Wrapping Up Another Trimester of Progressive Education

Our winter trimester break is now underwayhere at Eagle Rock School and Professional Development Center, which means many of our students have returned to their hometowns or headed elsewhere for this thrice annual vacation from school. Back here on campus, it’s been a busy trimester, with the graduation celebration for three of our students last Friday, followed by a mass departure of students the following day after an end-of-trimester community meeting. The staff held a holiday party on Saturday, and individual work teams met this past Monday for some trimester wrap-up work.

And while many of our instructors and staff head off to their holiday destinations, some — including Dan Condon, our Associate Director of Professional Development — are working during parts of the trimester break with educators who are committed to making high school a more engaging experience for our country’s youth. In Dan’s case, he was working earlier today on a Restorative Practices project with the Étude Group in Sheboygan, Wis., while tomorrow he’ll be working with TNTP (formerly known as The New Teacher Project), and on Friday he will be participating in a meeting at Public Allies, Inc. in Milwaukee.

Etude Group (Sheboygan, Wis.) engaging with Eagle Rock's Professional Development Center.
Etude Group (Sheboygan, Wis.) engaging with Eagle Rock’s Professional Development Center.

As for our organization itself, our campus schedule for the weeks ahead is as follows: Continue reading…

Eagle Rock Students, Instructors and Staff Wrap Up Another Successful Year

It’s been a busy December here at Eagle Rock School and Professional Development Center, and as we wind down for the holiday season, we thought it might be helpful to post a schedule for the rest of 2017 and the beginning of the calendar year ahead.

First off, where we’ve been this month:

  • We graduated three of our amazing students with pomp and circumstance last Friday, with the rest of the student population heading back to families spread across the nation last weekend.
  • Our staff held a holiday party this past Sunday, wrapping up the trimester with a final staff meeting on Monday morning.

Many staff members will be gathering together to make plans for our 74th trimester (ER-74) this week, as well as put additional thought and work in on the planning for our 25th Anniversary Celebration, which is scheduled for June 30, 2018, here in Estes Park, Colo. And, of course, our business office and operations team continues to run the day-to-day tasks that recognize deadlines and schedules (in addition to holidays and celebrations).

Eagle Rock School Elk Dec 2017
(Photo: ©2017 Joel “Shortz” Ziegler)

Meanwhile, staff from our Professional Development Center are wrapping up the current trimester with several commitments in Wisconsin in support of our clients. These include visits with Continue reading…

What Passes for Our Summer Break is Now Underway

Eagle Rock’s trimester shuffle is well underway, with our latest graduates receiving their diplomas last Friday along with the official end of ER 66, which put to bed our 66th trimester since Eagle Rock’s founding back in 1993.

If you missed our most recent graduates on stage, you can still see all the action — in living color — online via the Eagle Rock channel on Ustream (the ER 66 graduation ceremony can found in the right hand column).

But officially, as of today, we’re on break. Unofficially, there’s a lot of work still going on at our mountainside campus in Estes Park, with tomorrow being the final day on campus for our 2014/15 Public Allies Fellows, and preparations well underway for the arrival of the 2015/16 Public Allies Fellows for a week’s worth of training toward the end of the month.

DSC_2442

For those faculty and staff taking a much deserved break, what we hope is that this well-rested cohort returns to campus here in Estes Park on Monday, Sept. 7 fired up and ready for ER 67. A week later — on Sunday, Sept. 13 — our Continue reading…