“Students from Peconic Community School in Aquebogue celebrated International Day of Peace on September 21 by asking themselves, “What is peace?” The school’s Upper Primary class pondered the meaning of peace and wrote their thoughts about it on photographs of their hands creating the peace sign.”
read more at: The Independent: “Peace Happens” at PCS, September 25, 2018.
PCS will honor Joe Mc Kay at their annual event, SHARE: Building Community Through Scholarship on August 12th at Hallockville Museum Farm. Tickets are $150 and go towards providing scholarships for students at the school.
Long-time PCS friend, advisor and supporter, Joe Mc Kay is also a community leader, teacher, writer, speaker and advocate for life-long education and the environment. Joe has lived on the North Fork for 35 years, having moved here full time after retiring in 1993. Joe is an activist in the community, and has become a great friend and leader, not only to PCS, but to countless people and organizations across the East End.
Peconic Community School is thrilled to be honoring Joe because his work, his values and his approach to living on the East End align so perfectly with Peconic Community School’s mission and vision. We look forward to celebrating him alongside many of his friends and family not only for his support of PCS, but for his exemplary leadership on the North Fork, and for modeling a life of constant learning and humble citizenship.
read more at: Press Release: Joe Mc Kay to be Honored at 2018 SHARE: Building Community Through Scholarship.
"There aren’t many alternatives to the public schools on the North Fork. Until 2012, when the Peconic Community Schoolopened, there were only a few private options, all of them with religious affiliations.
Liz Casey Searl, who grew up in Mattituck, a town halfway between Riverhead and Greenport, started the school with her sister and another local parent when her own children were school age. 'It’s not that the public schools aren’t good,” she said. “It’s just that some of us wanted something different.'”
read more at:
The New York Times: When the Weekend House Becomes a Full-Time Home, November 24, 2017.
"Third-grade students on the North Fork have become “crazy about words” thanks to a collaborative program between Peconic Landing residents and local citizens that gifts children with a personalized dictionary.
More than 420 third-grade students at 10 schools from Aquebogue to Shelter Island will get a copy of A Student’s Dictionary and Gazetteer this year thanks to Peconic Landing resident Joe McKay, who coordinated the effort."
read more at:
Southold Local: Peconic Landing Group Donates Dictionaries to North Fork Students, December 14, 2017.
"My name is Paola Florez and I am a co-teacher for early childhood. I’m also the Spanish teacher for the entire school, so that would be early childhood through sixth grade, at Peconic Community School.
There’s no typical day, really. My routine would be, before the children come in, to come into the classroom and set it up. Throughout the day it’s really a matter of attending and supporting the children’s needs and their journey through discovery."
read more at:
Riverhead News Review: The Work We Do: Paola Florez, Peconic Community School, September 17, 2018.
"The Peconic Community School held their second annual Maker’s Fair, a family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, on March 25.
Weaving through the Aquebogue school building from surprise to surprise, through environments of ideas and play, each individual booth was run by somebody who came there because they loved what they did."
read more at:
East End Beacon: Peconic Community School Meets the Makers, March 30, 2017
"All summer Shinn Estate Vineyards is offering local kids a little less screen-time, a little more green-time.
When it comes to kid-friendly places on the East End, vineyards rarely make the list. Starting this season, however, Shinn Estate Vineyards in Mattituck is working to change that. Over the course of six Sundays this summer, the vineyard will present Vine-tastic!, its new youth and family programming designed to engage children and their families while fundraising for the Peconic Community School."
read more at:
Edible East End: Kid Programming on a Vineyard? Vine-tastic News from Shinn Estate, June 7, 2016.
"The Peconic Community School held its first-ever Maker Faire last Saturday, March
12.
Hundreds of people gathered in the gymnasium of the
Riverhead Charter School in Calverton to build, play, create, learn, innovate and engage in all things Maker.
The PCS Maker Faire was a Mini Faire, part of an international movement of Maker Faires, which create opportunities for conversations with Makers. Tech enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, engineers, science clubs, authors, artists, students, and entrepreneurs all come together to show their projects and to talk about what they have learned. It is a community-based learning event designed to inspire everyone to become a maker."
read more at:
East End Beacon: North Fork School Fosters a Community of Makers, March 18, 2016
"The Peconic Landing community and the students of the North Fork’s Peconic Community School got a rare treat Wednesday, when the Colombian dance group El Colegio del Cuerpo spent the day working with the students and seniors on a collaborative dance project, capped with an improvisational dance performance in response to Peconic Landing’s sculpture garden."
read more at:
East End Beacon: Peconic Landing's Day of Dance, Sculpture, and Intergenerational Education, September 22, 2016.
“The more closely he has observed the tugboat, the more deeply he has been stirred by it, and the more eagerly and vividly he will strive to recreate it, in building, in drawing, in words.” ― Caroline Pratt
The North Fork Education Initiative’s second annual Share: A Celebration of Education fundraiser and cocktail reception was held last Sunday at the Golden Earthworm Organic Farm in Jamesport, N.Y. to benefit the Peconic Community School, a holistic elementary school that uses a project-based, arts-integrated curriculum to deepen learning and promote creativity for children ages 3-11. The evening was enchanting as the Peconic Community School shared their progressive perspective on the upcoming school year and the future ahead.
read more at:
Out East Foodie: Peconic Community School Shares Their Progressive Perspective, August 9, 2013
"Farmers aren’t always fixing their plows and attending out-of-state conferences over the winter.
