East China School District News
Every Child, Every Day!
- Mar 10 Bond 2020 Election
- Mar 11 Early Release (2 Hours)
- Mar 23 Board of Education meeting 6:00 p.m.
- March 25 & 26 Kindergarten & Preschool Registration Noon-5:30 p.m.
- Mar 30 - Apr 3 Spring Break
Gearing Elementary Spotlight
Brooke Nowakowski
There is no one more adventurous than our Spanish and Art Teacher, Brooke Nowakowski! She has been teaching for 15 years, 13 of those at East China School District. Although she lives in Macomb Township, she looks forward to going to work everyday in our St. Clair Community. She has spent many years teaching elementary and middle school Spanish, and in recent years has taught elementary Art and Spanish. She loves being able to teach all of the kids in the school as an itinerant and is truly inspiring to our young artists!
Brooke went to the University of Michigan for undergrad and Oakland University for grad school. She also studied Spanish abroad for a semester at the University of Barcelona in college.
When Brooke is not at school, she and Rich are spending time with their 21 month old daughter, Brielle. She also helps run their business, Tropical Touch Boat Detailing, where she is the bookkeeper and handles communications.
Brooke LOVES to travel and then share her personal experience and adventures with her students. By age 30 she had been to over 30 countries in the world!! Her goal is to reach 40 countries by the age of 40 and we are sure she will make that happen! She started traveling as a child and is now sharing the love of travel with her daughter. She has been scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef, ziplining over the rainforest in Costa Rica, surfed in Hawaii, attended the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, ridden elephants in Thailand, and jousted at a castle in England! Some of her favorite destinations include Cambodia, Thailand, Sweden, Italy, China, and Spain.
Her love of helping others is evident when she spent many summers working as a teacher leader for People to People Student Ambassadors where she took students from metro Detroit to places around the globe and worked with international students in Washington DC and at Stanford.
From her middle school days, she found the love of volunteer work. She has volunteered in many capacities, but she says her favorite work is with children. This is exactly why she has served on the board of directors at Kids in Distress Services for the past 6 years and was recently named the Board Chair. She also has her own charity, the Logan Foundation for Children which she started when she was just in high school. This foundation brings cheer to children in need which usually includes a huge Christmas party for up to 700 students. They just hosted their 22 Christmas party in 2019. This charity also provides necessary items to fire victims, special needs students, foster children, and more!
In the summer months, she loves spending time at the beach, especially along Lake Huron where she grew up at her family cottage near Sarnia. While visiting there she likes kayaking and bike riding. She has even ridden four times in the Five Boro Bike Tour in New York City. Now that is adventurous!
We are lucky to have such a compassionate, giving and inspiring teacher in our building! Thank you for giving your all every single day, Brooke!
ECSD International Festival
Families from across the district gathered at Gearing Elementary to celebrate cultures around the world at the ECSD International Festival! Kindergarten to fifth grade students moved between stations while playing games, making crafts, and tasting foods from over 25 countries of the world! Some stations featured families who were excited to share their heritage, others were hosted by ECSD high school language students, and others were organized by the language teachers from their travels.
Kids loved trying out the British crackers, a traditional popper prize game and had fun making sand art with the Raymo family who recently returned to St. Clair after living in Jordan for a few years. Didgeridoo creations were a hit in Australia, as was tasting a Brazilian treat made by our ECSD paraprofessional, Giovana Betti. She shared her culture along with many other families in the ECSD community! We are grateful to all of the middle and high school volunteer helpers as well who helped to make the event a success! The event, which has been hosted at Gearing in recent years, is a unique opportunity to bring together ECSD students of all ages for an evening of celebrating a global community right here within our small town! Brooke Nowakowski, elementary Spanish teacher, says she hopes the event demonstrates to kids that differences amongst cultures are something to celebrate and that the event sparks an interest in families to visit some of the places that they learned about one day!
Gearing Students Artwork Displayed
Gearing students were excited to have their artwork displayed in a couple art shows this past month. Thank you to Ms. Nowakowski and Mrs. Wilson for providing this opportunity to our young artists.
55 students had their art displayed in the 52nd Annual Beatrice Thornton Art Show at the St. Clair Community College Fine Arts Gallery
21 students had art displayed at the annual St. Clair Art Association K-5 Art Show
Gearing Gators are Caring Gators
The 2nd Graders lead a community service project called “Caring for Kids” to collect items to send to kids at Children’s Hospital. Here’s what was collected! Thank you to all the Gearing students and families for helping us help others!
Gearing Walking Club
Despite the cold weather, the walking club is in full swing at Gearing! Led by physical education teacher Ms. Janet Cornish, along with many parent volunteers, students are able to walk during their lunch recess time every Thursday. This year students are able to scan their EZscan Badge for each lap, which makes the whole process run much smoother! Thank you to the generous gearing PTO for providing this amazing scanning device and to all of the parent volunteers helping our Gators remain active!
Gearing McTeacher's Night
Gearing staff enjoyed serving Gators and their families for McTeacher’s Night! Teachers greeted, delivered, swept, cleaned and Mr. Russell even worked the drive thru. It sure was a sight to see! Thank you to St. Clair McDonalds for supporting local public education and to all of our Gearing families for coming out to enjoy dinner out!
Inclusion Day - March 4, 2020
ECSD Physical Therapist, Anette Kiretta, received a grant for Gearing Elementary from Special Olympics to be a Unified Champion School. As a Unified Champion School we are dedicated to create a more inclusive world by pledging to spread inclusion and unity for all of our students.
SCC Special Education & Resource Fair
Contact Information
Email: info@ecsd.us
Website: www.ecsd.us
Location: 1585 Meisner Road, East China, MI, USA
Phone: 810-676-1000
Facebook: facebook.com/EastChinaSchools