WORLD CULTURES AND LANGUAGES MAGNET SCHOOL
Cindy McCullough, Principal

By Caroline Snyder

I arrived the day after the December 7 “Culture Fair” at the World Cultures and Languages Magnet School.  The excitement was still electric in the air but the teachers were a little weary from the night before and a turnout of 200 families.  I received a world wind tour of the building from Cindy McCullough, the principal.  The displays of the children were creative and enlightening and the challenges presented to them were especially revealing in their presentations.   I was very impressed with the progression of intellectual and adult-like thought processes and I was reminded of my own elementary education curriculum and how our thoughts and feelings were allowed to expand and explore the world.  Today this exploration is especially significant in a magnet school such as World Cultures and Languages.  I believe the children exposed to this environment and curriculum are blessed and privileged to participate.  This world selection event occurs 3 times a year and the project explores the various regions of the world and the movement of peoples.   Oceania was the region explored and Australia and the Aborigines peoples (their culture, art and language) was the focus.  The children write reports, create books, and study the products of the country through artwork and writings. 
 
 
At the helm of this cultural and language discovery ship is Cindy McCullough, a mother of 3 children (13, 11 and 2), a Sauk Rapids native and a principal of 2 private schools before coming to World Cultures and Languages.  A Morehead graduate, she taught at Pine City at the 3rd and 4th grade levels and at St. Scholastica in Duluth and St. Thomas as a teaching specialist.  She also was an administrator at 2 colleges and has been in the St. Paul Public School System for the last 3 years.  Assisting her are bi-lingual teachers who are proficient in Japanese, Russian, and Spanish.  The Hmong Language and Culture is studied year around.  The total enrollment is 345 students.  Before becoming the principal in 1999, Cindy was an assistant principal at Webster Elementary.   The class size is a ratio of 1 teacher to 17 students in the 1st and 2nd grades and 1 to 27 in the 3rd through 6th grades.  Teams of 3 teachers for every 55 students distribute the makeup.
 
The class environment is enhanced by the “technical” attributes as well as the intrinsic benefits derived from the exposure to various cultures and languages.  There is a database library of many books and children have a computer classroom of 30 personal computers,  available from the 1st grade on.  A resource and media center is available to all students.  A computer program which teachers the “keyboard” is accessible for future writers and journalists.  95% of the student body has read 25 books or more during the 1999-2000 school year.  The St. Paul Pioneer Press has donated T-shirts for children to be awarded when they reach their 25-book goal.  Since September this school year, already 48% of the students will have a new T-shirt presented to them which they truly can be proud of.

The Mat 7 (reading, language, social studies and sciences) scores this year have recorded the largest gain of progress to grade level – from 33 % in the spring to 46% in the fall at World Cultures and Languages.  The factors contributing to this progression are many but most outstanding is the smaller class size, the dedication of the teaching staff and the all day kindergarten which exposes the child to a learning and social environment prior to the first grade.  With a smaller classroom size, each teacher relates to her pupils on a more individual basis.  The closeness experienced on a daily basis encourages respect and dignity for each other. 
 
 
Exploring the common themes among the diverse ethnic backgrounds is accentuated and differences become less of a factor in the child’s development.  The student population illustrates the diversity of its makeup.  41% are bi-lingual, 38% are Hmong, 3% Vietnamese and Hispanic and 32% are African American.  The teacher’s makeup also reveals its diversity.  6 are bi-lingual teaching assistants, 2 teachers are bi-lingual Spanish, 1 bi-lingual Russian, 1 bi-lingual Japanese and 1 bi-lingual Korean.
 
 
Teacher instruction is manifested with the use of videos and guest speakers.  Mike, who teaches 5th and 6th grade classrooms had a scuba diver visit with his students and from that visit the children learned about the sea world that exists near the shores of the Australian coastal waters.  Photographs which he brought of the barracuda fish and other sea creatures, corals and underwater life indigenous to the islands of Oceania were topics of creative writing and artwork by the children.   Koala bears and kangaroos were also subjects of artwork and writings.  Postcards, quiz books and maps were created and studied by the children.  A real life ocean transparency created by one of the teachers along with her students was draped against the windows of one classroom exhibiting various creatures of the sea.  It almost made me feel like I was experiencing a deep-sea adventure of my own!  Truly this was a labor of love seen through the eyes of many gifted students.
 
 
Principal Cindy McCullough demonstrates an exuberance and humor, which is contagious.  A compatibility with the teaching staff is revealed every time she greets her teachers as well as the children as they display smiles and stories when Cindy is present.

The curriculum offered at World Cultures and Languages also energizes the teaching staff.  A fresh and exhilarating approach to the studies encountered at the magnet school is refreshing to behold in the classrooms.  An informal environment along with some structure is conducive to the creativity of the child.  A consortium of mind, body and spirit brought to the levels of the highest quality of teaching will bring only the best results of achievement.  An emotional and intellectual experience is awaiting your child at World Cultures and Languages. 

God created the world in 7 days and the children and staff at World Cultures and Languages Magnet School created a world of brotherhood and sisterhood of their own in just 3 years.   Children are color and culture blind and if we can begin at an early age to embrace all cultures and races, we can truly call World Cultures and Languages Magnet School “our world.”