after-school option for the school.
For more information about Bill Vesterman or Montessori Country Day School, visit www.montessoricds.com.
