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[toggle title_open=”BFA Partnership with HRMD through clean up” title_closed=”BFA Partnership with HRMD through clean up” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Ben Franklin Academy Begins Partnership with Highlands Ranch Metro District through Apple Orchard Clean-up Event
Highlands Ranch, Colorado; September 30, 2012— Ben Franklin Academy (BFA), a Douglas County School District public charter school, kicked off their partnership with the Highlands Ranch Metro District (HRMD) today by hosting a clean-up event at the Fly’N B Park’s apple orchard. BFA and HRMD plan to promote the mission of BFA to develop young adults who are civically engaged while also helping the Fly’N B Park located just west of the school campus at 2910 W. Plaza Drive.
BFA’s Parent Advisory Committee (PAC) hosted over 50 participants at the event. As the winter months are quickly approaching, the trees need to have the old fruit dropped from the branches and rotten apples picked up around the trunks to get ready for next year’s harvest.
BFA will provide periodic cleanup, apple picking, tree planting, nature learning and other civically-minded assistance to the HRMD’s Fly’N B Park throughout the school year and summer months. These activities identified by the HRMD will help BFA students learn the value and ways to take care of our local nature preserves, the importance of helping to protect these areas, and the satisfaction of giving back to the local community through community outreach initiatives.
[/toggle] [toggle title_open=”STEM Expo” title_closed=”STEM Expo” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Ben Franklin Academy Students Set To Once Again Launch Rockets From School
Highlands Ranch, Colorado; September 25, 2012— Ben Franklin Academy (BFA), a Douglas County School District public charter school, are gearing up for their bi-annual STEM Expo to take place this Friday, September 28, 2012, at the Highlands Ranch school’s campus.
Students will have the opportunity to again crawl into an inflatable planetarium, make space goo, hold exotic animals, learn architectural and engineering concepts using LEGOS, launch air-powered rockets 200-300 feet in the air and discover the traces left by dinosaurs. In addition there will be many new exhibits filling the gym with opportunities for students to learn about STEM subjects through hands-on activities.
Students, staff and parents are thrilled about this week’s expo following extreme success at last year’s event. 6th grader, Matthew McCoy, stated he was most looking forward to learning about organisms, “Amoebas are cool!” While his brother, 3rd grader David McCoy, was more interested in the rocket launches. “It is like bringing the museum to our school. The children can experience firsthand the wonders of science just down the street from our home”, commented their mother Susan McCoy.
BFA is joined by a variety of community partners including: The Wildlife Experience, Highlands Ranch Metro Districts Parks and Open Space, United Launch Alliance, Play-Well TEKnologies, Colorado Youth Education Connection, National Park Service – Air Resources Division and Geologic Resources Division, National Park Service Natural Sounds Program, Lockheed Martin, Spacetime Kids, Star Labs, BFA Greenhouse, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, BFA Green Team, Timbuk Toys, Engineering in Medicine, The Biology Society, Home Depot, and Ameribotics.
[/toggle] [toggle title_open=”Outdoor Science Lab: The Greenhouse” title_closed=”Outdoor Science Lab: The Greenhouse” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Ben Franklin Academy Embarks On Newest Endeavor: Creating Their Own Outdoor Science Lab
Highlands Ranch, Colorado; July 5, 2012— Ben Franklin Academy (BFA), a Highlands Ranch charter school within the Douglas County School District, announced their newest project Planting The Seeds of Knowledge: A Greenhouse Lab which will begin site work this summer for opening in Winter 2012. BFA’s greenhouse will follow the philosophy of the National Science Education Standards, which emphasizes that science should be taught through inquiry into authentic questions generated from student’s experiences, by offering this hands-on, classroom-sized lab that allows students to conduct inquiry-based experiments, transcend limitations imposed by Colorado’s arid environment and open their minds to explore the living world.
BFA’s greenhouse lab, a 16mm five-wall polycarbonate structure, will benefit a broad age range of students including the younger grades that typically do not have access to traditional science labs (BFA currently has a private preschool and enrolls K-7th grades, expanding to grade 8 by the fall of 2013) in addition to being one of only three school-based greenhouses in the State of Colorado.
Funding for the project began in early 2012. BFA will continue to work with local businesses, community leaders and non-profit advocates to secure funds for the project before its inauguration.
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