Beth Mackay Bursary Fund

Beth Mackay has taught at OMS Montessori, parent company of The Element, for over 40 years. She started the first Elementary Montessori class in Ottawa at OMS and she also started the first OMS art classroom, creating a wonderfully diverse environment where children can express themselves artistically.

Beth served as school administrator, pedagogical advisor, Board member, department head, Casa directress, member of many school committees, after school programme coordinator, tutor for after school students, after school programme facilitator for calligraphy, social skills/etiquette, and creative writing courses, summer camp counselor for Casa level, school signage aficionado, coordinator for Montessori refresher courses at OMS, convenor of the OMS 20^th anniversary dinner/dance at the Chateau Laurier, and parent to her two daughters who attended OMS many years ago. She has also served as Vice-President of the Canadian Association of Montessori Teachers and was one of the founding members and one time President of the Montessori Society of Canada. In addition to these accomplishments, Beth was honoured with the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal for Service in Education.

The Beth MacKay Bursary Fund allows OMS Montessori and The Element to maintain a diversity of students and families in its community by providing financial assistance to those who would not, otherwise, be able to remain at OMS and The Element.

No more than 50% of tuition will be covered by the bursary and the bursary will not be available to those who are not yet students of OMS or The Element. (As families can claim Toddler and Casa tuition as a childcare deduction, and city subsidized spaces are available, there is diversity of students entering the school.)

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Criteria

The criteria will be applied in the following order of priority.

• Financial need
• To finish a three year cycle in a class
• The length of time the child has spent at OMS and The Element

Financial Need

Financial need will be determined by Apple Financial Services, an external company that will assess the family’s finances and determine the amount of money the family can afford to pay for tuition. Applying parents will pay $125 approximately per application to Apple Financial Services.

Review

The Head of School or designate will review the applicants and determine eligibility based on the above criteria.

The name of the family applying for the bursary will remain confidential. Each application will be assigned a number. The application form will include the information required by the criteria. The documents from Apple Financial Services will be assigned an application number as well so that the Head of School is able to consider that information in a confidential manner.

Timeline

The deadline for a bursary application is in end of November. Once a decision is made, someone will contact the applicant families in order for the families to meet the re-enrolment deadline in January.

The Funds

The primary source of bursary funding will be from donations to the Beth MacKay Bursary Fund. All donations are eligible for a tax receipt.

The bursary funding is placed in a treasury account. Some of the Fund will be used directly for bursaries; some will grow the capital in the Fund. Eventually, the interest on the capital will be used for the bursaries.

If you wish to make a contribution to the Beth MacKay Bursary Fund, please drop a cheque to the office payable to “OMS” indicating the donation is for this program. Thank you!

Obtaining the Application Form

Applicant families are directed to obtain the application on the Apple Financial Services website at www.applefinancialservices.ca

The Application Process

1. Families will go to the Apples Financial Services website at www.applefinancialservices.ca.

2. Families will create a parent account registration.

3. After the email address provided is verified, a response will be sent with the subject line “Account Set-up”

4. Families will then go into the online application.

5. At the end of the process, requests will appear for the uploading of tax information, i.e. T4s, current year’s pay statements, etc.

6. Once the information is uploaded the payment section will appear and the $125 application fee will be required. Please note, it is an additional $40 for a secondary application for the same student by the other parent. Payments can be made by credit card (Visa & MasterCard).