Bullis Charter School has been recognized many times for its ingenuity and signature programs for students. Now school officials are using some of that creativity to design a yearlong program to share their best practices with other educators.

Superintendent Wanny Hersey said the school has attracted several visitors – educators from the area and around the world – to observe its STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) curriculum at work, but they are usually only there for a day or less.

“These people come and we are happy to share, but I wonder if we have any impact,” Hersey said. “What happens when they see this idea? How are they able to replicate it? There is so much more to learn than one can see in a single activity.”

So Hersey joined forces with the Santa Clara County Office of Education to help share the school’s best practices in a more meaningful way – through the program dubbed STEAM: A Practicum on Integrated PBL (Project Based Learning).

Over the summer, Hersey said she charged her staff with creating the practicum to help transform local schools “holistically” through two cohorts – administrators and teachers.

“The best model is something that provides a program that sees (the best practice), tries it out and gets some more support,” she said. “It has to be more long term. It is important to help schools transform, and you need a team of people to do that.”

The goal was to pair an administrator with a teacher so that the two could take what they learned back to their school and district to promote both systematic and curricular change.

The program, which began last month, includes 27 teachers and 14 administrators from Santa Clara County public schools. Hersey said there are educators from the Union Elementary, Evergreen, Cambrian, Berryessa Union, Alum Rock and Santa Clara Unified school districts.

The program requires the two cohorts to visit with the Bullis Charter School team seven times throughout the year – separately and together. Last week, Hersey and her team hosted the administrators, discussing design thinking and viewing two complete STEAM units.

“We’ve been documenting our curriculum so that we can share it,” she said. “We don’t want to let schools think you have to do it all that way, but we want to provide entry points and options for integrating STEAM one step at a time.”

She added that the administrators have to look at things from a broader level. Topics include finances, how to secure funding for programs and lessons, and creating a culture that fosters innovation.

Project-based learning

A key element of the program, according to Hersey, is informing educators of resources they may not have considered using. She said Bullis Charter School and the county are introducing participants to “what is out there and what can be leveraged to improve student learning.”

The teachers will have an opportunity to view the charter school’s project-based learning and STEAM units but will be reviewing them from a different perspective than the administrators.

“We will be building a community with these teacher leaders,” said Jennifer Anderson-Rosse, director of curriculum and special projects at Bullis Charter School. “We will be asking them to try some of what they learned in their classrooms and we will give them access to real people in real time for troubleshooting.”

Teachers will also have the opportunity to interview charter school students and teachers to see what works, Anderson-Rosse said.

A culmination event is planned for May as the school year comes to a close, Hersey said.

For more information, visit bcssteam.weebly.com.

When Athletic Director Joseph Stark introduced his love of archery to students at Bullis Charter School this year, he hit the bull’s-eye.

“It was a passion of mine,” said Stark, who joined the staff in the fall. “It is something I learned and love, and I know it is accessible to a lot of students, so I thought I should bring it to Bullis.”

Stark taught archery during regular physical education classes, then began to offer it as an afterschool sport.

“Our afterschool athletics program is built around the community interest at our school,” he said. “Archery has been at the top of that list for a long time.”

Participation has been solid, according to Stark, with approximately 60 students enrolled in the afterschool program and 20 regularly attending.

The charter school designed its archery program with National Archery in the Schools (NASP) standards in mind, emphasizing safety and proper technique.

“It’s the second-safest sport behind pingpong,” Stark said. “It may not seem like it, because you are using bows and arrows, but we emphasize safety and steps to succeed.”

Stark trained students to participate in the NASP California Archery Tournament, which requires them to shoot 15 arrows from a distance of 10 meters and 15 from 15 meters. More than 20 students competed in the tournament, individually and as a team. Bullis Charter School eighth-grader Skyler Rosenberg placed third overall with a score of 281.

Archery became one of Skyler’s passions after Stark launched the sport at school. Skyler enrolled in the afterschool program and pursues it outside of class as well.

“I think archery is special because it is one of the sports that is really accessible to everyone,” Stark said. “You are not really held back by any disability – you don’t have to be the most athletically gifted in the world. A lot of it is about patience, focus and concentration.”

Skills learned through archery can be used in everyday life, he added.

“You go out every day and try to better yourself,” Stark said. “There are a lot of kids who understand that. They set their own goals and you see the excitement when they actually reach one.”

Stark said he is fortunate to work at a school that allows him to share his interests with the students.

“You can really see how my passion is reflected in the students’ growth throughout the year – I am lucky to have that,” he said.

Fourth- and fifth-graders at Bullis Charter School stepped into the role of teacher last week when they taught kindergarten and first-grade students how they can help save leatherback sea turtles.

The school developed the event, called Turtle Camp, after receiving a $4,000 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Ocean (NOAA) Guardian Grant awarded to schools that demonstrate a commitment to protect and conserve local and global waterways.

Jessica Lura, director of strategic initiatives and partnerships at Bullis Charter School, worked with students in her co-curricular class “The Blue Crew,” an elective class focusing on reducing marine debris, to design the Turtle Camp for younger students.

“The NOAA grant allowed us to expand upon our school’s mission to teach our students about the interconnectedness of people and their environments,” Lura said. “It is important for students as young as kindergarten to understand that they have a direct impact on our local waterways, and that small actions can have a big impact on our oceans and marine life – in this case, the survival of the leatherback sea turtles.”

Leatherback sea turtle protection and conservation are part of an Environmental Science unit that all grade levels participate in at Bullis Charter School. Lura and her students wanted to build on their knowledge of leatherback sea turtles and explore the negative effects of marine debris on the health of the oceans.

