Each year, the Mount Madonna School (MMS) fifth grade class engages in a year-long, cross-curricular study focused on an environmental topic selected by the students. For 2021-22, students voted to focus on sea lions to raise public awareness and reduce the existential…
By Lisa Catterall Children make your life important. — Erma Bombeck I’m staring at a dresser covered with dirty glasses. They have rings of dried and yellowed milk, encrusted smoothie droplets, and they are sitting on top of a stack of plates,…
Biomedical Engineering is a unique, new Mount Madonna School course this school year. It’s an elective for eleventh grade students through the high school engineering program. This class includes units on genetic engineering and Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR), design…
Santa Cruz Sentinel, 2/7/2022, “Students Explore Elkhorn Slough.” Contributed photos by Stevan Manzur and Jessica Cambell.
From squid and jellyfish to sand, surf – and even Santa Cruz’s iconic Big Dipper roller coaster – each has inspired the sense-infused descriptions and evocative art pieces of Mount Madonna School (MMS) fourth graders. For the past several months as part…
Growing Up in Santa Cruz, February 2022, Teacher’s Desk, “The World is Knocking” by Lisa Catterall. He who has a why to live can bear almost any how. – Friedrich Nietzsche This week I had the pleasure of teaching in a true…
By Shannon Kelly In May, as part of the Values in World Thought program, junior and senior students will be traveling to Washington, D.C. to experience government in action. One key aspect of the program is providing students the opportunity to engage…
It is my conviction that there is no way to peace — peace is the way. — Thich Nhat Hanh Children are naturally more present than grown-ups. They are honest, in the moment, yet often are a bit “wound up.” Practicing mindfulness with…
Two Mount Madonna School (MMS) high school classmates are running a book drive as part of their Senior Capstone Project. They are accepting donations of new and used books for all ages, and in particular are interested for inclusive books reflecting the…
Mount Madonna School (MMS) first through fifth graders have spent many of their recent T.E.A. (technology, engineering and art) specialty classes in “invention education.” They are preparing to present ideas for original solutions to problems at MMS’s first in-house Invention Convention on…
