Fondren forges ahead as IB campus By Tom

Behrens | February 4, 2014

This has been a year of transition at Fondren Middle School after the campus gained
International Baccalaureate certification last summer.
But Principal Monique Lewis says the change has been much more than that - "a complete
transformation in the way teachers deliver instruction, the level of expectation, how students are
learning, how they are listening, how they embrace what they just talked about in class, and
embracing the differences in diversity and inclusion."
The school, 6333 South Braeswood St., is one of four HISD middle schools to offer the Middle
Years Programme through IB, a nonprofit foundation that offers challenging educational
programs for students aged 3-19 to help develop skills to live and work in a globalizing world.
Focuses are on technology, foreign languages and applying classroom instruction to real-world
events through partnerships with local and national community service organizations.
A November event at the school to celebrate the school's IB status and educate the community
about the program included guests such as former astronaut James Reilly.
A large emphasis is on connecting students with other parts of the world and country.
"We are very passionate about our approach," Lewis said, saying that Fondren is not the typical
IB school.
"We don't serve a school population that is high in gifted and talented - less than 2 percent. We
have over 90 percent of students in free or reduced price lunch program; we have a high,
impoverished population," she said.
The school, which has an enrollment of 789, was rated by the Texas Education Agency as having
"met standard" for performance targets for 2013.
Lewis said dramatic changes are occurring.
"You are going to see students in classrooms, not students hanging around in the hallways,
coming up with reasons to not be in the classrooms, or frequent trips to the restroom," she said.
"We are soldiers about that. ,,, That is not a culture our students are used to. Our students are
used to acting out, coming up with excuses."

Fondren forges ahead as IB campus By Tom

Behrens | February 4, 2014
Fondren pupils, she said, are being directed to build their vocabularies and become more
knowledgeable and balanced as well as confident to take risks.
"We have built a very strong culture, school climate, around the importance of being in your seat
learning," she said.
Fondren teacher Parisa Behzadi, merges teaching English as a second language and math.
Of the 80 students she teaches, 18 countries are represented. In addition to speaking English,
Behzadi is fluent in Persian.
"I can speak colloquial Arabic and I am working on Spanish and Nepali," she said.
Most of her students either speak Spanish or Napoli. Previously, Behzadi was an ESL teacher for
students who were mostly refugees.
"We believe in order to help our students the most, our students need to receive more content
instruction; so now I am an ESL math teacher," she said. "We embed mathematics into literacy.
My students read about mathematics, write about mathematics. It's more than just numbers; it's
about actual real-life applications."
Teachers are not required to be bilingual at Fondren but they need to be ESL-certified.
At the beginning of the school year Lewis and all the teachers went on buses into the community
visiting homes.
"You have to go out and knock on doors and let people know we care," Lewis said. "We are a
different school. Instruction is different, how we are taking care of your child, preparing them for
life, but we can't do that without you, the parent."
Tamokia Thompson, the school's PTO president whose eighth-grade daughter attends the
campus, said Fondren is trying to build stronger relationships with the community.
"The new principal has an open-door policy, promotes community meetings once a month with
parents as well as with business owners in the community churches, local businesses,
nonprofits, all those around or close to the school," she said.
"Also once a month she hosts meetings where parents can come in and see what the academic
curriculum is like at the school and how it is involving our children globally, professionally and
economically."
For more about the school, visit www.houstonisd.org/Page/6952.