Waters School in Chicago Goes Solar!
By Glen Kizer
The Thomas J. Waters School in Chicago, Illinois is a little bit unique. It is part of the huge Chicago Public School District and yet it feels like a small school. It has Pre-K, Primary K-3, Intermediate 4-5, and a 6-8 Middle School Program and yet it seems like a small school. But there are 584 students and yet it is has a close knit feel to it. It is a magnet school for the fine and performing arts. The actual name of the school is the Thomas J. Waters Fine and Performing Magnet Arts School. It is located at 4540 N. Campbell and as you can see from the pix it looks like a huge school building and it is larger than many school buildings, but it maintains the small school feel. To further make this point, let’s look at the Welcome from Principal Kipp.
Welcome to Waters!
Welcome to the Waters Elementary web site, where you’ll find a wealth of information about all things related to Waters and the learning and enrichment experiences we offer students.
My goal as the Principal is to instill a lifelong love of learning in each child. We foster this at Waters through a melding of academics, hands-on learning opportunities both inside and outside the classroom and an integrated arts curriculum that exposes students to visual arts, drama, music, technology and ecology. Children learn in many different ways, and this integrated approach has a positive impact on our students’ learning. In addition, we continue to partner with several community organizations and enrichment groups to enhance the Waters experience, including the Shedd Aquarium, CAPE (Chicago Arts Partnership in Education), Mad Science, Global Explorers, and MSA & Circus Arts, among others.
I am very proud of Waters students and am grateful to work with such an extremely dedicated community of learners, parents and staff.
Together, we are continuing to make Waters a unique and inspiring place to learn!
Sincerely,
Titia Kipp
The Waters School has now gone solar. There is a 1 kW installation on the front of the Waters School and the school has joined the Illinois Solar Schools program sponsored by the Illinois Clean Energy Community Foundation. Robert Christensen is the primary contact for the solar program at the school. Robert is the School Engineer. The live streaming data showing how much electricity is being generated and more information about the school will be found on the web site: www.IllinoisSolarSchools.org next week, but we thought you might like a preview of this new solar school installation.
