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Show I ff'"' . ; , K j' J '' J y i V ' I 1 vVJ"v 'J J j ' t,' -s.i If J ' v r I f "" if' ! I ? s,j Small group and one-on-one teaching is a basic philosophy for students attending North Canyon Academy, a private school in Bountiful. Left to right are Mark Smith, Robby Tibbits, Robin Rooklidge, Adriana Johnson, instructor Dave Weseman, Kippi Nordfors, Crystal Sells, and Tyra Collette. Private school successful By GARY R. BLODGETT BOUNTIFUL An uncommon solution to an educational problem has been reached by a group of Bountiful-area students and their parents." They formed their own private school. It happened about a year ago and the North Canyon Academy has been operating (if not smoothly) since that time with an enrollment of seven students and three part-time part-time teachers, plus a lot of help from parents. "We've had our trials and tribulations, tribu-lations, but we have made a lot of progress in the past year," said Bonnie Tibbitts, who with a friend, Becky Collette, founded the school. The seven students are seventh and eighth graders who attend the private school in the morning and then go to their regular junior high school for afternoon classes. Subjects Sub-jects at the private school include math, science, history and English. "This is one of the unique features fea-tures of this program," said Bonnie. Bon-nie. "We don't want to take the students out of the mainline of education;, edu-cation;, therefore, we plan our curriculum cur-riculum so that afternoons are spent in their regular schools South Davis, Millcreek and Mueller Muel-ler Park Junior High Schools. "Students can perform in all the activities of their regular schools except to hold class or school (stu-dentbody) (stu-dentbody) offices," she said. "They can participate in sports and enjoy the regular social life of their other friends." Because of the small classrooms never more than a dozen per teacher the students receive a lot more one-on-one attention, Bonnie noted. Also, smaller classrooms clas-srooms enable students to become more involved. She said these are two major necessities of a lot of students average students like the ones we have. "Most of them require, or at least desire to have, more personal attention and the opportunity to become more involved than they can in a regular school classroom," she said. Bonnie explained that although this is a unique program in private education, it has the support of the Davis School District officials and Board of Education. "We are a middle-of-the-road type of a program prog-ram which requires a lot of support from every student, parent and teacher," she said. The program, she explained, is supported entirely from private funds (families of the students) and that the parents are required to provide pro-vide a lot of moral support, serve on committees, help in the classroom, clas-sroom, and help their children progress in the program. Students, too, are required to sign "an agreement" with the teachers in the private school which outlines their goals and expected ex-pected accomplishments each month. A "complaint book" is left in the classroom for students to register complaints. The problems are reviewed by a committee of students, parents and teachers. Students are graded and their grades are recorded each semester with the Davis School District. "The school also offers more spiritual spir-itual aspects that are available in public school," said Bonnie. The two directors explained that the school was organized in January Janu-ary 1987 to "meet a few basic needs that parents felt were not being met to their satisfaction in traditional (public) education: (1) The need to mesh the spiritual and emotional development with their child's academic progress; (2) The need to recognize each child as an individual with individual indi-vidual needs, ambitions, abilities and problems; and (3) The need for parents to be involved in their children's educational educa-tional progress. They emphasized, however, that this is not an approach designed for all children. "The child who needs much teacher (or adult) supervision supervi-sion for academic, emotional or behavioral reasons may find difficulty diffi-culty in NCA," they said. NCA, they explained, has an "open education" philosophy by teaching students how to learn, build self-esteem, and create an atmosphere where the student feels responsible for learning, rather than attending class out of obligation. Applications are being accepted from parents to increase the school classroom by four or five students beginning in late January. For further information, contact Bonnie Bon-nie at 295-8947, or Becky at 298-0509. |