What school administrators say…
” As I previously stated, you are a resource too valuable to education and the profession to confine your talents to one district. Therefore, I am delighted that you will be sharing your enthusiasm, expertise and creativity with our districts in the DuPage Regional Office of Education and eventually across the State and the Nation. You have so much to offer to education!”
” Lourdes, your massage was very stirring and I greatly respect your ability to connect with the audience through real-life examples. They obviously connected with you as the feedback comments indicate. You were the perfect choice for our concluding keynote! Congratulations!
“This seminar was awesome Lourdes. You are extremely knowledgeable and provided us with information that is totally relevant to what we are doing now in our school. The workshop materials were organized and available. I appreciate your true authority as a presenter.”
What teachers and staff members say…
May 24th
Dear Dr. Lourdes Ferrer,
Probably you do not remember me, but I am one of the ELL teachers from the School District U-46, trained for you as a NAES Facilitator. I am emailing this to invite you to visit the Lowrie Elementary School where I am a Bilingual Second Grade teacher at the School District U-46.
Why? You would ask. Well, every year I worked hard to get students’ improvement. I read and took courses to better teach standard-based content, but with little improvement. However, everything changed last year when my school principal sent me at your NAES Facilitator Training. I was engaged with the program because promoted to help student success enhanced by involved supportive parents.
As I said, every year I worked hard to accomplish the ELL second grade goals requested by the school district; And at the end of the school year, I finished frustrated and with few achievements. The NAES Program helped me realize: Parental Support is the best help I could have to achieve those goals.
After the training, I started working with parents the last two months of the 2009-2010 school year, and I found out you were right about: Differentiated Parental Support.” Latino parents could fit in any of the Differentiated Parental Support Levels. I noticed too, they wanted to help their kids to achieve educational goals. Nevertheless, that was not all, they were eager to learn something to monitor their progress.
For the 2010-2011 school year I planned NAES training, develop graphs to monitor children progress and data interpretation (for parents and students); not only two annual parent conferences, but as many as needed, individually and in groups. I also created and set individualized student’s goals, before school, after school, parental involvement in homework, volunteers to support students during literacy learning centers, technology, etc.
And we did it! My 25 students no only achieved the U-46 goal on Reading and Math for ELL students but for Gen Ed students too. The NWEA norm for Reading is 190, they scored 190, for Math 191 and they scored 192. In addition, 7 out of 25 exited the Bilingual Program. 15 out of 25 were been pre-screened for the gifted program and 12 are eligible for formal gifted 3rd grade evaluation. Oh, and their Spanish Reading scores improved too, most of the students are on grade level or more.
Dr. Ferrer, I am very proud, delighted, and astonished with of all the wonderful achievements. Did I work hard? Yes, I did; but not alone. I applied Data Interpretation and your “Tricycle Theory.” The front wheel is the student and rear wheels are parents and teacher. Team work was the key!
After this long explanation, I want to extend you the invitation to visit our school. We would like to show you what we have done because my school principal is very happy with our results and next school year other teachers after so many frustrations (as I had) plan to implement it.
On June 2nd we will have the last NAES seminar and parents’ graduation; I know it is probably out of time, but if you accept we will be extremely happy if you can be with us. It will be such an honor and great surprise for my students’ parents to see you in person instead of on the TV. I hope you can come. Lowrie Elementary School is located on 264 Oak Street, Elgin IL 60123 Phone # (847) 888- 5262
Thank you for your time and attention to this happy letter and please, contact me if you have any questions.
Very Truly,
Ms. Cecilia Lima
ELL Second Grade Teacher
Lowrie Elementary School District U-46
(847) 888-5260
CeciliaLima@u-46.org
I attached Reading and Math graphs to show you the achieved students’ scores by quarter –fall, winter, spring.-
“Dr. Lourdes succeeds overwhelmingly at conducting an interactive, informative and exciting workshop that leaves you feeling exhausted with knowledge, yet exited to begin promoting positive change. This has been the best workshop that I have attended in my eleven years in education.”
“This presentation will definitely help me to grow in my understanding and respect for African-American and Hispanic students. For sure, from now on, I will pay more attention to where students from diverse backgrounds are coming from. I appreciate Dr. Lourdes’ honesty and sincerity. She personalized the presentation and opened her heart to the audience. This seminar was wonderful! Keep doing it!
“What got my attention the most in this seminar is Dr. Lourdes’ authenticity and experiences. She was real and down to earth… realistic and open. By the way, I was impressed with her ability to reach out to a variety of learning styles of the audience.”
What students say…
“Thank you Dr. Lourdes! You called me down at the perfect time. I decided to study by myself for the ACT and PSAE and ended up working myself out and wanting to give up. Now I understand that our Hispanic community is way too caught up in other things that they forget that education is pretty much their only pathway to a better future. You helped me open my eyes and realize that I need to work hard again, not only for myself, but also for the people whom I represent, Hispanics.”
What the media says…
Parent/Community Liaisons from a Hispanic highly-populated school district in Kane County participated in the Navigating the American Educational System (NAES) 2-day training program. The NAES training is a content-rich, engaging and highly interactive parental involvement curricular program. This program prepares participants to conduct parent workshops in Spanish. These workshops are designed to empower parents to successfully navigate the public school system and help their children experience academic success in school.
Teachers, Social Workers, Guidance Counselors and School Administrators, from different school districts in DuPage County, successfully completed the NAES two-day training. All of them were certified to implement Hispanic parent involvement programs and conduct workshops in schools and Districts in the State of Illinois that have purchased the appropriate license. More than 180 school staff members have graduated from the NAES program!
Dr. Lourdes, the author of the NAES program, partcipated in one of the NAES parent graduation ceremonies, in one of the school districts in DuPage County. During these graduations, which are happening through out different counties in the State of Illinois, parents meet Dr. Lourdes, in person, for the first time. To graduate parents must successfully complete the program, which consists of four workshops in Spanish. These workshops provides parents with the knowledge and skills they need to successfully navigate the American Educational System and help their children experience academic success in school.
Dr. Lourdes spoke to a crowd of Hispanic parents at a school with a high Hispanic student population. She explained the connection between a quality education and a quality life in the United States; taught the “basics” of the American Public School System; and empowered parents to manage and monitor their children’s education.
Dr. Lourdes met with White, African-American, Hispanic and Asian high school students to express her gratitude for their participation in a qualitative phenomenological study. The purpose of this study was to find out, from the students’ perspective, the reasons behind the lack of academic achievement in school and on the PSAE (Illinois’ accountability test). The information gathered through these studies provides schools’ leaders insight and information to come up with strategies to meet the challenges of the NCLB law.
Close to two hundred African-American and Hispanic high school students from DuPage, Kane and Will Counties participated in the Black and Tan Student Summit. This all-day summit, which took place at the DuPage Community College, provided students with the motivation, knowledge, skills and strategies to overcome challenges, experience academic success in school and pursue a college career that will ensure a quality life. The Black and Tan Student Summit was the realization of Dr. Lourdes’ vision.
