Upper School Archives

January 13, 2020

Meet 2019-20 Alumni Association Board member Annie Stewart ’11!

After attending MPA from grades 6-12, Annie Stewart ’11 went to St. Olaf College for four years and graduated in 2015 with a B.A. in Theater. She worked at a number of theater companies in St. Paul and Minneapolis before finding her way back to MPA as a substitute teacher and PreK teaching assistant. She worked in MPA’s Lower School for a year before deciding to go back to school to pursue her K-6 teaching license and Masters in Elementary Education! Annie says that it was working at MPA that helped solidify her passion for teaching, and she is so thankful for all of the experiences that led her to where she is today.

“MPA was such an important place and community for many years of my academic career,” said Annie. “Now, as I am completing a license and Masters, I use the tools and skills I learned at MPA on a daily basis. Most importantly, I am excited to teach and that love of teaching comes from the teachers and community I had at MPA. I’m especially looking forward to teaching the next generation of students how to think, not just what to think.” Read More

Spring Sports Registration Is Open

January 9, 2020

Registration for spring sports is now open! Enjoy staying active and competing with fellow Panther teammates this spring with a variety of options including baseball, fastpitch softball, tennis, track & field, and golf. Sign up for your choice here! Go Panthers!

Purchase Tickets For Perspective: 20/20

January 9, 2020

MPA Theatre, in Association with Penumbra Theatre, presents Perspective: 20/20! Purchase your tickets here for the MPA Winter Show on January 23 and 24 at 7 PM in the Black Box theatre. The performance is recommended for ages 13 and up. Please note that there is no performance on Saturday, January 25.

The show features five original one-acts written, directed, designed, and performed by Upper School MPA students. These pieces encompass privilege, “isms,” lived experiences, frustrations, hopes, communal and global issues, and most importantly students’ voices.

Additionally, one of the one-acts titled “And Then There Was One” will compete in the Minnesota State High School League’s One-Act Competition, January 2020.

The Impact Of Singapore Math At MPA

January 9, 2020

by Renee Wright, Lower School director

Editor’s Note: On the first Thursday of each month, you will find a guest Head’s Message here from one of MPA’s division directors. We hope you enjoy reading their thoughts and reflections about life at MPA.

Looking back over the past 30 years as a Lower School teacher, one of my most challenging subjects to teach was math. Some students were successful, and some were not. Some students loved math, while others didn’t care for it at all. How would I address these challenges? I knew it was my job to teach math concepts and make sure these skills could be applied. At the same time, I wanted students to love math and feel confident. I was not alone with these concerns.

Teachers often report that problem solving is one area that presents the largest challenge for students. It is not uncommon for students to feel anxious or frustrated when asked to solve challenging mathematical word problems. In fact, students often give up before even trying. Problem solving in math often causes students to feel incompetent and believe they aren’t good at math. This can lead to a negative mindset about math and becomes a huge barrier to future success in the subject. Six years ago, teachers and administrators at MPA started looking for a math program to address these challenges. After much research, the Singapore Math curriculum was selected and adopted in grades kindergarten through fifth. Read More

Save The Date For Maker Fest 2020

January 8, 2020

Join us on February 22 from 1-3 PM in the AnnMarieThomas Makerspace and cafeteria, where you can either host your own table or come as a spectator!

You can sign up here to share your Maker talents, either individually or with a group to have your very own display table at MPA Maker Fest. This is the perfect opportunity to “show and tell” something that you have created and share your accomplishments with the community. Maker Fest is free is open to everyone–students, parents, grandparents, alums, faculty, staff, etc. We can’t wait to see your creations!

If you have questions, please contact Ms. Koen at nkoen@moundsparkacademy.org.

Join Us For Pajamarama!

January 8, 2020

Wear your pajamas or comfy clothes and join us for Pajamarama 2020 on Thursday, January 30! This year at MPA, Lower School students will enjoy a short concert of their favorite Disney music, meet our musicians, and enjoy story telling in a new and imaginative way. Following the Disney performance, the children are led in interactive activities designed to spark excitement and curiosity about music. To finalize our program we will have a reading of a popular children’s book performed by a narrator while being accompanied by the MPA Upper School Orchestra. Students will receive a snack while they cozy up to hear this famous story come to life!

