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School Life

Winterim

Winterim enhances students' learning with intensive, focused month long experiences. Students select from offerings that include classes at Maumee Valley, educational trips and independent study projects both within and outside of the Toledo area.  At the end of their fourth year, Maumee Valley graduates have enjoyed a broad range of experiences and are well prepared to pursue their education at the next level. Click here for past Winterim offerings.
2011 Highlights

Winterim

France
MVCDS students traveled to France where they studied the history and architecture of Paris; Chartres; the Loire Valley castles; Mont Saint Michel; and Bayeux.  You can read the France Winterim Blog to learn more.
Film Making
MVCDS students traveled to Los Angeles for the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival for four days in November.  Additionally, the students toured post WB post production studios, visited with individuals involved in the movie business.  Upon their return to campus, students finished editing their films to prepare for a Winterim Fair Film Festival.

Films will will online soon. 
Amtrekkin'
This was a winterim about America. It’s about the people, the places, the music, the food… the EXPERIENCE of America. Students were challenged to see it, hear it, taste it, and, for fifteen days. On an Amtrak trip around the country, from Chicago down to Memphis and New Orleans – stopping for a tour of Graceland and checking out street musicians in the French Quarter. The students headed over to spend two days in El Paso – a city that has evolved in concert with influences from Mexico and Texas. After that, they trained over the Sierra Nevada mountains to Los Angeles – Hollywood, to be exact – where they saw a city that’s grown up fertilized by fame, music, and film. After leaving, they hugged the coast of California all the way up to Seattle, the birthplace of Grunge, famous for fantastic seafood and coffee, and home of the Science Fiction museum and Experience Music Project. From there, they traveled back to Chicago, and finally… Toledo.

You can retrace their trip by reading their blog.
Novel Writing
November was NaNoWriMo (pronounced “naa-noh-ree-moh”) – National Novel Writing Month. All over the country, people from every walk of life sharpened their keyboards and diving into novel writing, and MV students joined in the madness.  Students spent the month living the life of writers – writing 1500 words a day in a writing studio where students were comfortable, talking to writers and reading each others’ work. Students had daily writing goals, talked to local writers about the writing process and took a few field trips to Ann Arbor to hear acclaimed writers read sections from their soon-to-be-published work.   
A Winterim Story

Since 1977, Maumee Valley Upper School students have had the unique opportunity to participate in Winterim. This educational experience involves a month-long intensive study of one subject either at Maumee Valley, a school within the diverse group called “The Network of Complementary Schools”, independent study or international travel. The wide variety of Winterim offerings is as diverse as our student body. Amidst this diversity, each student comes away with a new perspective, greater knowledge, and increased appreciation for the world beyond Maumee Valley.

 

Following is an example of an independent study. It is just one of many stories of Maumee Valley Winterim experiences.

 

Well-known actor Robin Williams played the part of the unorthodox Dr. Patch Adams in the major

motion picture “Patch Adams” in 1998. The movie introduces the world to Patch Adams and his philosophy of treating his patients with humor and compassion. More than a decade later, Maumee Valley junior Arjun Reddy '11 spent his Winterim clowning around with Patch, his brother Wildman and other clowns from around the world.

 

The first leg of Arjun’s journey took him to Pocahontas County, West Virginia, the home of the Gesundheit Institute. The 321 acres the Institute sits upon includes a three-story woodshop, a domed staff house, a Chrysalis-shaped classroom, a lake, gardens, and a farmhouse. The farmhouse is where the Institute began back in 1971 when Adams and a group of twenty friends, including three doctors, moved into a six-bedroom home and called it a free hospital. The hospital was always open and welcomed patients of all ages and maladies. In those early years, 500 to 1000 patients were seen monthly. Adams’ dream is to build a teaching center and clinic on the land.

 

While visiting the Institute, Arjun assisted Patch Adams’ brother Wildman with a variety of projects designed to maintain the facilities including painting, digging footers for a new bridge, and clearing weeds. Knowing that the work was helping to secure a future for the Institute, Arjun found the work with Wildman rewarding. But Arjun had no idea then how much more rewarding his Winterim experience was about to become.

 

After spending a few days at the Institute and learning about the history of Patch Adams and the basics of clowning, Arjun jetted off to Russia for a two-week clowning tour with the funny doctor himself and other clowns from around the world.

 

Some of the children the clowns visited were blind, deaf, or severely impaired mentally. Then, of course, there was the language barrier. But Arjun learned an important lesson about the language of humor and something about himself, too. “I learned that … it didn’t matter whether I could communicate with them or not; humor was my language … I couldn’t help to think how happy I felt; I saw that I had made a small, but deep impact on their lives.”