Fourth- and fifth-graders led the younger students through four activity centers, all focused on different aspects of protecting the oceans. The first station included a world map and an explanation of the gyre in the Pacific Ocean and culminated with students signing a pledge to recycle and use reusable water bottles.

“It was exciting to teach the younger students because it gave them a good chance to learn about how all of their actions affect the ocean,” said Sophy Mintz, a fifth-grader at the charter school. “We wanted them to learn about how harmful even one piece of trash can be in the ocean, and we used interactive activities like a skit at the end of our presentation to help them remember the information.”

Another station included a mini-lesson on how local waterways connect to the ocean. Kindergartners used ocean props and costumes to act out a skit demonstrating how a piece of plastic could eventually harm a leatherback sea turtle.

Students also had a chance to draw and write short notes on ways to help preserve the oceans and marine life. The notes will be mailed to their sister school in Costa Rica later this spring.

Bullis Charter School has a new tool in its arsenal this year as it tackles the implementation of Common Core curriculum standards.

Seventh-grade teacher Lisa Stone was one of 200 chosen from among 4,000 applicants for the “Dream Team” assembled by the educational startup LearnZillion. Stone and the other members of the Dream Team worked to create online lesson plans for teachers that are Common Core-aligned.

LearnZillion, an online resource for teachers, offers a growing set of math and English resources for grades 2-12, developed by experienced teachers and connected directly with Common Core State Standards.

Stone spent the summer collaborating with four other teachers and a coach to dissect a Close Reading lesson for seventh-graders.

Her team was given a text selection and tasked with creating a five-day lesson plan around the text that would meet Common Core standards.

“Common Core now says that you need to put text in front of students that is really too hard for them to understand,” she said.

The final product instructs teachers on how to examine a piece of literature, identify what is complex about it and explain what to focus on with the students – step-by-step and at a determined pace.

The resource is valuable for teachers because it not only provides them with the lesson, but also offers real-time professional development, Stone said.

“It really teaches how to engage in metacognition,” she said. “It models for teachers how to teach these types of habits of mind.”

The lesson plans include instructional videos that teachers can use in the classroom or as part of their lesson preparation. The videos for each lesson are free and available to teachers, students and parents.

LearnZillion’s premium service provides details on how to build a unit around the Common Core concept. The end product of The Dream Team’s work is a textbooklike resource for schools and their districts that addresses the requirements of Common Core.

Common Core spells out the benchmarks and concepts that students need to learn, but leaves how to get there up to teachers. That’s where LearnZillion steps in.

“The focus of LearnZillion is on the metacognition – what are the building blocks you need to build up to the requirements of Common Core,” Stone said.

Because Stone served on LearnZillion’s Dream Team of teachers over the summer, Bullis Charter School benefits from the website’s premium service – equipping teachers with many different Common Core lessons to select and implement this school year.

“I think it is part of my job to help teachers become the best they can be,” she said. “Part of the reason why I chose to do this was because I need to go outside of my school and scale my impact.”

For more information, visit LearnZillion.com.

A group of Bullis Charter School parents established the Bullis Boosters Summer Bridge Camp to provide a summer camp experience for underserved local students.

The camp, in its second year, offers a free, weeklong program for second- through fourth-graders from the Los Altos and Mountain View Whisman school districts.

Charter school parents Martha McClatchie and Grace Yang co-founded the camp, which ran last week at the charter school on the Egan Junior High School campus.

“We do outreach to populations that wouldn’t normally get to attend summer camp,” said McClatchie, who is also a candidate for the Los Altos School District Board of Trustees. “We really believe that in the summer, kids need something going on in their lives.”

And the timing of the camp is intentional, Yang added.

“Having the camp when we have it – two weeks before school starts – and just getting kids back in that mindset brings a real confidence when they come back to school in two weeks,” she said.

Yang and McClatchie stressed that the camp takes a village to host. The pair estimated that there are as many volunteers as there are campers – 50 – devoting hundreds of volunteer hours.

The campers enjoy a small-group experience, with a ratio of approximately 6:1 in the classroom.

Assisting are 14 volunteer counselors from local high schools and a number of volunteers from Explorabox and i3, who oversee science and math activities.

Explorabox, a nonprofit organization based in Los Altos, produces science-in-a-box kits that encourage students to participate in hands-on activities. Explorabox donated its boxes and volunteers to the camp.

i3, a group of Stanford University mechanical engineering students, volunteered to conduct science experiments and math games with campers.

A thirst for learning

In addition to the daily language arts, math and science activities the camp offers, students took a field trip to Deer Hollow Farm, where they identified plants and animals and connected them with their camp curriculum.

“I love watching the kids’ reactions and watching them learn right in front of my face,” said Mary Porter, a senior who volunteers with the camp. “This is an outstanding camp for the kids. If you watch their faces during the day, you see their faces change because they get hot and tired – but they are always so excited to see what comes next.”

Yang said student engagement is part of what makes the Bullis Boosters Summer Bridge Camp unique.

“All of our kids are so well behaved and so eager to learn, and that is unusual to see in many camps,” she said. “They are thirsty to learn, and they just need the opportunities.”

The camp is a true volunteer effort, McClatchie said. The only paid staff members are the two teachers, one from Castro School and another from the charter school.

Local organizations, including Linden Tree Books, Whole Foods Market, The Counter, LuLu’s, Spot Pizza, Choice Lunch, Smitten Ice Cream, Explorabox and the Kiwanis Club of Los Altos, donated supplies, lunches and money to offset camp expenses.

In the future, McClatchie and Yang said they want to create a “camp-in-a-box” model to share with other school districts.

“All you need is a group of dedicated parents to get started,” McClatchie said.

For more information, visit bullisboosterscamp.org.