From Convent to Corporation for Kids

Lighthouse School, Inc. was established in 1967 (as The Holy Union Special School) to provide educational opportunities for special needs students in the greater Lowell, Massachusetts area for whom alternative resources were non-existent. The school relied exclusively on nominal parent contributions as a source of funding until 1973, when Chapter 766, the Massachusetts statute for special education, was introduced.

Since that time, Lighthouse School has grown and now offers Comprehensive Biodevelopmental Services to a large network of communities throughout Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine. These comprehensive treatment services are integrated with a full complement of educational and interdisciplinary services — those unique characteristics that have defined Lighthouse School for over 50 years.

Our current site at Wellman Avenue, our first purpose-built, state-of-the-art facility, opened in 1997. It was designed to meet the wide-ranging needs of all of our students and the staff who serve them. The building and its grounds allowed us to not only provide the highest level of educational, vocational and therapeutic services, but to do so within a safe and nurturing environment.

From 2021 to 2024, because of the pandemic need for more space, the school temporarily operated at two sites - one at Wellman Avenue and one at Mill Road in Chelmsford. The Mill Road facility was dedicated to our oldest students, with a programmatic emphasis on transition preparation. However, the recent completion of a second, new building at Wellman Avenue meant that our staff and students could once again be reunited on one campus for the start of the 2024-2025 school year.