Photo by Sam Nalven To learn the value of public service, students at Paradise Valley’s private Tesseract School regularly volunteer at the Phoenix Herpetological Society, among other organizations.

PUBLIC SERVICE/CHARITY
Tesseract School, Paradise Valley
Private school

Picking up snake poop teaches you a few lessons. One, responsibility. Two, proper reptile care. And three, you just shouldn’t fool around with snakes.

For students at Paradise Valley’s Tesseract School, however, the greatest lesson is giving back to the community. Cleaning up after these cold-blooded animals – which they’ve done gratis for the Phoenix Herpetological Society since 2004 – is just one of their many public service projects.

Every week, students from Tesseract’s two campuses, which serve pre-kindergarten through high school, engage in activities such as collecting clothes for youths at the Arizona Children’s Burn Camp, gathering vitamins and supplies to send to a sister school in Cambodia, or reading to children at a homeless shelter.

Twice a year, fifth- through 12th-graders participate in off-campus activities, including sorting food at Desert Mission Food Bank and enhancing the Pinnacle Peak trail. Each year, eighth-graders go to Costa Rica to visit a rainforest and work on an organic farm to learn about sustainability.

Ninth- and 10th-graders are required to do 16 hours of community service a year. When the school adds 11th and 12th grade in the fall of 2010 and 2011, respectively, those students will be expected to complete 20 hours per year.

“Good schools are thinking about the whole child in a real-life setting,” says head of school Nigel Taplin.

Other standouts: Arizona Connections Academy, online with office in Mesa; Pima Butte Elementary School, Maricopa


SCHOOL NEWSPAPER/YEARBOOK
Sunrise Mountain High School, Peoria
Peoria Unified School District

Be objective and protect the First Amendment. OMG! Seems like a heavy responsibility for a text-crazed teenager, doesn’t it?

But at Peoria’s Sunrise Mountain High School, students are delivering quality journalism to a local audience using digital photographs, podcasts and Twitter, an online communication tool where users can post mobile updates using 140 characters or less. Their work earned the school newspaper, The Mustang Express, the Arizona Newspaper Association’s 2008 Better Newspapers Contest in the large high school category.

Newspaper multimedia editor Morgan Brewster was one of eight students nationally and in Korea selected for the Journalism Education Association’s Scholastic Press Student Partners, which helps students protect the First Amendment. Sunrise graduates Melissa Fittro, former newspaper online editor-in-chief, and Alex Powelson, who was The Stampede yearbook’s editor-in-chief, were honored with The Arizona Republic’s Scholastic Journalist Awards in 2009.

Students have tackled sensitive subjects with maturity, says newspaper and yearbook adviser Kristy Roschke, including the death of a former student.

“We fight for students to be able to express themselves,” says Brewster, 17. “Without journalists, a lot of things would go unnoticed.”

Other standouts: Highland High School, Gilbert; McClintock High School, Tempe


SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNING
Bennett Academy, Phoenix
Charter school

China is our second largest trading partner, with $32.5 billion in imports and exports for the month of April alone. Canada is No. 1, but really, when it comes to doing business, do we have a problem communicating with Canadians? No way, eh.

But with China’s increasing impact on the world economy, officials for the Bennett Academy are getting students ready for tomorrow’s reality today.

Students at this charter school near Interstate 17 and Bethany Home Road learn Mandarin Chinese from an early age. Last year, second- and eighth-graders took weekly Mandarin classes taught by a Panpan LLC language school instructor. Second-graders attended them once a week for about 60 minutes, while eighth-graders attended them once a week for 80 minutes. During class, students learn to speak, read and write Mandarin as well as study Chinese history, art and culture. They may learn how to introduce themselves one day, and then sing songs in Mandarin the next.

Next year, officials may reduce the courses to 45 minutes per week, an easier amount of time to learn the rigorous instruction.

“Knowing about China and Chinese culture will help them in whatever they do to understand the competitive playing field… in the business world,” says Principal David Blakeley.

Other standouts: Gilbert Classical Academy, Gilbert; Pueblo Elementary School, Scottsdale

Photo by Sam Nalven Students at Edu-Prize charter school in Gilbert link hand-made chains together for a school project in April.

SCIENCE
Edu-Prize School, Gilbert
Charter school

Forget about the pet rock. To truly respect, appreciate and understand geology, try belting out a tune about metamorphic and igneous rock types among friends.

They will laugh at you ­– unless their kid attends Edu-Prize in Gilbert. Then they might sing along, since that’s the kind of thing this charter school near Cooper and Baseline roads encourages to make science fun.

The school was founded in 1995 by Dr. Lynn Robershotte and JoAnna Curtis, two educators whose goal was to incorporate science into art projects, writing and music.

The state-labeled “excelling” K-8 charter school has earned Arizona Educational Foundation’s A+ award, and 94 percent of its fourth-graders passed the science part of the AIMS test in 2009. The state average for that grade was 57 percent.

Students have used scientific principles to dissect owl pellets, analyze historical figures’ actions, create fake moon craters, and test whether smiling affects behavior. They also care for vegetables in a hydroponic greenhouse and garden.

“These kids are on fire with excitement,” says Robershotte, superintendent of Edu-Prize School and a similar charter campus, Eduprize Schools in Queen Creek. “With our hands-on approach, it ensures… retention and learning.”

Other standouts: Campo Verde High School, Gilbert; Phoenix Union Bioscience High School, Phoenix