Tommy McAree Archives - Eagle Rock Blog

Eagle Rock School Continues to Place the Focus on Literacy and Literature

“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read.” ~ James Baldwin (American novelist, playwright, and activist)

For more than five decades, educators throughout the United States have taken Baldwin’s comments to heart, stressing the importance of reading and words to allow students to navigate their future.

Poet Edgar Kunz visits Eagle Rock School in Estes Park, Colo.

And, indeed, literacy and literature — which we believe helps students unleash their imaginations, relate to the world around them, and actualize their literacy skills — is forefront in the curriculum at Eagle Rock School, with hands-on experiences such as the one I am attempting to pass on to my students this trimester. Called Adventure Writing, this is the latest class delivered through an experiential education context that emphasizes the importance of reading and writing.

Most recently, a class called Continue reading…

Second Half of Eagle Rock School’s 78th Trimester Gets Underway

We’re entering the second half of our 78th trimester, and as promised in our post about this trimester’s first grouping of classes (see: Here’s Some of What We’re Learning This Trimester at Eagle Rock School), we’re now publishing a follow-up post featuring a rundown of the classroom offerings for this particular portion of the school year. Call it ER 78: The Sequel, if you will.

Each of our classes is carefully contemplated, curated and contained within our curriculum — constructed specifically for students seeking a purpose in school and in life. It’s an approach that has worked continuously for the past 25 or so years for the young people who are studying hard and experiencing a new life with and through the Eagle Rock community.

Without further ado, here’s what we’re tackling on the backside of ER 78 (the 78th trimester since our founding in the early 1990s): Continue reading…

The Role of Power Standards in this Trimester’s Class Offerings

It’s the beginning of our 77th trimester here at Eagle Rock School and Professional Development Center and our students are already well entrenched in furthering their education with meaningful classes — many promoting strong leadership and good citizenry in the world they will soon inherit. A rundown of those classes is offered below, but first, we’d like to give you some insight into how we plan for and assess educational progress here at Eagle Rock School.

At Eagle Rock, we’ve long maintained an “Individual Learning Plan” for our students, as well as “Power Standards” that assess student progress within this plan. All of this is organized around what we call our “5 Expectations,” which include:

Creating Healthy Life Choices
Effective Communication
Leadership for Justice
Engaged Global Citizen
Expanding Knowledge Base

The Individual Learning Plan (ILP for short) is a means of assessing each student’s progress in completing their graduation requirements. The plan is divvied up among three sections, which include: Continue reading…

Meet the Team: Eagle Rock’s 2018/2019 Fellows

Summer break is winding down here at Eagle Rock School and Professional Development Center, and that means we’re getting ready to welcome a new cohort of instructional, professional development, and student services fellows. Our 2018/2018 cohort includes ten new and three returning fellows — a baker’s dozen who are about to begin or continue a year-long commitment to service.

Our 13 fellows will immerse themselves in everything we have to offer in education and professional development — each responsible for supporting alternative and progressive approaches to teaching and learning, with an emphasis on playing an important role in engaging our students in their own education.

Below, we present a brief educational history and biography of each of our new and returning fellows:

Amelia la Plante Horne, 2018/2019 Fellow in Residential Life

Amelia was born and raised in Las Vegas, N.M. After graduating from Eagle Rock School (she arrived in May of 2011, graduated in April of 2014), Amelia attended Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where she designed and completed her Bachelor of Arts degree in Ecological Praxis in Healing — a multidisciplinary degree that explored environmental science, anthropology, philosophy and psychology.

During her college years, Amelia’s non-academic activities included creating a campus Continue reading…

Summer Break 2018 at Eagle Rock School

It’s not necessarily a ghost town around campus today as the first week of the summer trimester break gets underway, but with three of our students graduating last Friday and our student body departing for their hometowns the following day, it’s quieter here than normal.

Adding to the lack of frenetic activity is the fact that we recently said goodbye to our 2017/2018 cohort of Public Allies Teaching Fellows, although three of them — Tommy McAree (Literature & Literacy), Felicia Walker (Residence Life) and Micah Saugen (Science) — will be returning as second-year fellows for Eagle Rock School trimesters 76 through 78.

