Teachers to get overseas training

DOWNEY – Three DUSD teachers have been chosen for an education fellowship and will travel abroad this summer. Daniel Kim, an AP environmental science teacher at Downey, will travel to Costa Rica, where he will explore the flora and fauna of the marine coastal and rain forest biodomes to create more tangible and relevant learning tools for his students.

Warren High’s Tiffani Bowen and Lisa Mistrik will travel to Austria, Slovakia and Switzerland. They will study the concepts and applications associated with the effects of music as a psychological therapy in working with students with autism and other special needs.

The fellowships are financed by grants from Funds for Teachers, which describes itself as “a piggy bank of sorts, funding educators’ quests for deeper knowledge or mastery that transfers directly to students.”

“We all learn by knowing, by doing,” said Karen Webb, executive director of Fund for Teachers. “These grants offer teachers more than ‘one-size-fits-all’ professional development and it’s free for the district. Everyone wins, with the biggest winners being the students.”

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Published: April 16, 2015 - Volume 14 - Issue 01