HARFORD FRIENDS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TO OPEN IN 2008:
Planning Team Formed to Develop Lower School Program, Features Local Educators
February 15, 2007: In preparation for the opening of its elementary school in 2008, Harford Friends School announced today the formation of a stellar Elementary School Planning Team. Members include Pat Anderson, Linda Davis, Deborah Goldman, Ann Gregory, Judy Harlan, Susan Healy, Christine Huxtable, Linda Pierno-Derengowski, Erik Resurreccion, and Dr. Mary Ellen Saterlie. The Planning Team is responsible for laying the foundation and framework for a Harford Friends elementary education. Members will develop a curricular framework of academic excellence based on the Maryland Voluntary State Curriculum, while incorporating the dynamic social/emotional learning, Quaker values, inquiry-based, hands-on approach to learning that Harford Friends School advances.
The addition of a lower school to the current middle school program significantly advances the mission of the school. In its first year, the elementary school will offer a fifteen student first grade and combined second/third grade and fourth/fifth grade classes will be offered if demand warrants. Elementary school applications will be made available beginning October 1, 2007. Harford Friends School will then offer a full first through eighth grade program, utilizing classroom and administrative space at the Highland Commons Building in Street. The school will have use of the facility's gymnasium/auditorium, as well. HFS has also been granted daily access to the fourteen acres of athletic fields operated by the Department of Parks and Recreation.
The dynamic middle school program will benefit from the superior academic foundation at the elementary level and the first grade through eighth grade program brings the school one step closer to its eventual goal of offering a full kindergarten through twelfth grade. “If the quality of the elementary school program reflects even just a fraction of the Elementary School Planning Team's collective wisdom and experience, our children and families should get ready for an amazing elementary school experience!" remarked Jonathan Huxtable, Head of School.
The Planning Team represents a variety of educational backgrounds and leadership experiences. Pat Anderson, a recently retired Harford County teacher, has thirty-five years teaching experience and numerous years of service with the Harford County Education Association and Maryland State Teachers Association. Ms. Anderson earned a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education and a Master's degree in Early Childhood Education from Towson University. Ann Gregory, a lifelong Harford County resident with twenty-five years of teaching experience, obtained her degree in education from the University of Delaware. Judy Harlan, a founding HFS Board member has sixteen years teaching experience in elementary schools. Harford County Public School's "Teacher of the Year, 2006-2007" award-winner, Susan Healy, is also a member of the Planning Team. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Salisbury State and a Master of Science in Instructional Technology from Towson University. She brings thirteen years teaching experience at North Bend Elementary School to the group's effort, as well as eight generations of Harford County family history.
The Planning Team also includes active community member Harriett Holloway, a retired teacher with two years in the classroom and eight years as a substitute teacher. Linda Davis has twenty-eight years of teaching and administrative experience with Baltimore County Public Schools, The Park School, Friends School of Baltimore, and at the Calvert School in Calvert County (MD) where she served as the Head of Lower School. Deborah Goldman is an active community member and a parent who home- schooled three children. She is currently employed by HCPS as an inclusion helper.
Christine Huxtable, who holds a Master's degree in elementary education from Widener University (PA), has nine years of teaching experience at regional independent schools.
Erik Resurreccion, a graduate of Dartmouth College and Columbia University's Bank Street College of Teacher Education, is a first-grade teacher at Manhattan's Allen Stevenson School. He is a published author on issues of diversity in independent schools and has served on the New York State Association of Independent Schools Diversity committee as both member and chairperson. Mary Ellen Saterlie, founding HFS Board member and former Associate Superintendent of Instruction for Baltimore County Schools, is a graduate of Towson University, and holds a Masters degree and PhD from the University of Maryland. Linda Pierno- Derengowski serves on the Planning Team, as well. She is Harford Friends School's middle school math teacher and serves as Student-Life Coordinator. Linda is a graduate of Whittier College in California and has taught in Harford County private schools and in the public school system.