We also bid farewell to a handful of veteran staff members, including Jon Anderson, a Human Performance & Outdoor Education Instructional Specialist and2018 Instructional Coach. John has been named instructional coach at Mapleton Expeditionary Learning School of the Arts (MESA) in Thornton, Colo.

(Jon Anderson — top & left — leading his final piece of national work for Eagle Rock ... helping launc Austin’s newest Innovation Academy. Image credit: Michael Soguero.) — (Jon Anderson — top & left — leading his final piece of national work for Eagle Rock … helping launch Austin’s newest Innovation Academy. Image credit: Michael Soguero.)

Jen Frickey headed back to Canada and will be working with Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario. Jen began her Eagle Rock career as an intern in our Human Performance Center back in 2001 and served in several capacities before becoming our Director of Curriculum in 2012. Meanwhile, we recently had the opportunity to welcome Professional Development Associate Sarah Bertucci as our new Director of Curriculum.

Other staffers departing include Continue reading…

Eagle Rock Students Wax Poetic at National Poetry Slam

A half-dozen of our Eagle Rock School students, along with three staff mentors, have just returned from a national youth poetry festival at the University of Houston in Houston, Tex., and while we didn’t walk away with any major trophies or prizes, the reward came in helping each of our students find and display their own voice.

Called the 2018 Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam Festival, the annual event brings more than 500 young poets — along with their educator mentors — all joining up with some the nation’s leading spoken-word artists and cultural workers to take a deep dive into arts education, artistic expression, and civic engagement.

Brave New Voices is a national youth poetry festival sponsored by Youth Speaks, an organization that has long championed what is becoming a global movement of young people finding safe places to discover, develop, publicly present, and apply their voices as creators of social change.

Participating students do this through the intersection of arts education and youth development practices, civic engagement, and quality artistic presentation.

Dan Hoffman, Eagle Rock’s Societies & Cultures Instructional Specialist — and a Ponderosa House Parent— did most of the heavy lifting at the local level, coordinating the Continue reading…

Announcing Eagle Rock’s 2017/2018 Cohort of Public Allies Fellows

We’re about two months away from welcoming nine new and three returning Public Allies Fellows to Eagle Rock for the 2017/2018 academic year.

Achieving the title of Fellow is no easy task. Funded by AmeriCorps, Public Allies is insistent in the philosophy that everyone has the ability to lead and anyone can be an inspiration to others. Creating just and equitable societies takes hard work, and the job requires a great amount of passion, and the courage to step forward and take action

Arriving September 1st, each of the fellows referenced below will be active participants in our residential and community-based school and professional development center. To that end, each fellow has expressed or demonstrated a passion for teaching and youth development — and more specifically — an interest in progressive education.

So, who exactly are these young leaders? Below are short biographies and a few fun factoids about each of our 2017/2018 Fellows:

Adam Louie, 2017/2018 Public Allies Fellow in Outdoor Education: Adam was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he recently graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Recreation, Parks, and Tourism Administration from San Francisco State University. With an emphasis in Outdoor Education, Adam has worked as a field instructor for Outward Bound California and frequently takes courses with WMI (Wilderness Medicine Institute). His love for nature and passion for traveling has brought him to many corners of the earth. Adam enjoys getting lost in foreign countries, learning their language, and eating local street food. He also can’t get enough of playing sports, experimental cooking, and binge watching tv series.

Adriana Ortiz, 2017/2018 Public Allies Fellow in Health, Wellness & Counseling: Adriana is originally from the Bronx, NY. She obtained her Bachelor of Arts in psychology from Temple University in Philadelphia and recently completed her Master’s degree at the Silberman School of Social Work at Hunter College, located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Prior to pursuing graduate school, Adriana served as an AmeriCorps Member for City Year Los Angeles. When she’s not in school or working, Adriana enjoys discovering new places to eat, reading, listening to music, traveling, and spending time with friends and family.
Continue reading…