Mission: The mission of Odyssey Charter School is to prepare students for a lifelong enthusiasm for learning, develop a keen awareness of world citizenship and culture, and establish critical thinking and problem-solving proficiency through the added learning of the Modern Greek language and Mathematics focus.

Core Philosophy: The core philosophy of Odyssey Charter School is that students from all walks of life will establish a lifelong enthusiasm for learning, will become critical thinkers and problem solvers, and will develop a keen awareness of world citizenship when challenged with a structured bilingual and rigorous core curriculum occurring in a nurturing environment.

Focus of Curriculum: Odyssey Charter Students will understand and appreciate the ideals of Hellenism, including the continual pursuit of higher education, the adoption of democratic methods, environmental sustainability, and the respect of other’s personal beliefs through exposure to the classic Greek language and culture, in a context of mathematics, science, and philosophy.

The curriculum at Odyssey Charter School is designed to provide rigorous, standards-based learning opportunities for all students. Odyssey Charter School fosters lifelong enthusiasm for learning and global, critical thinking through participation in a focused foreign language immersion program.

Aligned to the Common Core State Standards, students attending Odyssey Charter School are taught critical subject matter in both English and the Greek classical language. This focused language-immersion instruction method builds key reasoning techniques, language arts skills, and significantly strengthens the mathematical comprehension and performance of our students.

Odyssey Charter Upper School promotes independent thinking and fosters a love of learning through the teaching of Greek Language and Greek Enrichment Courses. In both seventh and eighth grades, students are exposed to a variety teaching strategies and techniques unique to OCS. Odyssey Charter school provides students with the highest quality education and was ranked the #1 Public Middle School in Delaware by K-12 and college ratings powerhouse Niche.com. Niche’s 2019 Best Schools rankings are based on academic and student life data from the U.S. Department of Education along with test scores, college data, and ratings collected from millions of Niche users.

The goal of Odyssey Charter High School is to promote college and career readiness through the added learning of the Modern Greek Language and Mathematics focus. The core philosophy of Odyssey Charter School is that students from all walks of life will establish a lifelong enthusiasm for learning, will become critical thinkers and problem solvers, and will develop a keen awareness of world citizenship when challenged with a structured bilingual and rigorous core curriculum occurring in a nurturing environment.

Mission
Our mission at OCS is to provide high quality foreign language instruction at a developmentally critical time in a student’s language development. Greek language instruction is introduced in Kindergarten and is completed in grade 12. Greek language classes aim to help students acquire communication skills as well as academic proficiency in Greek.

Assignments, assessments, and grades provide valuable feedback about what a student is learning and how they are progressing. With this information, teachers and administrators can monitor teaching and learning and make changes, if necessary, to ensure that students are provided with foundational skills and knowledge that help prepare them for success in school and beyond.Odyssey Charter School uses the following tests to evaluate student and teacher performance.

Odyssey students have access to our library at the Upper and Lower School sites. Both have picture books, fiction, and nonfiction, appropriate for the reading levels of the students. In addition, the Lower School has a good collection of beginning readers, or “easy-to-read” books.

Lower School Information

• Hours: The library is available to teachers and their classes Monday through Friday, all day.
• Checkout Procedure: The teachers facilitate the checkout, leaving a sign-out sheet with the barcodes of the books their children have borrowed. The librarian is part-time and comes in one day a week to enter the barcodes of the borrowed books into the library circulation system. She also returns the books to the system, clearing the titles from the individual student’s account.
• Overdues: Lower School students check out one book at a time. Books should be returned on the next weekly class visit to the library. Then another book can be selected. Overdue notices are sent out as friendly reminders when the book is overdue by two weeks. This will be followed by a second notice which lists a replacement cost for the book in case it is lost. There are no fines for overdue books, but weekly return is appreciated so that other children can enjoy our books.

Intermediate School Information

• Hours: The library is open to students Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday during lunch and recess times.
• Checkout Procedure: Students may borrow two books at a time for a period of one week. Books that are needed for a longer period of time should be renewed. There is no limit on the number of times a book is renewed, within reason. Students bring their selected books to the circulation desk where their last name is entered and the barcode of the book scanned into their account.
• Overdues: Overdue notices are sent out as friendly reminders when the book is overdue by two weeks. This will be followed by a second notice which lists a replacement cost for the book in case it is lost. There are no fines for overdue books, but weekly return is appreciated so that other students can enjoy our books.

