Marina Orth: Escritos

THE FOUNDATION

Wed, 3 Feb 2010 11:45:53 -0700

The Foundation

Welcome to the web site of the Marina Orth Foundation. In the United States we are called the Marina Orth Foundation. We are a 501.c3 non-profit organization that serves underprivileged schools in Colombia. At the request of the secretary of education of Medellin, we have developed a pilot program in English and Information Technology with teachers and students at the Marina Orth Rural School, a school of 350 students from kindergarten through high school. This program makes the Marina Orth school the first public bilingual school in the country. It is also the first school in Colombia to provide every primary school student a laptop from the One Laptop per Child Foundation. We are currently planning to develop similar projects in other schools in Colombia.

Thanks to the work of the Marina Orth Foundation and the generosity of the Chevron Corporation, each student in kindergarten through fifth grade at the Marina Orth School has his own personal laptop to use at school and take home with him. The foundation has also arranged for the donation of thirty PC’s for the technology room, as well as the construction of a new cafeteria and new field house for athletics, assemblies, and after school programs. The foundation is currently developing its VUELA (Taking Flight) Project that seeks to use the laptops in innovative ways to improve education. The foundation is also developing an advanced English program in the school.

OUR STORY

Escuela Marina Orth began in the sixties when Peace Corps volunteer, Maureen Orth was asked by the people of the rural community of Aguas Frias, in the Andes mountains above Medellin, to help them build a school. With a donation of building materials from the National Federation of Coffee Growers, the people carved a site out of the side of the mountain and together with Marina built their first school. Escuela Marina Orth began with two classrooms and 35 students. Today it is a fully equipped primary and secondary school with 350 students from pre kindergarten through high school.

In 2004, Dr. Horacio Arango, Secretary of Education of Medellin, asked Maureen Orth to help make the school named for her the first public bilingual school in Medellin. In 2005, she hired Luis Fernando Sanchez to be Executive Director of the Marina Orth Foundation, which was formally incorporated in 2006. Since the formal incorporation of two non-profit foundations, Marina Orth Foundation in the United States and Fundacion Marina Orth in Colombia, the foundation has dedicated itself to creating a model public school to eventually be replicated elsewhere so that primary and secondary students in Colombia and elsewhere, no matter their race, gender or economic background, can compete globally and make a positive contribution to the world.

NEWS

THE NATIONAL MINISTRY OF EDUCATION VISITED US 2 -02 -2010

Wed, 3 Feb 2010 11:36:45 -0700

The Last February second a comity compound by Claudia Zea, Juan Carlos Grimaldy y Luís Antonio Torrá from the national ministry of education visited us to know the pros and counts of the Step by Step Project, in order to implement the same program in others schools of the country.

December 2nd : Teachers From El Carmen de Viboral Training at The Creas Center

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:26:34 -0700

On December 2nd the teachers of the Campo Alegre Rural School, located in the hamlet Campo Alegre, in the County of El Carmen de Viboral, Antioquia, met in the CREAS center of the Aguas Frias to receive training in the pedagogical fundamentals of the Step by Step Project. In this day the teachers jointly constructed the theoretical frame of the project with the goal of building the 2010 plan of action.

November 26th and 27th : "Towards a policy of including mobile technologies in education"

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:25:34 -0700

The 26th and 27th of November the National Ministry of Education convened the leaders of the different projects that are being developed in the country in the matter of use of movile technologies in education, with the purpose of creating national policies in this matter. The name of the workshop was: "Towards a policy of including mobile technologies in education".

November 20th and 21st: Second National Encounter of Resource Finders

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:23:29 -0700

The 20th and 21st of November members from different Non-Profit Organizations convened by the Universidad del Rosario and the Foundation Mercadeo Social to approach different aspects on the search of resources in times of economic crisis.

October 26th: Inauguration of the Project Step by Step

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:22:54 -0700

The Inauguration of the Step by Step Project, on the Campo Alegre Rural School, located in the hamlet of Campo Alegre, in the County of El Carmen de Viboral, Antioquia. The school will base its work on the four central points of the foundation: English emphasized, Information Technology, Leadership and One to One Learning (One Laptop Per Child).

October 22: Launch of the WiFi Network

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:21:49 -0700

After a long process where companies and organizations of the local government like: Motorola, The Mayor’s Office of Medellín, The Secretary of Education of Medellín, EPM and Eleinco, and leaded by the Marina Orth Foundation we have got a complete WiFi Network working at the school as well in the hamlet of Aguas Frias. With this project not only the students are being benefited, but also their families. Now we can finally say that this small world is connected with the rest of the world.

1.October 22: Inauguration of the CREAS Center:

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 09:20:32 -0700

With the presence of some friends and guests, the Marina Orth Foundation inaugurated the House of Recreation and Studies After-School and Take Care Center, where the children and parents of the hamlet have been developing activities since last March. The INDER (Recreation and Sport Institution of Medellín) is the organization responsible of the house. It has the purpose to provide recreation and prevention to the children and their parents seven days a week.

August 27-28: First Annual Science and Creativity Fair

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 09:17:29 -0700

Under the leadership of the foundation, the teachers and students presented their designs and inventions to the school in two wonderful days. The first day was marked by the artistic expression of the students and some teachers who performed songs, plays, and poems for the rest of the school. The second day the science projects were presented in various rooms, each with a unique theme: exhibition room, origami room, little planetarium room, conference room, film forum room y experimental room.

August 25: Regional Educational Forum

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 09:16:55 -0700

The director of the foundation, Luis Fernando Sanchez, presented the Step by Step Project at this conference of outstanding educational programs in Medellin. The project was selected as one of only two experiences from Medellin to participate in the upcoming national educational forum in Bogota. Participants in the forum were impressed by the magnitude and creativity of the project.