SISTER SCHOOL PROJECT

Pinnacles National Monument (PINN) is proud to have a relationship with the Parque Nacional Quebrada del Condorito (PNQC), their sister park in Argentina.  The sister park relationship has been extended to two schools in the vicinity of each park, the Hollister Dual Language Academy (HDLA) near PINN, and the Escuela Ceferino Namuncurá (ECN) near PNQC. The two schools are now sister schools, and they want to exchange letters and projects with each other that communicate the realities of their lives and their relationships to the resources protected by their national parks.

Thanks to generous funding and support from the Pinnacles Partnership, Rotary International, American Conservation Experience, the NPS Pacific Coast Science and Learning Center, and the hard work of Pinnacles National Monument and Parque Nacional Quebrada del Condorito, the sister parks and sister schools have achieved the following goals and identified future steps in the project.

What we’ve accomplished:
 

• 9/23/2010: Veronica Johnson and Sara Reid from Pinnacles meet with teachers at HDLA to discuss sister school project and present materials to help teachers communicate project to students and parents.
   
• 9/29/2010: Germán Jaacks, visiting Vice-superintendent from PNQC visits HDLA to give presentations about Argentina, the resources at his park, and the lives of the students at sister school ECN. Germán brings messages from ECN for the students at HDLA, written on the back of painted condor feathers on paper.
   
• 10/8/2010: Students at HDLA respond to messages from ECN with letters, drawings, class scrapbooks, and condor feather wishes. Projects are sent to ECN via Germán Jaacks.
   
• 11/15/2010: Germán Jaacks visits ECN to tell about his visits to PINN and HDLA and deliver the messages from the students. The students at ECN are fascinated with the students at HDLA, and the teachers comment that the sister school relationship will motivate the students at ECN to learn to use computers so they can be in contact with their friends across the world. ECN emails drawings of condors to HDLA.
   
• 12/07/2010: Veronica Johnson and Sara Reid meet with teachers at HDLA to discuss future activities, how to spend the budget, and how to encourage an educational and meaningful relationship between the students at HDLA and PINN. HDLA decides next they will donate Spanish school books to the students at ECN.