|
Howard Drive Elementary School was built in 1960 as a
relief school for Palmetto Elementary. The mission from the inception
has been to provide students with a firm academic foundation that
fosters intellectual, emotional and social development.
Howard Drive Elementary students proudly displaying their school
nickname -- the Hurricanes.
The focus of Howard Drive Elementary in the years to
come will be to prepare students to utilize mathematics, science and
technology as fundamental skills in the 21st Century.
 The
school took significant steps toward achieving that dream on Jan. 21
when it dedicated the state-of-the-art media center to the students
and community during a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Principal Florine Curtis welcomed everyone who came to
the dedication on a cool Friday morning and introduced several key
members of the audience. In attendance were Village of Pinecrest Mayor
Evelyn Greer and Councilman Leslie Bowe, Miami-Dade Superintendent of
Schools Roger C. Cuevas, Region V Superintendent Neyda G. Navarro and
several members of the Miami-Dade School Board.
"As we look forward and move into the new
millennium, we have truly brought our kids a facility that will help
them meet the needs of what is ahead of them," Cuevas said.
"The media center -- we used to call them libraries in my time --
will provide the community of Pinecrest and Palmetto Bay a state of
the art learning center for generations to come."
The media center includes a new state of the art
reading room and traditional library with access to thousands of
books. Also in the reading room are several new computers, all with
access to the Internet, so that students may facilitate their learning
with educational materials only found on-line.
The media center will contain a closed- circuit
television production studio, from which morning announcements will be
made to the student body via television sets in all classrooms.
Following remarks by all of the respected guests,
Howard Drive Elementary students put on a retrospective medley of the
decades, marking significant events of the world and their school from
its inception in the 1960s.
Students noted how in the 1960s their school was
segregated, then sang Yellow Submarine by the Beatles, then mingled
with the crowd with poster art they created depicting hot rod cars,
hippies, the space race and the pop art.
For the 1970s, students discussed integration, sang
YMCA by the Village People and showed the crowd posters of the Vietnam
War, Mr. Rogers and Charles Schultz's cartoon, Peanuts.
Students depicted the 1980s, by singing Celebration by
Kool & The Gang and by displaying illustrated posters of ET, Pac
Man and the AIDS Quilt.
For the 1990s, students commented on
how Hurricane Andrew and how it affected the community, sang Larger Than
Life by the Backstreet Boys and displayed posters of technology, cable
television, cell phones and the Gulf War.
Later, Councilman Bowe remarked how the student population had grown over
the years and how Howard Drive Elementary School exemplified the character
that educational institutions of today try
to emulate. He went on to proclaim that Jan. 21
"would be forever known in the Village of Pinecrest as Howard
Drive Elementary School Day."
A ribbon-cutting ceremony followed and principal
Curtis closed the event by saying "The 40-year history of Howard
Drive Elementary lives on in all of us, providing a solid foundation
upon which we build and grow each day."
Howard Drive Elementary students proudly displaying
their school nickname -- the Hurricanes.
Howard Drive Elementary principal Florine Curtis
addresses the audience at the ribbon cutting ceremony.
|
