Brookwood’s Academic Resource Center celebrates two decades
It’s not often that you see such a joyful celebration during the school day; the gathering may as well have been a family reunion. The room overflowed with alumni, current students, their parents and their teachers — past and present. They exchanged hugs and kisses, as well as stories of triumph and growth.
Brookwood School’s Academic Resource Center (ARC) this year celebrates 20 years of excellence, and Thursday’s open house, along with the grand opening of an Outdoor Learning Center, were highlights of the event.Brookwood’s stated mission is to educate the whole child — academically, physically, socially and spiritually, regardless of a student’s learning style. And for the past two decades, the school’s Academic Resource Center has offered support services to facilitate that mission.
“We are celebrating students’ success,” said Amy Stalvey, ARC director for the Middle and Upper Schools. “We’re celebrating the fact that these kids — no matter what they’re struggling with — they overcome it. They learn the tools, they learn to advocate and they become successful human beings outside of these walls.”
ARC educators collaborate with the students, their teachers and their families to meet their learning needs. The program is available to every student in kindergarten through 12th grade who has a demonstrated need for learning accommodations.
The ARC’s services
Children in kindergarten through second grades can qualify for the school’s Reading Intervention Team program (RITe) through teacher observation and a diagnostic tool called DIBLES, a standardized reading fluency assessment given three times a year to all children in kindergarten through the fourth grade.
“If there are indicators of at risk, then they may be candidates for the program,” said Jenny Ladson, ARC director for the Lower School. RITe is for kindergarten, first and second graders, and it’s free of charge for Brookwood students.
Ladson is trained in both Lindamood-Bell and Orton- Gillingham, two reading programs for younger students who struggle to read. Older grade school children, whose services are based on the recommendations set forth by educational psychological evaluations done professionally outside of the school, see Ladson on an individual basis. “We really try to remediate using a student’s strengths,” she said. “Through those strengths, we try to fill in the achievement gaps and give the student tools for their toolbox to become independent and successful in the classroom.” For Middle and Upper School students, Stalvey said, the Academic Resource Center is a place where they can reach their potential when that may be more difficult for them in the regular classroom.
When kids walk through the doors of the ARC, they find that it is also staffed with teachers with whom they are familiar and who specialize in their subject areas. Mrs. Christa Boggs helps students with math and science; Mrs. Sara Wagoner, with English and history.
“Having someone who is a Resource Center teacher who is also a classroom teacher outside of the room just makes the transition for some children so much easier,” Stalvey said.
In order to cater to the learning needs of each student, the ARC is equipped with multiple seating options and locations to work. Brookwood’s counselor, Allison Harrell, is also on hand to work with students, as well as Mavis, the school’s therapy dog.
Dr. Randy Watts, Brookwood’s headmaster, said the value that the Academic Resource Center brings to Brookwood School cannot be overstated.
“The staff in the ARC work tirelessly to help students help themselves to find success in our challenging academic program,” he said. “As a school, we embrace diverse learning styles, needs, and mindsets. This is exemplified in the ARC.”
The Center’s history
When it was founded in 1997, the ARC — known at the time as the Study Lab — was funded by a grant that ran out after a few years. The Brookwood community then rallied to find the funding to ensure that the Academic Resources Center would continue.
Parent Rebecca Moore, whose son Aulston, class of 2016, received services throughout his Brookwood career, said it’s easy to misunderstand the importance of the resource. “So many people.... just don’t get what the ARC does for a student.
Many see it as a crutch, but it is actually a bridge to a new way of learning,” she said. Today, she said, her son uses the skills and confidence he learned from the ARC “to tackle anything he wants to learn. His frequent standing on the Dean’s List of GCSU is proof of this ability.”
Indeed, Brookwood’s faculty soon began to see growth in students who received services.
“It was amazing to see proof” when a child took the extended time he or she needed to complete a test, Stalvey beamed. “Look.
Look what was in their brain. And you would have never seen that, without time.”
Of course, Ladson added, it never hurts to have administrative support. “Dr. Watts is an integral part of the ARC. His educational background and classroom experience enable him to see the value of differential teachingstyles,” she said.
Twenty years of growth
The ARC is now recognized as a place where all children’s differences are embraced and celebrated.
“I felt appreciated, respected, cared for and loved,” said Brookwood alumna Rachel Click of the time she spent in the ARC. “I remember feeling more free in the Study Lab because despite what anyone may think, the test, homework or paper didn’t get easier in there; we were simply allowed a better, quieter, less pressuring environment to really review and think about the task in front of us,” she said.
“The ARC gave everyone a chance to feel equal — and more importantly, capable,” she continued.
“We are all bright and capable and should all be confident of the gifts we were given, despite how brighter or quicker others around us may seem.”
Click, who graduated in 2004, now works with Raymond James Financial Services in Brentwood, Tenn.
final plans. Alumna Catie Hancock, who graduated from Brookwood in 2008, agreed.
“The door that I was originally so nervous to open was actually the door that opened my mind to ... resources and learning strategies that helped me understand what my difficulties were and how to tackle them,” she said.
And through their work together, the students and their teachers begin to feel like family, Stalvey said. “We’ve gone to weddings and baby showers. It’s a family within a family. It really is.”
The new Outdoor Learning Center
Stalvey and Ladson are proud to celebrate 20 years of service with the grandopening of an outdoor classroom.
“We’ve dreamed about an Outdoor Learning Center for years,” Stalvey said. “Jenny and I have talked about, designed and played with it — and it never quite happened until a wonderful gift came. We got the approvals and met multiple times to design it.
ARC students even had a chance to weigh in on the “These kids need a different environment to learn. Sometimes they just need to be outside,” Stalvey said. “There are so many different learning styles, and sometimes students need a different kind of environment in which to learn and be productive.
The Outside Learning Center provides just this — a beautiful place for students to be outside with the sun shining on them, the birds singing and a comfy chair or bean bag to sit in.”
The outdoor lab is equipped with a chalkboard and tables that can be turned vertically or horizontally and connect, depending on the size of the student group working there. Varied comfortable chairs, including bean bags, will help “take the stress and anxiety off of some situations that they may have,” Stalvey said.
Thursday’s open house was designed to be a celebration and an eye opener for those in the community who have questions about ARC services.
“We want to open the doors to everyone. We want them to see what we’re about,” Stalvey said.
Brookwood School
Located in Thomasville, GA, Brookwood School is a private school for grades JK-12. Students benefit from a challenging academic program, fine and performing arts, competitive athletics, and a wide selection of extracurricular activities.