Newsletter, September 2011
Dear Friends,
We are well into our third year of instruction with an enrollment of 27 students, up from the 21 students we had at the end of last year. Not only do we have new students, we also have a great new faculty member. Jorge Guevara is our new math and Spanish teacher. He actually found us, having become disenchanted with teaching in the public school system in Texas. After searching the Internet for private schools that emphasize academic excellence he decided that we were the school he wanted to join; fortunately we were in a position to hire him. He is a real advocate of Singapore Math and excellence in math; in his classes he already has many of our older students doing Challenge Problems in addition to the standard problems in the texts and workbooks. In Spanish class, after only four weeks of classes, he is providing instruction almost exclusively in Spanish, ensuring that the students learn to truly understand spoken Spanish as well as speak it themselves. He is even producing his own Spanish workbook. We are impressed and pleased.
One of the consequences of growth in student numbers is that we are rapidly reaching the point where we need a new, larger home for the Academy. We are preparing for a capital campaign to raise the funds.' We have found two properties we think would be suitable in Mesilla; now all we have to do is raise the money to purchase one of them and do the modifications necessary to make it legal. Board members, Vince & David Gutschick have put in hundreds of hours already in preparation for the campaign, assembling business plans, lists of potential donors, recruiting volunteers and board members, getting a Web-based database ready, etc. Several people in the community are lending a hand on the campaign committee, including Sen. Mary Kay Papen, Norm Fristoe, CPA, and Prasanna Pai of First Step. You can help; if you know of any potential donors, can work in fundraising (contacting people, finding and entering data), or would be willing to help us finance the purchase of the property your help would be greatly appreciated.
Our Outreach program has started this academic year with two public science demonstrations by Dr. Vince Gutschick at the Academy. The first one was, “What do you know about fire?” and the second was “Light, and us, part I: mostly about color.” This second session will be repeated on Saturday, October 1st, 1:30-3:30 PM at the Academy (212 S. Downtown Mall)
We are getting ready to do a larger-scale program with the children doing much of the talking; the topic is, “Visit the Solar System”, with an accurate scale model of the Solar System along the entire Downtown Mall. It takes that much space to illustrate how much distance there is between the Sun and the planets.
We are pleased to announce that we have our first student teacher. Erica Surova is an older student working to obtain alternative teacher certification. She has worked as a teacher of English as-a-second-language in other countries, so has enough teaching experience that she knows what skills she wants to gain. In selecting a school in which to do her student teaching she considered several schools and chose the Academy as the place that was using methods she wanted to master. She tells us she is pleased, that she is learning a lot from all of us. We, the students and the teachers, are enjoying having her here and appreciate all her help.
Two of our teachers, Debbie Cota & Paula Hines, have completed the in-class portion of the Take Flight Curriculum, a research-based program developed at the Luke Waites Center for Dyslexia & Learning Disorders of the Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children. This program was recommended by our advisors as the best phonics program available. In addition to the 5 weeks of intensive in-class instruction, students of this program must do 12 class presentations, read 12 textbooks and 4 articles, write summaries about these readings, attend 9 all-day seminars, do 700 hours of phonics instruction with dyslexic students, and finally pass a comprehensive examination, all in order to be a certified therapist. Debbie & Paula are both working diligently to complete the requirements.
Last, but most importantly, our students have been busy. They are all progressing in all three languages. In Chinese all but the newest students are writing as well as mastering reading, speaking, and understanding spoken Chinese, under the excellent tutelage of Mei Dai. In Spanish with Paula Hines and Jorge Guevara, all the students are speaking, reading at their level, and understanding spoken statements. All the students are making significant progress in English with Debbie, Paula, and Liz Coll, from learning the sounds of the letters to reading thick chapter books and writing their own stories, books, and plays. Several of our youngest children have just celebrated reading their first book, an early-reader Bob book. It is a very exciting step that we all treasure.
In social studies with Liz, Debbie, & Paula we are covering a variety of topics. The youngest students finished a unit on Egypt, complete with a model pyramid, and are now learning about the oceans, the first in the list of topics they suggested. This topic has already been enriched in science class by learning why the oceans are salty and why some marine regions have lots of fish and others are relatively barren. The older students are learning history of the United States, and at the request of one of the older students, about the two World Wars. In science with director Lou Ellen Kay, all the students studied plants and performed experiments about what plants need to grow. Now the students, aided by Vince and David Gutschick, are beginning true science fair projects. The older students are also learning about the solar system, preparing to explain the facts to the public.
We are thankful to our teachers, parents, students, and community members for the support we are continuing to receive in finances, goods, and services. There are so many people to thank that our growing list will need much space for posting. The most recent good news is that we have received $2,500 for scholarship funds from El Paso Electric, their third such donation of our three years of operation. Thanks to all of you, our benefactors and supporters.