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want to take a student who is significantly
behind and say, ‘If you’re not proficient
tomorrow, you’ve failed. You’re done.’ It’s
all about the growth and the goal setting,”
she continued. “We want our students to
be responsible for their own learning and
we want them to set goals and problemsolve
and grow towards their success.”
Upon starting the school year with this
tremendous news, Principal Johnson was
careful to remember that their journey was
not complete. She added: “Obviously, we
want to maintain the course; we don’t want
to fall back. Especially this year, adding
sixth grade! We have to make sure that
we bring what we found successful last
year to sixth grade this year.”
That’s right, Palm View is not only
achieving – they’re growing! The school
has added sixth grade students to their
campus this year. And they expect to
have seventh and eighth grade students
on campus within the next two years –
growing their campus to a full elementary
and middle school student body.
But that’s not the only addition to the
Palm View campus this year. Palm View
has also launched the “Woz Career
Pathways” program – making it the first
school in Florida to implement the full
program, which will eventually (with
the addition of the seventh and eighth
grade students) offer instruction to all
Kindergarten through eighth grade
students at the school.
Sixth grade instructor Neirda Lafontant
brought her background in civi l
engineering to Palm View this year to
work with students on STEAM learning.
Her excitement was palpable as she
discussed the program: “The Woz
program was brought about by Steve
Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple. He felt
the need to give hands-on experience
to kids in the fields of STEAM – science,
technology, engineering, arts, and
mathematics - in the hopes that he would
plant the seed and they would pursue
those in-demand careers in the future.”
Woz Career Pathways cur rent ly
incorporates instruction in five STEAMbased
areas (or “Pathways”): engineering