Donations of books that students have outgrown or are no longer using are cheerfully accepted! If the books can be used in the library, they will be cataloged and put on the shelves for the students to borrow. Books that cannot be used in the library will be either offered to the teachers for classroom libraries or taken to 2nd & Charles for credit. Credit will be used to purchase new books for the library or to provide classroom sets as needed for reading groups.

Summer work and supply lists for the 2023-2024 school year can be accessed here. All summer work assignments are mandatory. Teachers will request them at the start of the school year.

Save the Date! Open House K-12 is Thursday, October 19th, 2023 at 5:30-8pm.

Fall 2020 Kindergarten Open House recording

OCS High School Brochure

OCS Student Activities

OCS Overview

OCHS Course Catalog 2024-2025

Odyssey Charter participates in the SchoolChoiceDE.org statewide application process for choice and charter schools.

Current Odyssey students do not need to apply to attend Odyssey for the following school year.

Students not currently attending a public school must first register at their school of residence before applying for choice or charter schools. Register here.

• Monday, November 6, 2023 – 8:00am – Online Choice Application Opens
• Wednesday, January 10, 2024* – 11:59pm – Online Choice Application Closes
• Thursday, February 29, 2024 – Final Day for District/School to Notify Parent of Invitation Status
• Friday, March 15, 2024 – Final Day for Parent to Notify District/School of Acceptance Decision

Any applications received after the open enrollment period will not be included in our lottery but will be put at the end of our waiting list in the order received.

Please apply online at SchoolChoiceDE.org

**Students who are not currently registered in a public school in Delaware will be required to pre-register in their resident feeder school. Any student who does not have a State of Delaware student ID by the end of the open enrollment period will not be included in the lottery.

My child has a sibling who currently attends Odyssey. Does he/she still have to apply to attend Odyssey?
Yes. All prospective students must complete an application during open enrollment in order to be included in the lottery and to be considered for admittance to Odyssey Charter School. For further information about the charter/choice process see School Choice

For further information about the Odyssey Charter School lottery procedure, please read the Odyssey Charter School Admissions Procedure.

In 2006, Odyssey Charter School opened its doors as Delaware’s first mathematics content focused, 2nd language (Greek) elementary education charter school.

Odyssey has strong academics, insight into the classical learning ideals of Hellenism, a small-school environment, and a fresh approach to learning.

Since opening its doors in 2006, Odyssey Charter School has provided the families of Delaware with a classical approach to public education. A rigorous standards-based curriculum and instruction in the Greek language is delivered in a challenging, yet nurturing, learning environment.

Odyssey Charter School employs Delaware certified teachers to instruct the core subjects of language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies. In addition, a Greek language class and a second unit of math are taught each day. These added exclusive features of Odyssey Charter School are provided by credentialed instructors from Greece. Students also experience specialized instruction in art, physical education, and music, and are encouraged to maximize their second language and foreign culture experience.

Current enrollment is over 1000 students in grades K-8; the diverse student body includes students from five different public school districts. Student/Teacher ratio is 12:1 and the avarage class size is 20 students.

Odyssey Charter School was rated a Superior School by Delaware’s Department of Education in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011.

Odyssey Charter aims to enable parents and stakeholders to engage meaningfully in education decisions, which is only possible when they have access to clear, robust, timely and continuous information about how our students and schools are doing. Check out this link to see educational and demographic information for Odyssey.

On July 4, 2014, Harvard University’s Center for The Hellenic Studies, recognized the participation of Odyssey in the collaboration program between Greek schools and US charter schools:

This year the collaboration program between Greek schools and U.S. charter schools continued to make significant progress. Teachers and students at the Odyssey Charter School (OCS) in Wilmington, Delaware cooperated with several Greek schools. The OCS and the Primary School of Nemea developed common projects on a wide range of subjects: regional history and mythology; rivers and their role in myth and legend; mathematics; international commerce and trade between Greece and the U.S. Numerous teleconferences enabled students to share their work and to exchange ideas. The OCS also undertook a program in cooperation with the 2nd Gymnasium of Nafplion. Students at both schools, under the guidance of their art teachers, studied the lives and work of famous Greek and U.S. painters. They were inspired to create paintings of their own. Students from the OCS from the 3rd Primary School of Nafplion also worked together, their collaboration resulting in parallel exhibitions at these schools.