April
Revue Magazine!
Here is another glimpse at �the bright side of LIFE!�
Community News
First off, I would like to send out a warm welcome to the new families that joined us during the course of this year: Regine and George Bos, parents of Armando and Andr�; Rebecca Cutter and Ronaldo Lec, parents of Ixchel; and Hope Jones and Jason Ryan, parents of Tyde.
In January, we had a group of friends from Colorado visiting us. They spoiled us by creating a balloon hat or animal for each child in the younger grades. Thanks for making our day with these fun treats!
One of the things that sets us apart and fills me with pride is the strong involvement of our families. 98% of our parents attended the evaluation meetings in February! Our teachers and I are very grateful that you always take the time to be active participants in your children�s education.
Events
Of course the biggest event in the past months, was our Environmental Week in March. All classes were out and about for the entire week, learning through hands-on activities how we can take better care of our environment. A big thank you goes out to Mauricio Mogoll�n, Marcos Lux, and Rosa Panjoj for helping us with transportation. Thank you to Ronaldo Lec for giving us a great tour of the Permaculture Institute, and thanks also to Alberto Rivera for putting the facilities at the Reserva Natural at our disposal.
One of our main missions is not only to provide our students with an excellent education, but also to foster their leadership skills. Therefore, we always encourage our students to share their knowledge and teach others, as was the case during our parent presentations. The 3rd and 4th graders also did a town-wide survey about turtle eggs that raised awareness in the community. Furthermore, ARCAS (Asociaci�n de Rescate y Conservaci�n de Vida Silvestre) asked our student to submit the results of their surveys to them.
Lastly, did you know that our students are true science pioneers in Guatemala? Our students continue to be the only foreign participants in the Leafpack Network. This is a group of schools who monitors the quality of local rivers through the sampling of small insects and shares their findings on the internet. In fact, our students are on the cutting edge of environmental science in Guatemala, since no one else in the entire country, not even universities, is doing this type of research.
In the spirit of leadership development, our middle school students will visit the Escuela Tzal� in April and teach their peers how to analyze the quality of their nearby stream below the waterfall. Our goal is that with the help of our students, the quality of all local rivers will eventually be monitored by schools and the results will be presented to the Panajachel community on a regular basis.
Congratulations to our boys soccer and girls basketball teams for participating in the municipal tournament!
LIFESavers
In February, the Brophy Elementary School in Framingham Massachusetts sent us over 100 pounds of brand new school supplies! �Gracias� to them as well as to our friends Yael and Shai Niv, who schlepped them all down for us.
�Pashalsta� also to Paul Dunn, who came down in February to support us with our fundraising and has been continuing these efforts in the US.
A further �Dankesch�n� goes to Tom Boice for giving us a great new cooler for our events.
In March, through our friends Bruce Doyle and Dana Gust, the Baylake Pines School in Virginia Beach provided us with a huge box of new and used books for our K-2 students. With the support of assistant headmistress Glenda Graves, the school also organized a special fundraising day for us and sent us a big check. We can�t thank you enough for your generosity. Merci!
Matiox to Dave Schaefer for bringing us an excellent class set of new World History books from the States.
A final �xie xie� goes to Jess Gatley, a photography student from Massachusetts, for taking school pictures for us and bringing down materials as well.
Kind regards,
Franziska
Upcoming Events
For an up-to-date calendar, go to: http://calendar.yahoo.com/lifeschool_director