Parent
Terra Nova Bilingual School in Küsnacht turned out to be a disappointing and terrible choice for us that we sorely regretted. Drab, depressing, mishmash campus that was shared with not one, but two industrial companies. No nature or green space to call their own, they pitiably painted a patch of concrete green to compensate for their lack therein. The very youngest kids, however, didn’t even get any green paint, they were mostly confined outside to a small depressing jail-like grey concrete block bordering the street. The class sizes for the youngest years Pre-K to K2 were full to the max. Various sports activities were performed in vastly reduced space due to the tables & chairs of the cafeteria being in the way (conflicting dual-purpose space). Catastrophic daily parking round this school, parent taxis from 10+ districts overwhelming the local infrastructure, the situation was dangerous to the children & the subject of many complaints by parents, neighbours and police alike. Pickups became a dreaded, stressful daily occurrence. The level of education felt sub-par for a private school and the environs, no better than the Swiss state offering. Terra Nova seriously exploited the parents when it came to extracurricular paid activities (non-transparent prices, clauses adjusting the prices buried in the terms and conditions, and even very questionable non-documented and non-optional add-on hidden fees). The school did not deliver a key provision advertised, which we felt to be very dishonest of them in their marketing of the services available. The management team was really atrocious and left us wondering how on earth they were hired to their positions of authority. We were left in the position of having to make repeated complaints about a multitude of things. Terra Nova’s failure to deliver on multiple fronts was so bad, we proceeded with the huge upheaval of pulling out mid-school year rather than stay any longer than necessary. It was the right decision, and our child is now thriving at their new school. We can only recommend avoiding this school at all costs, we wish we had done so in hindsight.
