Atlantans Awarded Top Honor by Inc. Magazine; Company Ranked as Number One Fastest-Growing Urban...

ATLANTA -- Inc. Magazine and the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC) has announced that Mosaica Education, Inc., founded by Atlantans Dawn and Gene Eidelman, ranked number one as America's fastest-growing company serving the inner city. The 2005 Inner City 100 list is a ranking

Mosaica Education, Inc., one of the nation's leading educational service providers, manages 51 charter schools -- serving approximately 13,000 students in eight states, the District of Columbia and the Persian Gulf country of Qatar. Its Spectra Division provides after-school tutorial services to students attending traditional public schools at 38 sites around the country, including a site in Atlanta's Southwest Regional Library and three sites in Savannah. Mosaica-managed schools have yielded superior academic results to date by utilizing a unique school design, which combines a proprietary curriculum called Paragon(R) with state-of-the-art technology and sound fiscal practices.

"The Paragon Curriculum allows students to actively participate in learning through hands-on study, addressing students' individual learning styles. Paragon is powerful because it recognizes, cultivates and celebrates the potential and success of each unique student," says Dawn D. Eidelman, Ph.D., co-founder of Mosaica and creator of the Paragon Curriculum. Gene Eidelman, Mosaica's President added: "We are thrilled that our curriculum and the incredible dedication of the 1,300 great teachers, administrators and school leaders who implement it, have enabled us to earn this award."

WestEd, a non-profit research agency designated by the U.S. Department of Education to provide leadership in educational assessment, was engaged to determine whether students in Mosaica-managed schools utilizing the Paragon Curriculum improved their academic performance while Mosaica operated the schools. According to West Ed, last year, the average Mosaica student exceeded his or her expected academic growth by over 17 percent. This dramatic gain was measured by assessing the increase in the total core NCE (normal curve equivalent) score on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills. Not surprisingly, parents are proud of their children's achievements too. On a scale of 1 to 10, the average Mosaica school received a score of 8.4 on last year's Parent Satisfaction Survey, and it is their word of mouth that has generated the rapid growth and success the Company has enjoyed.

The #1 Inner City 100 ranking is not the only accolade recently received by Mosaica. In June 2004, a Washington DC-based charter school managed by Mosaica, Arts and Technology Academy was named one of eight "Outstanding Charter Schools" in the United States by the U.S. Department of Education. In addition, the Office of Innovation and Improvement of the U.S. Department of Education honored Mosaica as an "Educational Innovator" for the implementation and design of the Paragon curriculum. Mosaica is also a member of the Inc. 500 and was #3 on the Inner City 100 list last year.

To qualify for the Inner City 100, companies needed to have at least 51 percent of their operations located in economically distressed urban areas. The specific ranking was based on total revenue growth over the five-year period. This year, ICIC received a record 7,500 nominations to be on this prestigious list.

About Mosaica Education and Dawn and Gene Eidelman

Founded in January 1997 by Dawn and Gene Eidelman, Mosaica opened its first elementary school in September of that year. Dr. Dawn Eidelman received her Doctorate from Emory University and she was the visionary and creative designer of Mosaica's Paragon curriculum. Prior to starting Mosaica, the Eidelmans founded Atlanta-based Prodigy Child Development Centers. Prodigy's merger with Children's Discovery Centers led to the Eidelmans' relocation to Northern California in 1995. They returned to Atlanta with their three sons in the summer of 2004.