Westbury Friends School is a Friends school under the care of the Westbury Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. As a Friends school, we use what Friends refer to as testimonies, or guiding spiritual principles, to inform our daily practice as educators. These testimonies are: simplicity, peace, integrity, community, and equality. Friends schools embrace these principles as they strive to weave them through the daily life of the school, in how children are educated, and in the nature of human interaction. This work can be witnessed in the respectful manner in which people interact with one another, and how the diverse voices within each classroom and the broader school community are heard and valued. In Friends schools, learning goes beyond the acquisition of skills and information; students are taught to ask thoughtful questions in the spirit of curiosity, intellectual integrity and creativity. They learn to resolve conflicts peacefully, through purposeful listening and engagement in the process of reaching a solution. Students explore and embrace cultural, religious, personal and economic diversity through studies of their local and global communities, and through the daily interactions with peers who are both similar and different from one another. Through active service learning experiences in their own communities and around the globe, students develop a sense of responsibility as stewards of the earth, and caring citizens of the world.

Children attend weekly Meeting for Worship, a period of silent reflection. This practice has a long and meaningful history in Friends faith and practice. For the students of a Friends school, most of whom practice other faiths with their families, it is presented as a period of silent reflection during which time one can ponder a question, called a query, which is philosophical, often practical, sometimes spiritual and always deeply human.

Friends schools do not seek to impose any particular set of beliefs or doctrines on others. It is the aim of a Friends education to “nurture a particular sort of personhood” - one who will ultimately be able to appreciate the beauty and the struggles in our world and in one another, to value simplicity, to embrace the inner journey with courage and integrity, and to strive to live peacefully in a diverse world.