For information about the schools of our Winter Institute 2007 featured speakers, as well as Webster University, we invite you to review the following:

Bold Park School in Perth, Australia

Bold Park Community School is committed to the provision of quality education and care of three to fifteen year olds. We believe that children learn best when they are given the opportunity to explore and interact with an environment in a constructive way at their own pace. Consequently our programs are designed to provide the maximum opportunity to experience a variety of materials, ideas and social situations at a level appropriate to the individual child.

We provide a stable physical environment that encourages the child to develop self-confidence and communication skills. Rather than separating children by age, we provide an environment more akin to society where all ages interact. Through our comprehensive and sensitive approach to developing the individual, Bold Park Community School aims to provide an appropriate education that enables our students to successfully approach challenges that lie ahead. We believe that parents and family play an integral role in a child’s education and welcome them to share in the learning journey.

Boulder Journey School in Boulder, Colorado

Boulder Journey School is a full-day, year-round school that welcomes over 200 young children ages 6 weeks to 6 years and their families. Beginning in 1995, the educators at Boulder Journey School have been engaged in a study of the world-renowned schools for young children in Reggio Emilia, Italy. This study has resulted in ongoing collaboration with educators in Reggio Emilia and with educators throughout the world who are inspired by the Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education. As a school community, Boulder Journey School is committed to creating and maintaining a culture that acknowledges, reflects and communicates our values. Boulder Journey School’s fundamental values are based on an image of children as curious, competent, and capable of co-constructing knowledge. From the moment of birth, children are engaged in a search for the meaning of life, seeking to understand the world that surrounds them and the relationships that they form and develop with others in their world.

At Boulder Journey School educators observe, document and interpret children’s thinking and learning in order to understand, support and extend the children’s meaning-making experiences. Carlina Rinaldi, Executive Consultant to Reggio Children, writes, “In this sense, among the first questions we should ask ourselves as teachers and educators are these: How can we help children find the meaning of what they do, what they encounter, what they experience? And how can we do this for ourselves? These are questions of meaning and the search for meaning (why? how? what?).” These questions are fundamental to the work of children, families and educators at Boulder Journey School.

Opal School in Portland, Oregon

Opal School is a public charter school of the Portland Public School District and a program of Portland Children’s Museum. Opal students come from communities throughout the Portland area and are selected through an open lottery process. Opal School opened in the fall of 2001 with pre-K through first grade students. The school adds one level each year until serving children preschool through fifth grade. Teaching and learning at Opal School is influenced and inspired by the principles and practices of the early childhood schools of Reggio Emilia, Italy.

Every child enters our world asking questions. Who am I? Who are we? What is my place in the world? Children respond to these questions with a capacity that is unique to humans, a rich imagination with the ability to reflect and wonder. Children are fortunate, and their communities blessed when adults listen, pay attention, and create responsive environments that support the innate desire of children to make meaning and find purpose in their lives. When schools support children to uncover, recognize and develop their potential, the entire community and the nation is strengthened.

The mission of Opal School is to strengthen public education by provoking fresh ideas concerning places where people, creativity, and learning thrive. Oregon’s Public Charter School Legislation Act of l999 was designed to strengthen the K-12 public education system by creating opportunities to innovate, rethink, and explore new ways of educating children within the public system.

Opal school is based on the belief that education must provide opportunities for ALL children to participate fully in creating and shaping their own lives, and to contribute fully to the quality of life around them. At Opal School, all children contribute from who they are. Every child brings a particular “uniqueness” that is made visible by the group. It is our intention to dive into the uniqueness of both the individual and the group. We carry a deep respect for differences, however they may be expressed, and a belief that listening, dialogue, and exchange open doors to unimagined possibilities. We hold the view that quality academic practice happens when people form relationships with one another, the environment, the academic disciplines, and the content of their own research. We value the rights of children, families, and educators to participate together in forming and shaping environments that are rich with opportunity, challenge, and choice.

The Campus Children’s Center, University of Vermont in Burlington

The Campus Children's Center at the University of Vermont is an employee-based day care for children 6 weeks to 5 years of age. The Center's missions is two-fold: It is dedicated to serving the children and their families who are enrolled at the Center, and it provides a training facility for the university and the community. The program is accredited by the National Academy of Early Childhood Programs.

The mentor teachers provide supportive, nurturing care to the children at the Center with an emphasis on respecting the individuality of each child in the context of a group setting. Relationships are highly valued and we carefully consider the various relationships between children, parents, teachers and students as we plan our program. Teachers view themselves as co-constructors of children's knowledge, and therefore are directly involved in the children's inquiries. To provide for the greatest consistency in your child's care, at least one primary staff person rotates with each group of children from the infant room until they reach the preschool years.

Ongoing staff development is recognized as fundamental to providing quality child care. Time is made available to staff during the August in service week and throughout the year for the purpose of professional growth both for individual teachers, and for the staff as a group.

The teachers are committed to supporting the parents' role as the primary facilitators of their child's development, and to respecting the diversity among families, which is inherent in the culture of our community. Parents are always welcome in the Center and encouraged to participate spontaneously in the program; parents teach us about their children. We value the close relationships between teachers and families that occur over the years and value the partnerships which develop around educating children.

Webster University in St. Louis, Missouri

Webster University was founded in 1915 by Sisters of Loretto and was one of the first Catholic women's colleges located west of the Mississippi River. Webster has many campuses nationwide as well as international campuses in Geneva, Switzerland, Vienna, Austria; Leiden, the Netherlands; London, UK; Hamilton, Bermuda; Shanghai, China; and Cha-am, Thailand. Webster has about 5,000 enrolled students at the main campus in Webster Groves and 15,000 worldwide.

Webster's Loretto-Hilton Center is home to The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis and the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. It also hosts the Webster Film Festival.

In 1992 Brenda Fyfe, now Dean of the School of Education at Webster University, and Jan Phillips, then director of The College School co-wrote and were awarded a three year grant from the Danforth Foundation that supported a diverse group of schools located in St. Louis city and county to study the Reggio Approach, and to begin to find ways that this approach could inspire their philosophy and their practice with young children.  Since then, Webster University and the three schools of the St. Louis Collaborative, The College School, The St. Michael School and Clayton Schools’ Family Center have collaborated on many initiatives and conferences including bringing in short and long term consultants from Reggio Emilia, and North America, and hosting the exhibit of the Hundred Languages of Children in 2001.