{"id":466,"date":"2016-06-17T20:33:22","date_gmt":"2016-06-17T20:33:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nycrican.soy\/?p=466"},"modified":"2016-06-18T03:58:41","modified_gmt":"2016-06-18T03:58:41","slug":"my-ecuador-higher-educationk-12-leadership-study-abroad-trip-tuesday-june-7th-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nycrican.soy\/?p=466","title":{"rendered":"My Ecuador Higher Education\/K-12 Leadership Study Abroad Trip: Tuesday June 7th, 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

This morning, the plan was for us to visit one of the best private prep k-12 schools in the country, so we can learn about the kind of curriculum used at the school\u00a0and how it got started. The plan was\u00a0to attend lectures there from 9:00 am until 1:00 pm and also enjoy a midmorning snack at the school. The name of the school is, “Colegio Intisana”, which has a website located here: http:\/\/www.intisana.com\/<\/a>\u00a0This school only admits boys, but also has a sister school which only admits girls. Nevertheless, due to the fact that the sister school is located elsewhere and because of the time constraints, we only visited all boy school.<\/p>\n

Here is a picture of the inside of the all boys school. As shown, you will notice that this school is located in a scenic part of Quito.<\/p>\n

\"School1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The school\u00a0got started when a bunch of neighborhood parents got together and decided that their children needed a different type of school than the schools that were available at the time. The parent group decided that the new school needed to do more than just\u00a0educate students. Specifically, the new school needed\u00a0to hire faculty whom were also\u00a0pillars of the community\u00a0and who\u00a0modeled exemplary behaviors\u00a0that\u00a0students could\u00a0emulate to help them\u00a0become outstanding citizens. The visionary school also needed to address the student’s\u00a0spiritual needs and had to be non denominational. \u00a0Therefore,\u00a0whatever religion was practiced in the student’s home would be respected by the school.\u00a0 The school also had make learning the English language a high priority.\u00a0The school finally\u00a0opened it’s doors on October 26th, 1966 with a handful of teachers and a few students.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As previously stated, presently\u00a0this school is one of the best quality private k-12 prep schools in Ecuador. The tuition at this school is very expensive, however many\u00a0students who attend get scholarships. Many parents who send their children to the school, do so because many other generations of their families also attended. Surprisingly, some\u00a0of the first set of teachers whom were hired to teach at the\u00a0school are still employed\u00a0there. Additionally, wealthier parents who send their children to this school support the school scholarship fund\u00a0so that\u00a0the school can\u00a0admit students regardless of socioeconomic backgrounds and keep operating.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, what distinguishes this Ecuadorian school from others, is that on July 27th, 2013,\u00a0their high school got approval to start participating in the, “International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme \u00a0(IBDP)”. \u00a0The IBDP organization has a website located here:\u00a0http:\/\/www.ibo.org\/<\/a>\u00a0According to the website,\u00a0 the the IBDP program is recognized worldwide as having high quality rigorous academic standards and that the high school credentials of any student graduating with an\u00a0IBDP HS diploma, makes them\u00a0eligible to apply for admission to any university in the world.<\/p>\n

In the year 2014, the school also became\u00a0a pilot school participating in the, “Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)”, exam program. The PISA webpage can be found here:\u00a0http:\/\/www.oecd.org\/pisa\/<\/a>\u00a0According to this website, these are international standarized exams that test high school students in the subjects of reading, mathematics and science. The webpage\u00a0also states that students benefit by having their test scores\u00a0in these three subject areas recognized worldwide as adequate credentials, for admission purposes to universities in all countries that participate in the PISA program.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the website states that PISA exams are financed by the governments who participate in the program. The PISA webpage states\u00a0that some of the schools in the USA also participate in this exam program. Nevertheless, as of the date of this post, Ecuador is still in the pilot stages of participating in this exam program. \u00a0Therefore \u00a0the county is not yet listed as one of the participating countries on the PISA webpage.\u00a0You can however, read more information about Ecuador’s pilot plan participation on this webpage here:\u00a0http:\/\/www.elcomercio.com\/tendencias\/pisa-comenzara-ecuador-pruebas-piloto.html<\/a><\/p>\n

One of the things that impressed me the most about this school is that the school offers ministry to the entire family. They have counselors available at the school to advice the family’s of the students with any personal problems that they may have. I believe that this is essential if students are to truly thrive in an academic setting.\u00a0\u00a0I was also \u00a0impressed that the school has a policy of\u00a0not assigning homework on the weekends to allow students to have more time for family activities. Finally, this students of this school currently has the highest overall scores on Ecuadorian National Standardized exams. In my opinion, this fact leaves no doubt in my mind regarding the academic success of the students at that school and it’s rigorous academic standards. We left the school around 1:00 pm and went to a local restaurant to have lunch.<\/p>\n

Then, we went on to do some shopping for several hours. We visited the. ” Artisanal Market” located in Quito’s Mariscal Region. We stayed in the area until approximately 4:30pm and then returned to our bed\/breakfast location until dinner time.\u00a0<\/span>Here is a short video showing what the shopping area is like:<\/p>\n