Scott Chaskey, of Sag Harbor, paid a visit to the students of the Peconic Community School last month, reading to the students from his book, 'Seedtime: On the History, Husbandry, Politics and Promise of Seeds.'"
read more at:
Riverhead News Review: "Seedtime" at Peconic Community School, March 8, 2013.
In a naturally lit area of the early childhood education classroom at Peconic Community School in Aquebogue last Friday, students learned about trees by becoming trees themselves.
“Follow me, seeds,” their teacher, Alison Aldredge, whispered as she tapped on a drum. “Come on seeds. Follow me around.”
Her students then tip-toed toward the class’s potted hibiscus tree.
“The seeds are beginning to find their spot in the ground,” Ms. Aldredge said as she motioned to the children to sit and crouch like little seeds. “Come, find a spot. Plant yourself low. It’s time to begin. Starting to grow. Get your roots so deep down.”
read more at:
Riverhead News Review: Alternative School Sees Enrollment Triple in Two First Two Years, October 12, 2013.
BY LIZ CASEY-SEARL |
"What do our children really need as they head back to school?
I’ve been pondering this question over the past few weeks, as a mother, educator and now as a founder and co-executive director of Peconic Community School.
Just how has this back-to-school time we find ourselves in become a consumer experience? This is the part that has troubled me lately."
read more at:
Riverhead News Review: Guest: Peconic Community Co-Founer on "Back to School," September 24, 2012
"Peconic Community School 4th, 5th, and 6th graders are keeping busy this winter. Along with their intensive academic work, they are making time each week to support the local community.
In an initiative that began in November, with the holidays approaching, the students have been making sandwiches and brown bag lunches to be delivered to local homeless persons across Suffolk County."
read more at:
Peconic Community School Students Engage in Service Learning, March 2, 2016
Peconic Community School in Aquebogue has a new teacher who’s a familiar face to most of the staff.
Shannon Timoney is the private school’s new upper primary teacher, whose class includes students in grades 4 through 6. She previously taught for eight years at the Ross School in East Hampton.
Ms. Timoney’s mentor there was Alison Aldredge, Peconic Community School’s former kindergarten teacher and early childhood director. Ms. Aldredge died July 5 from an embolism related to Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, an illness from which she had suffered all her life.
“I was in awe of her,” Ms. Timoney recalled in an interview this week. “To have Alison show me how magical progressive education can be — I’m the luckiest person.”
read more at:
Suffolk Times: Fast chat: Peconic Community School Gets New Teacher,October 3, 2015
"The Peconic Community School has established a memorial fund to honor its kindergarten teacher, who died in early July while traveling with her husband in Oregon.
Alison Aldredge, who was also the school’s early childhood director, died July 5, three days before her 52nd birthday.
Ms. Aldredge suffered an embolism related to Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, from which she had suffered all her life, according to The East Hampton Star.
The Southampton resident had over two decades’ experience and had taught at Ross School in East Hampton before coming to Peconic Community School in 2013."
read more at:
Suffolk Times: Memorial Fund Established to Honor "Irreplaceable" Educator, August 1, 2015
“What do you do for fun?” the girl in Aquebogue asked.
“Do you have pets?” the boy in Zimbabwe asked.
“How big is your school?”
“Do you have a garden?”
These questions and more were answered Friday morning when a group of roughly 30 students at the Peconic Community School in Aquebogue met a group of Zimbabwe orphans through a live online video.
The meetup, coordinated by the nonprofit group ZimKids Orphan Trust, was the first time any of the students in Aquebogue had met kids from Africa, as well as the first time the Zimbabwe students had met someone outside their community. The school also hosted Dennis Gaboury, who founded the nonprofit, and its director — Tinashe Basa.
read more at:
Suffolk Times: Through Skype, this Class is taken to Zimbabwe, November 8, 2014
"A school that began with only eight students and a vision is expanding.
The Peconic Community School, which launched last year in downtown Riverhead, has new students registered, as well as additional staffers and a preschool scheduled for fall -- has a move planned, to Aquebogue's Our Redeemer Lutheran Church property."
read more at:
North Fork Parch: Peconic Community School Moves to Aquebogue, Adds Preschool, July 6, 2013
"The North Fork is a great place to raise kids. We have farms, beaches and fresh air. But there hasn’t been an alternative to traditional or faith-based schooling, or innovative programs that include education about the environment, community and local agriculture. People have had to send their children to the South Fork for that.
Now, North Fork parents have an option. The Peconic Community School, based at the East End Arts Council in Riverhead, started this fall with a multi-year classroom for kids, kindergarten through second grade. It’s a place that creates “collaborative growth, artistic experience and inspired change” and that taps into local food and cultural resources, says Liz Casey Searl, co-executive director. Hands-on farming will be part of the curriculum; the school has a plot at the Roots and Shoots community garden, and the children will cultivate vegetables that will be added to the lunch menu."
read more at:
Edible East End: A New Farm-to-Table School, October 10, 2012
"Last Friday afternoon, just before 3 p.m., the sounds of happy children filled the first floor of East End Arts’ headquarters on East Main Street in Riverhead.
It was the end of the first week of classes at the new Peconic Community School, an independent elementary school founded by three parents from Southold Town who wanted to give their kids, and other kids in the community, a chance to learn in an environment that encourages cooperation and an understanding of the interconnectedness of art, science, nature and community.
Their first school year began Sept. 10, with eight students from all over the North Fork, ranging in age from 6 to 9.
The school was founded by sisters Liz Casey-Searl and Kathryn Casey Quigley and their friend and fellow parent Patricia Eckardt, who is working on a doctorate in education."
read more at:
Suffolk Times: Independent School Up and Running in Downtown Riverhead, September 22, 2012
