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Four years ago, 119 students entered the building at 1100 Catharine St., where they were the leaders from day one even as freshman.
“I remember students that had eyes wide open, that weren’t really sure about coming into a building that they were the only students here,” The Academy at Palumbo Principal Dr. Adrienne Wallace Chew said on the school’s 2006-’07 inaugural school year. “There was a lot of apprehension and maybe a little bit of fear, but also there was some excitement.”
Four years later, those students are the class of 2010 and the first ever to graduate from The Academy at Palumbo, an academic magnet school. The ceremonies were held at Friday at The University of Pennsylvania’s Irvine Auditorium.
“During the actual graduation when our class president spoke, she was in tears,” class valedictorian Chanel Tam said. “That affected most of us.”
“It was a happy moment and then it was really sad for me,” Francess Samura, the class president, added. “Personally, I couldn’t keep it together. I was crying half out of my mind.”
Samura, who will head to La Salle University to major in nursing this fall, and her peers paved the road for the future students and established significant traditions for the school including its mascot, the griffin, and its colors, silver, teal and black, for the incoming classes that were added year by year.
“In general, Palumbo has given us so much to work with,” the Southwest Philly resident said. “Basically we watched this school turn into what it is now. As a whole class, we’ve been the ones to set the standards for everyone else. We’re more of a family than anything. We’re so close.”
But the class exceeded expectations with a 100 percent graduation rate while each and every student has plans to further his or her education at a two- or four-year institution with acceptance letters from colleges and universities across the country including in-state at The University of Pennsylvania, Haverford and Penn State University.
“This really is what I would call the highlight of my professional career — graduating this class — and I’m so proud,” the principal with 34 years of experience in education said.
Samura chose Palumbo after she was waitlisted for Central High School, which sent her a letter advising her to apply to Palumbo as it was modeled after the Olney Avenue school.
Tam, who chose the local institution over Central, was accepted to three of the four schools she applied. She asked her father his opinion and he suggested Central or Palumbo, preferring the latter for its size and proximity to their Chinatown home. And Tam has no regrets with her choice.
“You’re not just one in a million. It’s small,” she said of the 494 student body, adding, “ah, memories” when she finished reflecting.
And the memories of high school days these students will keep with them. At graduation, the school’s choir sang “For Good” from the musical “Wicked,” which represented everyone’s feelings, Wallace Chew said.
“‘Because I knew you I have been changed for good,’” she said quoting the lyrics, “and so have I because I knew them.”
More graduates proceeded to the stage at the Mummers Museum, 1000 S. Second St., Friday morning. Decked in purple caps and gowns, these 28 youngsters aren’t headed to college just yet. Instead, they will begin elementary school next year. Preschoolers from Discovery Place Preschool, 2131 S. Seventh St., boasted their singing, dancing and spelling skill before receiving their diplomas. They even performed American Sign Language for Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the U.S.A.” and the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Got a Feeling.”
But 19 of these youngsters are the first class to graduate from Fitadelphia Kids Obesity Prevention and Obesity Recovery Program — a pilot course that aims to teach the children healthy habits. Through the program the 4- and 5-year-olds learned 10 yoga poses through Yo! Stretch, about eight Pilates moves, three forms of dancing — salsa, merengue and reggaeton — through LaCardio as well as learning My Food Pyramid for Kids.
“These kids couldn’t even touch their toes when I started with them," said Cindy Ortiz, Fitadelphia creator and director of the Northeast Philly-based La Placita Wellness and Education Center. “They’d say, ‘oh, it hurts.’”
Ortiz approached Butterflies teacher Alyssa McIntyre, who is also her yoga student, to implement the program at Discovery Place starting in September.
“I had a lot of children that had a hard time focusing or I have one child in particular that had jerky movements,” McIntyre said adding the program relaxed the children enabling them to pay attention to lessons better.
It even helped one student who was slightly overweight. Ortiz simply taught the child how to breathe from her abdomen. “She started to lose weight just by breathing correctly,” McIntyre said.
Ortiz launched La Placita four years ago after taking a $25,000 loan out on her house to start the nonprofi t, which began to spread its wings this year after First Lady Michelle Obama launched her task force on childhood obesity, which La Placita has contributed to.
Discovery Place is the second pilot program Ortiz has done with the first being an eight-week program at Headstart, formerly at 13th and Jackson streets.
“The program does work,” Ortiz said. “Then they go home and complain [to their parents], ‘why are you feeding me junk?’ because they come to school and say, ‘my parents are feeding me junk.’”
The students at Discovery Place also discovered new foods. Each week Ortiz brought a food many of the children had never tried including dried kiwi, pistachios and almond milk.
Some of the foods were even new to the students’ parents. Martina Nash’s 5-year old daughter Kayla Williams introduced her to kiwi, which she had never tried before.
Her favorite thing she learned from the program was the yoga pose the mountain, Kayla, who will be a first-grader at A.S. Jenks next year, said as she stretched her arms over her head demonstrating the pose.
“[At home,] she’ll just be doing little, different exercises,” Nash, of Broad Street and Snyder Avenue, said.
Kayla also ensures the family eats healthier, Nash said.
“‘Mom, does this have a lot of calories? Does this have sugar?’ She’s skeptical of what she eats,” she said adding that on the fl ipside of most kids, Kayla has even requested to her to make vegetables more often. “It’s kind of awesome.”
Contact Staff Writer Amanda Snyder at asnyder@southphillyreview.com or ext. 117.
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