Geometric Christmas

Career Academy students practice lessons with origami

“A charter means choice. Now people can have a choice about where their kids go to school. If the school is not working, they can take their kids out. That’s why it’s important that we get it right.” Nancy Roberts, executive director and CEO, Louisiana Resource Center for Educators

Sixteen-year-old Navia Jones knows one reason students are making origami Christmas ornaments in her geometry class at the Career Academy Charter School.

“If some people can’t afford Christmas ornaments, they can make their own,” Jones said.

Her teacher, Cecelia Perkins, has another idea.

“This is a geometry class,” she said. “We are talking about dimensions. We are talking about squares and rectangles and triangles.”

Perkins has 37 years of experience as a math teacher with many of those years in California. She is originally from Baton Rouge. “This is home,” said Perkins, who has complete control of the class from a motorized wheelchair.

She believes in enrichment projects like origami, the Japanese art of paper folding.

“The children are learning to listen. They are working cooperatively together. They are following specific, clear directions to get a finished product,” she said.

The class spent three 40–minute periods on the project over three different days. On the first day, the students learned about origami and the basics of folding paper. On the second day, they prepared the paper, which they used on the third day to fold into their ornaments. These now decorate the school Christmas tree.

Perkins insists that the children do their work carefully and correctly. “We’re not in any hurry,” she said. The project also taught a lesson in economy. Because origami paper is expensive, the students made their own by pasting heavier paper on Christmas wrapping paper.

The Career Academy is the vision of Nancy Roberts, said Pamela Mackie, Career Academy principal. Roberts is executive director and CEO of LRCE, the Louisiana Resource Center for Educators.

“In Louisiana, you must be a not–for–profit to apply for a charter school,” Roberts said. “A charter is a contract, and my agency is the 501(c)3 (non- profit) agency that holds the charter/contract to manage the Career Academy high school.”

The school is housed in the old Brookstown Elementary School, which closed in May. Career Academy now has 172 students in the ninth and 10th grades. The plan is to add the 11th grade the next academic year and 12th grade the following year. The school, which opened Aug. 10, operates on the trimester system.

Career Academy is a Type 1 charter school authorized by the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board. It has open enrollment and is financed by public funds and donations.

“We try to get kids to focus, not on jobs, but on careers,” Mackie said. “That can lead to a lifetime of achievement.”

“The focus of the school is workforce development, and the students are to leave the Career Academy with a career path in one of four areas,” Roberts said.

Allied health, manufacturing, culinary and hospitality, and automotive repair and transportation are the focus areas.

“There are jobs right here that need to be filled by competent employees,” Mackie said. The school partners with businesses and individuals in the community to help the students understand the focus areas.

Assistant Principal Sherwanda Johnson coordinates field trips so students can see what is involved in a particular career path. In the four months the school has been open, groups of students have visited the Baton Rouge General Medical Center, Gerry Lane Enterprises, Kleinpeter Farms Dairy, Exxon and Turner Industries.

Once a month, the students practice job interviews. “They have to dress as if they are going to an interview,” Mackie said.

Career Academy also provides rigorous academic courses as preparation for a high school diploma, Mackie said. “We give all state mandated tests.”

Jeremy Matthews, 16, took to the paper folding almost instantly and was soon working on his own from a book of origami. He likes the “one-on-one relationship” with the teachers at the Career Academy.

He is planning for a career in business management.

Roberts is doing everything she can to help the Career Academy succeed.

“A charter means choice. Now people can have a choice about where their kids go to school,” she said. “If the school is not working, they can take their kids out. That’s why it’s important that we get it right.”