Our Story
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Tom and Tammy Winstead founded Jackson Day School, formerly known as Mountain Island Day, in 2009. The school opened as an extension of Early Beginnings CDC, a local preschool center also founded by the Winstead's. JDS operated as a Christian private school for nine years before converting to a public charter school in 2018. The school initially operated out of a leased facility in Coulwood until the school outgrew that location. JDS moved to its current location off Fred Alexander in 2016. We renovated the existing facilities on the 25-acre campus in 2016, and JDS recently constructed a new 55,000 square-foot education building and gymnasium that opened in August 2021.
JDS has acquired and continues to acquire land surrounding our campus to expand our facilities further. The construction of a new student parking lot is underway (2021). Construction will continue with extensive renovations to existing buildings and new athletic complex with an expected completion date of August 2023.
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JDS received accreditation from Cognia/AdvancED in 2014 and graduated its first senior class in June 2018. In 2009 JDS opened its doors as a private school with 42 students in TK-3rd grade and grew the private school to roughly 220 students before converting to a charter school. Since our conversion to a charter school, we have grown to over 800 students (2024/2025). We will continue to add 100-120 students each year until we reach our final growth of 1076 students K-12th grade.
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