Invite A Friend To Experience MPA

January 8, 2020

Please extend our invitation to your friends and neighbors for the MPA Preview on Sunday, January 26 at 2 PM. Visitors will see what’s possible when students are inspired to dream big and do right at MPA! This event will allow families to truly experience the joy of learning that our students do each day by rotating among hands-on, experiential lessons taught by expert faculty. Between lessons, they will join student and parent ambassadors for an opportunity to see our state-of-the-art facilities.

Please have them RSVP here!

Seventh Graders Do Right Through Design For Change

January 8, 2020

“Design For Change” is more than a phrase that our students and faculty have become very familiar with this school year. It is an organization that functions on global and national levels, working with students and educators to “turn empathy into action.” More than one million students are involved in Design For Change and are positively impacting their communities worldwide. This movement has made its way into the minds and hands of MPA students through Ms. Koen, Makerspace coordinator, and Ms. Joyce, technology integrationist, as they work with seventh graders on MPA’s very own Design For Change global challenge.

In November, Ms. Joyce attended the I Can Children’s Global Summit in Rome, which featured students from over 40 countries and their Design For Change initiatives. Their solutions covered global issues including violence, gentrification, medicine, environmental issues, and teens and mental health. After an incredibly powerful experience, Ms. Joyce is helping the MPA seventh graders get their projects ready to submit to the 2020 I Can Global Summit.

“Attending the Summit was definitely a life-changing experience for me,” said Ms. Joyce. “Besides the individual impact of each of the students’ participation in their Design For Change solution, the group impact made possible by the global conference will resonate beyond anything we can imagine.”

The idea behind Design For Change is that there is no single one-and-done solution. The purpose is to spark curiosity, relationships, partnerships, and ongoing work that ripples into the community, and eventually, the world. The MPA students involved are currently focusing their efforts on the United Nations sustainable development global goal of reduced inequalities–specifically, quality education and school funding disparities. Read More

Bumpy Roads Build Skills

January 2, 2020

Empowering Students To Understand Stress And Navigate Anxiety
Feeling frightened has infiltrated everyday life. As a society, we worry about the future, and are unsettled about the unknowns. We’re stressed and we’re scared, with anxiety showing up among people of all ages.

While anxiety is increasingly common, learning how to manage—and even embrace—difficult emotions helps build resilience while cultivating individual and interpersonal skills. At Mounds Park Academy, Dr. Jules Nolan works with faculty, students, and parents to help families understand what stress means in context of overall well-being. As a licensed, nationally certified school psychologist and president of Minnesota’s association of school psychologists, Dr. Nolan brings expertise in child and adolescent mental health, behavioral issues, school performance, learning issues, and effective teaching and parenting strategies.

“We are seeing a spike in student anxiety (nationwide), driven by three key factors,” she explains. “One factor is that we have more sophisticated tools to diagnose anxiety. So, while the prevalence can seem greater, it’s tied to a better understanding of what anxiety is and what makes it different from other conditions. At the same time, we are seeing circumstances where anxiety is over-diagnosed. For example, in any given population we would expect one to three percent of people to meet criteria for generalized anxiety. However, in some schools we’re seeing as many as 20 to 25 percent of students with that diagnosis. The third, and perhaps most influential factor, is that our society often has a hard time grappling with stress and anxiety, and by trying to push it away, we are actually making it more difficult for children to develop coping skills.” Read More

Moving To Collaboration Over Competition

December 31, 2019

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Ella Jones’s Senior Speech.

As many of you know, I have only been a member of the MPA community since the beginning of eleventh grade. Before moving to Minnesota, I lived in China. Growing up in Beijing during the Chinese economic boom was a very unique and an eye-opening experience. I watched the entire city develop and grow in front of my eyes. I watched the roads outside my apartment shift overnight from dirt to asphalt, and the vehicles on them evolve from bikes to cars.

The city began to quickly fill with people from many provinces across China. Beijing became a domestic web of people from all corners of the country. Between 1990 and 2015, Beijing’s population doubled, reaching a staggering 20 million people in 2015. At my school in Beijing, there was no such thing as a student on financial aid or scholarship, and because of that, I was surrounded by people who were privileged and had opportunity. School became a competition of who had the nicest clothes or who went to the coolest places for vacation. I started to judge my self-worth on what I had compared to my peers, and not the amazing opportunities I was already provided with. School became a toxic environment where every aspect became a comparison. Read More