MEDFORD -- Andrea Sullivan, principal of St. Joseph School in Medford, is the first to admit that her school is "different." And she likes it that way.

"It would be super boring if we weren't," she told The Pilot during a visit to the school on Jan. 16. "I always say I'm super weird, and that's okay, because everyone here loves everyone, and I mean that. And we're kind to everyone because that's what we do. That's what God told us to do. So, if we don't do that, we're not doing our job."

Sullivan said that SJS prides itself on welcoming the stranger. Its 175 students (25 more will enroll in the fall) are a diverse group, and they get more diverse each year. They speak 17 different languages in their homes, mostly Spanish, Portuguese, or Haitian Creole. For over half of them, either they or their parents were born outside the U.S. In some classrooms, there may be only one white student.

"That's good," Sullivan said. "It's preparing students for life in Greater Boston, because they'll have to know how to negotiate with people who aren't like them, and that could be scary if you just spend time with people who are just like you."

The teachers often find themselves learning from the students as much as the students are learning from them. Teachers must navigate students' cultural differences. For instance, some students may refuse to look their teachers in the eye because doing so is seen as disrespectful to authority, and their parents may prefer in-person meetings to exchanging emails.

"I think it's important to know how to teach someone from a different culture, too," third-grade teacher Kiana Hinson told The Pilot. "The things that we normally learn that they might not have learned at previous schools and differentiating the curriculum for that student and their strengths, instead of just kind of throwing them to the wolves and their weaknesses."

Hinson was in charge of the school's Christmas pageant last year, which required her to unite the diverse student body. She was responsible for making sure they learned their lines and confidently said them on stage.

"The biggest thing I always tell them is that it doesn't matter what we look like, where we come from, we're all here for one common goal: to learn," she said.

The Christmas pageant is also where students learn their different strengths. Some of them may be good at reading, speaking, and singing, while others have talents elsewhere.

"We all have a part to play," Hinson said, "and it kind of fits like a puzzle together. And at the end, they all saw that puzzle come together with each of their different parts and understanding and being encouraging to one another."

Teachers at SJS are responsible for teaching academics and social values. Sullivan called them role models, "and good ones, too." Students might interact with their teachers more than their own parents, who may work multiple jobs and overnight shifts. The school is located in a working-class neighborhood, and many students come from single-parent households. Some students come to school at 6:45 a.m. and leave at 6 p.m., taking advantage of the before and after-school programs.

"Our students are not rich financially, but they're rich in other ways," Sullivan said. "They're very culturally rich. And they bring that to us. So we're different than a lot of schools that are close by."

The small size of SJS makes it easier for students and teachers to be close. The largest class has 21 students. Sullivan does not want there to be more than 10 kids per adult in any classroom, and is planning to add more classrooms next school year. Last year, second-grade teacher Katherine Ventola had 21 students in her class. This year, she only has seven. The smaller class size makes it easier to help her students, who have a hard time with math.

"I almost had to reframe the way I teach, in a way," Ventola told The Pilot, "because it was harder for me to pull a child individually when I had a bigger group. But now I'm able to pull them to the back and really help them through whatever they're struggling with."

SJS's embrace of welcoming the stranger is not only for students who are new to the U.S. One recently-enrolled eighth grader attended local public schools before his desperate parents enrolled him in SJS. He was neurodiverse and relentlessly bullied by his classmates, receiving 50 to 100 texts a day encouraging him to commit suicide.

"He was obviously somebody with a ton of talent," Sullivan said. "He has been welcomed. We're small enough."

Looking at the student now, Sullivan sees a young man who is healthier, happier, and more confident. He has friends and a plan for his future. To her, that is the most important thing SJS can accomplish.

"I remember at the Halloween party that we had in the gym, watching him smile and watching him play basketball and dance with the other kids," she said.

The student told SJS Office Manager Michelle Forziati that he couldn't wait for Christmas break to be over so he could see his friends again.

"That's our secret sauce," Sullivan said. "We don't have the biggest hockey rink. We don't have the newest school, but our students here learn how to be kind and good human beings, because our teachers are really kind and good human beings."