Category: All Stories

[caption id="attachment_276" align="alignleft" width="3264"]Children at Desert Spring Children’s Center in Tucson, Ariz. play with the natural materials at the Reggio Emilia inspired school. (Photo provided by Desert Spring Children’s Center) [/caption]

Reggio Emilia is an alternative approach to early childhood education that is gathering more and more attention in Arizona.

The program allows children to see their value in their learning community. The philosophy hit the United States about 12 to 15 years ago, and has grown in schools since then.

The North American Reggio Emilia Alliance (NAREA) is an organization that promotes the spread of the Reggio philosophy throughout education facilities across the nation.

NAREA held its fourth winter conference in Tucson last weekend at the Tucson Marriot University Park Hotel. Tucson Children’s Project, the University of Arizona and Head Start Children Parent Centers hosted the conference.

“Tucson is unique,” said Reggio educator Andrea Buttrick. “Unique in the way we’ve supported each other in collaborating and growing.”

This uniqueness ties into the winter conference in Tucson, titled “Walls into Bridges: Transforming Challenges into Opportunities.” It focused on turning the challenges the Reggio philosophy faces in Tucson into occasions in which educators can put this philosophy into practice.

[caption id="attachment_271" align="alignleft" width="500"]A dilapidated motel sign beckons road-trippers to take Exit 212 on Saturday, Jan. 26, 2013. This sign and other run-down markers along Interstate 10 reflect the comings and goings of interstate culture (Photo by Johanna Willett 2013).[/caption]They jut into sunny skies—an American flag, a Dairy Queen billboard and a yellow Shell—one by one beckoning the weary traveler to take Exit 219 for Picacho Peak Road. Take a break from the high speeds and sudden break lights, they say. Interstate 10 will be here after you gas up, get a soft-serve cone, and experience the quirk hidden beneath billboards.

I-10, the descendant of territorial trails and country-crossing railroads, speeds through the southern half of Arizona. Its lane lines, faded by decades of sunshine, stretch from California to New Mexico and through Arizona’s largest cities, Phoenix and Tucson. Just beyond the off ramps, oddities forgotten by most entice the treasure-hunter, history buff and strange family on vacation.

From Australia to England, vendors from around the world are gathering in Tucson for the United States’ largest mineral and gem show. The main event, the 59th Annual Tucson Gem and Mineral Show, starts on February 14 and runs until February 17 but is preceded by two week’s worth of independent shows throughout the city.

For an event that started off as a single, free show in 1955, the Gem Show quickly grew an international reputation. “For seven years we were the only show in town, then in 1962 there was the first satellite show,” said Gloria Quigg, publicity chair for the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show.

Since the show’s initial premiere and quick growth in popularity, the excitement around the show has drawn thousands of independent vendors and promoters to Tucson. More than 3,000 vendors have unique minerals, gems, fossils, rocks, beads and jewelry for sale at nearly 40 individual shows throughout the city.

[caption id="attachment_267" align="alignleft" width="1920"]Rep. Ron Barber gives his speech on the GAO report this past week in Douglas, AZ. (Photo By: Aungelique Rodriguez)[/caption]

DOUGLAS- Ariz.- U.S. Rep. Ron Barber was recently appointed to a leadership role on the Homeland Security Committee and with that role holds the responsibility of finding ways to improve the security along the Southwest Border.

The Department of Homeland Security has agreed to the Government Accountability Office’s new strategic recommendations. Barber and other public officials gave Arizona residents a brief overview of the GAO report in Douglas and Tucson earlier this week.

Creative Commons Licensed from Flikr: Photo by Bill Morrow