Lake Mountain School District Board Of Education Board Meeting
The meeting featured an innovation spotlight presentation by Joy Peterson, Library Coordinator for Alpine School District, who detailed initiatives at Sage Canyon Middle School, including making the library a vibrant hub, hosting themed activities like a Harry Potter quest, running a monthly genre book club, and implementing project-based learning collaborations with teachers on topics such as world religions and Westward Expansion using immersive, hands-on experiences. Peterson also presented data comparing library circulation statistics across various secondary schools, noting the high correlation between library activities and increased book checkouts, and the significant difference in physical versus ebook readership among high school students. Following this, April Thompson, a chemistry teacher at Westlake High School, presented on her initiative to drive student enrollment in challenging science courses by adopting the 'Bites' program from Harvard University, which utilizes food-based phenomena to teach chemistry concepts and demonstrate real-world application, aiming to address student reluctance toward difficult subjects.