Oak Park Neighborhood School honored with Golden Bell Award

The California School Boards Association (CBSA) awarded the Oak Park Neighborhood School with the 2005 Golden Bell Award.

The award recognizes school programs throughout California that utilize outstanding methods to aid educational development and enrichment.

The CBSA is a nonprofit organization that represents more than 1,000 K-12 school districts and county offices of education throughout California.

Located on the campus of Oak Hills Elementary School, the Oak Park Neighborhood School offers a hands-on learning experience for children between the ages of 3 and 5.

The school employs the Reggio Emilia method, an Italian educational philosophy that seeks to develop a child’s power of thinking by developing expressive and cognitive communication techniques.

“Our school operates on a relationship-based program in which the kids are treated as competent and capable people,” said Kim Gregorchuk, director of the school.

The mixed-age classrooms base their curriculums on the interests of the students as well as the three issues that concern parents: reading, writing and math.

“One of our students held a high interest in sharks, so we had the teachers organize a unit on marine life,” said Gregorchuk.

According to Gregorchuk, the passion for marine life quickly spread from one child to the next once the unit was introduced. Learning fundamentals were incorporated into the unit by having teachers assign readings from books about the ocean and writing exercises that included marine life word banks.

The students also took a field trip to the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium and are currently in the process of transforming their classrooms into underwater environments.

“Our setup models that of a typical developmental preschool, but our curriculum is guided by the children’s interest,” said Gregorchuk.

The Oak Park Neighborhood School was founded in September 2002. Originally occupying only one room and serving 22 students, the half-day preschool program has tripled in size since its

“We are very pleased and proud that our preschool has been so honored,” said Tony Knight, the Oak Park Unified School District superintendent. “The program is truly remarkable and provides the highest quality early childhood experience available. When we developed the program, it was decided that it should serve as a model in all ways, and it truly has.”

Even though the school has only been operating for a couple of years, children who have graduated from the program are doing very well both academically and socially in upper grades, said school officials.

“We make sure that the children not only love learning and want to continue learning, but that they know how to get their shovel back when they’re out on the playground,” said Gregorchuk. “Academics are only half the equation. We also want to make sure the students can communicate properly so that they will be able to negotiate and problem solve later in life.”

Gregorchuk, who received a bachelor’s in child development from Cal State Northridge and has over 25 years teaching experience, credits much of the school’s success to her staff of teachers. The preschool teachers often log extra hours in an effort to extend learning options and make sure all the children’s interests are incorporated into the curriculum.

The preschool program is available only for Oak Park residents and is funded by a state grant in addition to student tuition.

Tuition for the program, which runs from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday, is $528 a month.