By: Nomi Martin-Brouillette
Staff Writer
Last year, Mr. Baird and Mr. VK were contacted by Frederic Burtley, Vice President of The Franklin Institute, saying that the US government had given a grant for an exchange program to between STEM Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) educators in Egypt and schools in the US. They were told that they would like to have them involved in the program.
“We went to Egypt last March and we were there again in November. We were running workshops for teachers in schools in Egypt. They are special schools for students in interested in STEM.” say’s Baird.
Last May, after hearing about SLA, some educators from the Egyptian end of the program came to visit our school. The purpose of this program was to help teachers in Egypt learn from teachers in the US, and vice versa. They bounced ideas off of each other, and visited each others schools.
“Were going again 2-3 more times starting February 1st, and then spring break and then 4 weeks this summer.” says Baird. “It’s open for teachers to come this summer, we’re hoping they can come to share their extersit and knowledge with the Egyptians, it’s a really interesting program.”
So what will this look life for the general SLA Community?
“There are a couple things in the works to try to build some virtual exchanges with the students in Egypt. There is also the benefit sla is serving as a model for other schools.” say’s Baird.
The main struggles are that the Egyptians are running into problems when trying to acces visas to come to the US, due to current political struggles. The future of the program is still up in the air.
“The biggest thing is simply that realizing that the type of learning and teaching we do at SLA is really well thought of.” says Baird. “The Egyptians could have gone anywhere, but they chose SLA. People need to realize that our school is having a big influence on the world.”
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