The
Ida B. Wells Community Academy
An Introduction to Educational
Quality
semper novi quid ex Africa!
"Everything new always comes out of Africa!"
— Pliny
The Ida B. Wells Community Academy's Educational
Mission
The Ida B. Wells Community Academy (“the Academy”)
opened in August 1999 as an independent, nonsectarian and public Community
School. The Academy is currently located at 670 Wooster Avenue, Akron,
Ohio 44307-1868 (Call: 330.376.4915 or FAX: 330.376.4912).
Its mission is to educate young people (K to 6; eventually it will enroll
students in grades K to 12) in a holistic educational program that is personalized,
problem-posing and problem-solving, centered in the humanities, natural
sciences, language arts, social studies (civics), the arts and African
and world culture studies. This mission emphasizes passing standard proficiency
tests and reuniting traditional subject areas and learning activities so
that students are better able to understand the relationship of one subject
area to another and education to their present and future lives.
Who Will the Ida B. Wells Community Academy
Serve?
The Academy was chartered by the Ohio Department
of Education and established in Akron, Ohio, in association with the Task
Force for Quality Education and a consortium of Akron based community organizations.
It is designed to serve low-income and medium income African American,
White, Native American, Latin American and Asian students residing within
the Akron metropolitan area. Moreover, the Academy addresses its curriculum
and educational services also to the needs of under achieving and under
represented youths eligible to attend the Akron Public Schools. Recently,
the
passage of HB 282 affords the Academy the possibility of enrolling students
through an "Interdistrict Transfer Program" who reside outside the Akron
School District. Admission is FREE. Busing is to be provided by the
Akron Public School District. Interdistrict transfer students will
NOT
be transported. Their parents will have to arrange for their transportion.
The Academy's decision to maintain a low 15:1
student to teacher ratio will strengthen its efforts to increase these
students educational performance while at the same time diversifying educational
content. The Academy's intent is to eventually serve students from Kindergarten
to High School. In its first year, which began in August 1999, the Academy
enrolled only students in kindergarten through the 2nd grade, adding on
average one grade per year during its initial five years in operation.
In 2000-2001 the Academy will add a 3rd grade. The number of students the
Academy can serve is limited to 90 students. When these places are unfilled,
students will be selected for admission by lot. Interested parents should,
therefore, register the children as soon as possible.
The number of students by year and grade level
the Ida B. Wells Community Academy can serve currently is limited.
50
|
Year One |
1999-2000 |
Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd |
90
|
Year Two |
2000-2001 |
Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd |
120
|
Year Three |
2001-2002 |
Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th |
150
|
Year Four |
2002-2003 |
Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th |
180
|
Year Five |
2003-2004 |
Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th |
Enrollment preference will be given to continuing
Academy students and their siblings. As stated above, other students will
be accepted by lottery, provided space is available.
Why Should Parents Enroll their Children in
the Ida B. Wells Community Academy?
The Academy's personalized educational program,
curricular structure and delivery system are major program elements. The
Academy's emphasis on high academic expectations, moral and social responsibility,
and increased proficiency test ratings will help influence parents to enroll
their child(ren). Furthermore, the Academy involves parents in meaningful
activities throughout the Academy's start-up and operational phases. These
activities include teaching, administrative and governance functions, and
committee assignments of various sorts, e.g., discipline, curriculum, admission,
and faculty hiring.
The Ida B. Wells Community Academy's Educational
Program and Goals
The Academy provides an education that is nurturing,
intellectually stimulating and intended to imbue in its students a mutual
respect for learning proficiency, competence and for the attainment of
knowledge of their history, culture, traditions and values. Students will
learn to appreciate themselves, their fellow students, their families,
and their community. Most importantly, the Academy seeks to establish a
learning community and environment that is supported by a curriculum that
relies on the learners' experiences at home, in their neighborhood, and
in the society. It is structured to produce measurable performance outcomes
in reading, writing, mathematics, social studies and the natural sciences.
The Academy promotes learning activities based on individual student interests
and needs and allows students to grow at their own pace and enhance their
own achievement expectations. Frequently the Academy will assess itself
and report to parents how the overall curricular program and educational
process is progressing as well as how well students are performing based
on national, state and city norms. The Academy regularly assesses teacher
performance, learning obstacles, student rights and responsibilities, student
government and parental and community involvement.
The Ida B. Wells Community Academy's Educational
Philosophy and Operational Imperatives
The Academy's educational philosophy emphasizes
a program structure and instructional design with these essential ingredients
and more:
-
A required 6-week Summer Education Program
that extends the academic year from 180 to 210 days to enhance
the students’ learning potential;
-
Small classes (a 15 to 1 student-teacher ratio) that
are interdisciplinary and culturally integrative; these classes are designed
to increase at all grade levels the amount students learn;
-
Team-teaching emphasis that stresses, where appropriate,
using parents, interns, student teachers, retired teachers, and professionals
as part-time teachers;
-
Individualized instruction, learning through doing
(an active vs. passive instructional design);
-
Meeting students where they are culturally, socially
and academically and then moving them to higher educational levels;
-
Self learning projects that are student or teacher
initiated and conducted first in-school and later, based on student maturity,
assigned as out-of-school projects;
-
A “unidisciplinary” or holistic model that allows
students to experience how one set of basic skills directly relates to
other basic skills, i.e., reading to mathematics, geography to social sciences,
mathematics to science, culture to history, and how all these relate to
being educated in general.
The Academy's instructional philosophy and program
structure are open ended so that it can maintain curricular and operational
flexibility. The Academy's curricular focus follows the standard school
curriculum with one noteworthy exception: The Academy infuses into its
curriculum an emphasis on Africa, African America and the world. This element
is vital to the correct education of its enrollees. A review of the Academy's
educational philosophy and curricular plan reveals that we approach education
from a quality perspective that agrees with Carter G. Woodson's caution
in his The Mis-education of the Negro (1933):
"The element of race does not enter here.
It is merely a matter of exercising common sense in approaching people
through their environment in order to deal with conditions as they are
rather than as you would like to see them or imagine that they are. There
may be a difference in method of attack, but the principle remains the
same. . . . History does not furnish a case of the elevation of a people
by ignoring the thought and aspirations of the people thus served."
Most children (and most educated Americans regardless
of race) have not been properly exposed to the history, culture and aspirations
of the African in America, the largest non-white racial group in the United
States. This group's history, culture, languages, traditions and contributions
to American civilization have been most neglected in school curricula from
kindergarten to the PhD. The Academy is designed to correct this inequity
by infusing curricular diversity that will not exclude learning about other
ethnic or racial groups, particularly Native Americans, Latin Americans
and Asians. All Americans must learn to live, work and understand each
other. This need has been evident, although ignored, since the inception
of the nation. It is the purpose of the Academy to offer a well-balanced
education where academic skills are taught along with mutual respect and
cooperation. In this way we undergird our efforts to keep the American
experiment alive.
For More Information, Call: 330.376.4915
or FAX: 330.376.4912
Send e-Mail to: Academy@Concentric.net
or AcademyEWC@Netscape.net
Visit the Academy’s Web Site at:
http://hierographics.org/AcademyIndex.html
or Write to:
Perkins B. Pringle, Principal
or
Angela M. Anderson, Business Manager
or
Dr. Edward W. Crosby, Superintendent
The Ida B. Wells Community Academy
670 Wooster Avenue
Akron, Ohio 44307-1868
We Are An Equal Education and Employment Opportunity
Institution
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