Beaver faculty members have had a busy summer attending Google Think Tank, visiting High Tech High, creating new curriculum, traveling to Belize with NatGeo Marine Field Research, working at the BVR summer camp and much more! Read more to find out about their experiences and see pictures by department below.
ENGLISH
- Lisa Brown + Dave Liebowitz went to Oxford, Mississippi. “You learn so much just being in a different part of the country.” It was interesting to watch people who are passionate about something and present on specific topics in a very detailed and fascinating way.
- Josh Rilla went to (didn’t catch the name of the school … it sounded like Brotherly) and had a lot of different conversations happen around Go Set the Watchmen, which he brought back to the English department and has led to lots of interesting discussions about race, class, and culture.
- Matt Lippman taught at Chapel Hill.
- Kathleen Kosberg worked as the Communications Director for the Beaver Summer Camp.
HISTORY
- Melissa Alkire went to High Tech High, and learned about project-based learning. Her experience was fantastic. She kept thinking, if she lived in California this would be the place for her as so much of what they believe about students falls in line with Beaver’s values as well. “One of the absolute highlights of the experience was the opening address given by Rob Riordan. He is the absolute visionary and heart of the school. His entire address encompassed the new basics and paid particularly close attention to the need for empathy not just among the students but for the teachers to see their students through common eyes, in their shoes, and as their care-takers and not merely test givers.”
- Geeta Jain + Yolanda Wilcox Gonzalez went to a primary source workshop and learned about the history on To Kill a Mockingbird
LANGUAGE
- Anna Bergholz went to a “teaching language with technology” conference/workshop.
- Shanshan Xu completed her masters at Middlebury and developed the new MS Chinese program.
MATH
- The entire math department is creating an in-house Khan Academy.
- Crystal Fantry kicked off her research on Girls & Math.
- Jayne Everson interned at IDEO.
- Robin Brown worked as the Director of the Extended Day program at the Beaver Summer Camp.
PERFORMING ARTS
- The entire Performing Arts department worked on the new MS music curriculum.
- Kenny Burt went to a Broadway teaching workshop and saw 5 Broadway shows in 4 days. (Fun Home, Kinky Boots, An American in Paris, Something Rotten, and, The King and I). Kenny said, it was interesting to see similar technology and resources used in such a wide variety of ways in such a short time. Plus he thought the shows were all great, and beautiful and inspiring. “I went backstage at 3 shows (Kinky Boots, Something Rotten, and, On the Town), so I got to see a bunch of spaces, tech, and working environments; I look forward to supporting atmospheres like those I saw here at Beaver.”
VISUAL ARTS
- Sejal Patel took “Coding Dynamic Experiences” at MassArt.
SCIENCE
- Tate Nazzaro went to the Museum of Science Engineering Conference where he got a lot of new ideas for different thing to build at Beaver.
- Sam Salfity went to a new teacher boot camp, learned a lot of gaming-oriented technology.
- Zoz Brooks worked on robots, all robots, all the time.
- Larry McKinney was the head lifeguard at the Beaver Summer Camp.
- Jon Butler was in charge of woodworking at the Beaver Summer Camp.
- Kim McCabe went on a National Geographic Marine Field Research trip off the coast of Belize, where she worked with high school students as well as PH.D candidates
, specifically using drones to research dolphin behavior. The photos to the right show a little bit of what Kim experienced. Top left photo is the beautiful choral, the top right photo is the drone being launched, the bottom left photo captured by Ramos features footage of Blackbird Caye, the island that they stayed on, and the bottom left photo is Kim in here scuba gear!