Northbrook School Celebrates 40 Years As A Family Affair

In the late 1960s, Frank and Annette Kulle began looking for a Montessori preschool for their oldest daughter. There were six such schools in the Chicago area, all of which had three-year waiting lists and no elementary programs—meaning she would be too old to attend once a spot finally became available. 

“I said, ‘How hard do you think it would be to start a school?’ ” Annette recalled.

Frank thought that it might be pretty difficult, but told his wife he would look into it. 

“It turned out not to be that hard,” he said, more than 40 years after that discussion.

The couple founded Countryside Montessori School in 1967, educating 57 children out of a Methodist church in Glenview. The school next moved to Skokie before finally settling in Northbrook in 1974, when the Kulles bought a house at Techny and Pfingsten roads and converted it into a school. The couple operated the school out of that building until they retired last year, turning the school over to their youngest daughter, Wendy Calise, who now serves as president and head of school.

“What drew me to [Montessori] was the independence of the learning style,” said Annette.

Established by the first female physician in Italy, Maria Montessori, the educational philosophy is designed to give children an environment where they can choose what and how they learn. Annette, who went to parochial schools throughout high school, said she also liked the fact that children—not the teacher—were responsible for their learning.

“When I heard about Montessori in one college course, I remembered it,” she said. “I didn’t do a lot of research into other methods, but we’ve never looked back.”

Today, Countryside Montessori offers educational programs beginning with toddlers up through elementary aged children. The school is fully accredited by the Independent Schools Association of the Central States and is recognized by the Association Montessori International, an organization that measures how Montessori schools live up to the standards set by Maria Montessori.

Early Challenges of Starting a School 

Although establishing a school wasn’t as hard as they expected, it wasn’t easy, either. One of the most difficult parts of opening their doors to students turned out to be finding teachers who had been trained in the Montessori method, Annette said. 

“I started with a list and kept calling,” said Frank. “I asked if they knew somebody who had recently trained, might be looking for a job, and I just repeated that with everybody I talked to.”

Eventually, the Kulles found their first two teachers. But finding and keeping Montessori-trained teachers continued to be tough in the early years.

One Monday morning, a couple of months into the school year, one of their teachers didn’t show up for work, Annette recalled. When she called the teacher’s roommate, she found out that the teacher’s mother had gotten sick and the teacher had gone home—to Trinidad.

“We never heard from her again,” Annette said. “Now we’ve got a classroom with 30 kids and no teacher. So, [we] get on the phone again.”

During the first two years of operation, Frank continued to work as staff assistant to the manufacturing vice president of the Miehle Co., which made printing presses. But he left that job to take over the business side of running the school in 1969, while Annette oversaw the educational operations.

“I didn’t like working for big companies. Even as a kid, my vision of life was [that] I was going to be working for a small business,” Frank said. “Once the school began running, it just kind of filled that goal.”

“You get to see the consequences of your decisions much quicker, in something as small as this, than you do in a larger corporation,” he added.

Working Side by Side for 40 Years

Neither Frank nor Annette was trained in education, although he had a minor in business and she had majored in math. The two met at the University of Illinois on Frank’s first day of college and were married one week after graduation. For their entire four-decade career at Countryside Montessori, the couple worked side by side in the same small office. 

“We never had any problems working together,” Annette said. “Frank is pretty easygoing.”

If the couple disagreed, Frank said, they would talk over the matter, but ultimately learned to defer to one another’s area of expertise.

“If I said. 'We couldn’t afford it,' we would defer on it. If she said, ‘Well, we really need to have it for the classes and for the kids,’ then generally if I could at all see my way clear I would go along with it,” said Frank. “That’s preserved our marriage for 40-some years." 

“It’ll be 50 years in June,” Annette added.

The Kulles had three children, all of whom went to Countryside Montessori. The first two went to public elementary schools after first grade, Annette said, because Countryside did not yet have an elementary program at the time. But their youngest daughter, Wendy, was able to begin elementary school at Countryside in third grade. All three children went to Glenbrook North High School.

3 Generations at the School

Today, Countryside continues to be a true family affair. The Kulles’ oldest daughter, Krista, is a teacher, while their youngest, Wendy, took over as head of school and president. Wendy's husband, Guy, is also a teacher at Countryside Montessori, and the Kulles’ three grandchildren all attended or currently attend the school.

Annette and Frank said they never expected their children would join them in the education field—let alone work at the same school.

“It doesn’t seem to be such a popular thing these days for a family business to develop,” Frank said. “We’re happy that they stayed, but I kind of expected them all to go this way or that.”

After majoring in psychology at Northwestern University, Wendy took a year after graduating to decide what she wanted to do professionally. Once she knew that teaching was her calling, coming back to Countryside Montessori was an easy choice.

“Having gone to public schools, I just felt that conventional structure didn’t permit enough kids to reach their potential,” she said. “I wanted to be in a setting that would really attend to character more, not to the next year of school.”

Wendy said she decided she wanted to teach at Countryside Montessori because of the school’s culture and its commitment to offering teachers continued professional development. 

“It’s hard for me to stay idle very long,” she said. “If you were to ask me what my hobby is, really and truly, it’s learning.” 

Wendy spent 19 years teaching at Countryside Montessori before she took the reins. Working with family—Frank and Annette as well as her husband, Guy—was never really a problem, she said.

“When most people hear about it and respond to that, I imagine they must not get along as well as we do, because there’s usually a gasp,” Wendy said. “Certainly it had its moments at times, but overall it’s pretty harmonious. I really revere the work my parents have done.”

Taking over from her parents has also been relatively harmonious, Wendy said. While they’re no longer involved in the day-to-day business of the school, Frank and Annette are still right next door—literally, in the home adjacent to Countryside Montessori that they’ve lived in for as long as they’ve owned the Northbrook school building. 

“We come to borrow the paper cutter and look at the kids,” Annette said. “There’s always something.”

Countryside Montessori will honor the Kulles with a yearly Founders’ Day celebration. The tribute's debut is scheduled for this April 27.

“I really didn’t want a fuss,” said Annette. “It’s not the end. It’s a continuation.”

Countryside’s chorus will sing in their honor, and the school will hold an open house for parents, staff and former students who want to chat with the couple. Frank and Annette will also be on hand to open car doors and greet students as their parents drop them off in the morning—something they did together every day during the nearly 40 years they oversaw the school.