Celebrating Global Youth Services Day!

Thanks to Serve Ohio, Americorps, and the Ohio Commission on Service and Volunteerism, Sara’s Garden and New Horizons Academy celebrated Global Youth Service Day on Friday, April 21! The students, staff, and gardeners immersed themselves in “green therapy.” For some of our kids, this was the first time that they “got their hands dirty,” planting fruits, vegetables, and flowers in individual, classroom, and school planters. With Earth Day on April 22 and Arbor Day on April 28 through container gardening, they made their school, community, and the world a greener, more beautiful place to live, play, and grow in. Thank you, Serve Ohio!

NHA State Charter Approved!

We are thrilled to announce that New Horizons Academy has been approved by the Ohio Department of Education to become one of the newest non-public, chartered schools in the state of Ohio!

The New Horizons Academy teachers, staff, and students did an outstanding job with the Ohio Department of Education’s site visit on January 25!

Since New Horizons Academy has been providing outstanding educational and intervention opportunities for years, there will be very few changes in day-to-day operations with the charter’s approval. The biggest change is that many of our students’ home school districts have begun transporting them to New Horizons Academy if their families live more than two miles away from the school but less than 30 minutes away. Thank you to Archbold, Defiance, Delta, Liberty Center, Napoleon, Northeastern Local, Patrick Henry, Stryker, and Wauseon!

As a nonpublic, chartered school, the students’ home school districts are still responsible for their individualized education plans (IEP’s) while Wauseon Exempted Village Schools will be responsible for all testing. New Horizons Academy and its staff will continue to work closely with parents and home school districts on IEP goals and ETR plans.

New Horizons Academy is looking forward to its final ODE site visit before the end of this school year. NHA’s newly-formed school board will hold its next meeting on Tuesday, June 6 at 5:30 p.m. in the Hope Center.

Donate Your Old LEGOs

Do you have boxes of old LEGOs laying around? They could serve a crucial function to the kids here at our school.

Most parents already know the benefits of playing with LEGOs. What many people aren’t aware of are the powerful benefits playing with LEGOs can have for children with Autism.

Playing with LEGOs can be far more than just a way to pass the time and prevent boredom. For many of the students we serve at New Horizons Academy it can boost their play skills, transform their social skills and build self-esteem. We’ve learned that LEGO toy building blocks offer a highly routine, repetitive and structured form of play that many of our children with Autism find appealing.

Building success… One brick at a time!

Our team of specialists have created activities using LEGOs that can be integrated into their curriculum and free time. These activities can be simple step by step instructions that help build awareness and concentration to free building time that allows for creativity. Group activities can be designed to help children gain skills in both verbal and non-verbal communication, sharing, turn taking, collaboration, and other social skills.

Don’t throw your old LEGOs away! If you have LEGOs that you no longer want we would love to have them.

For more information, please contact our school office at 419.335.7272 or via email at info@newhorizonsacademy.org.

2016-17 NHA Yearbook Sponsorship

Do you remember how excited you and your classmates were when your school yearbooks arrived?

Yearbooks hold images and information of all of the events and people who made your years in school special. Yearbooks capture memories frozen in time, events that happened, faces that inevitably change and memories that may only be remembered again by opening the cover. Yearbooks have a way of connecting students, families and entire school communities in ways that few other projects can. They never go out of style and will always be cherished for years to come.

Parents get just as excited about the yearbook as students do — sometimes more. They enjoy seeing how childhood friends have changed. They want to remember their child’s school years. The first look at a yearbook is fun and exciting, often marking the end of a school year and a summer of freedom. But the moment a yearbook is opened years later, a flood of all types of memories will resurface.

Our hope is to provide our students with those very same feelings and memories. In many cases, this is something that their families have never had the joy of experiencing!

This will be the very first year that a yearbook is made available to students at New Horizons Academy. Our goal is to raise funds through sponsors in order to keep the costs of the yearbooks lower, so that more students and their families will be able to afford one.

We invite you to consider being a sponsor of this very special project!

Sara’s Garden is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization and your donation is tax-deductible within the guidelines of U.S. law. To claim a donation as a deduction on your U.S. taxes, please keep your email donation receipt as your official record. We’ll send it to you upon successful completion of your donation.

NHA Classroom Toy Drive

We’re asked all the time for simple ways that families can help support our students and their classrooms.

One such option that is often overlooked, yet incredibly important, is the need for sensory toys that can be used to support the interventions and therapies being provided.

Every child benefits from having toys to play with. Toys help a child develop motor skills, creativity, social skills and other things they will need for growth and development. But for a child with autism or other special needs, toys play an even more vital role. Sensory toys help children with special needs gain a measure of control over their environment. Sensory toys for autism development are important because they help the child to learn problem-solving skills, something that many children with autism struggle to do. What may look like simple play with sensory toys for children with special needs is actually the process of education in action.

Having the right kind of sensory toys for autism education is very important to the development of the children in the classroom. Millions of children are affected by some kind of special need or disability that affects their ability to learn in a conventional way. Because of that, NHA incorporates various sensory related toys into our classrooms for special needs students.

We are holding a classroom toy drive to help collect toys so our kids can play! You can help make Christmas a little merrier for our kids and their classrooms.

BUY A TOY ~ SPONSOR A CLASSROOM

Thank you so much for making a difference at our school.

Merry Christmas!

Students and Teachers at New Horizons Academy

Backpacks of Hope

Backpacks of Hope began in March of 2014. This program was started in order to help the families of students attending New Horizons Academy at Sara’s Garden. All of the students who attend New Horizons Academy have a special learning need. A majority of our students have varying degrees of Autism and the others have more of a physical disability, such as Cerebral Palsy or Traumatic Brain Injury.

If you know anyone with a child with special needs, you understand that they are often short on money partly due to the many appointments with Doctors and other specialists. The purpose of Backpacks of Hope is to help the families of students who attend New Horizons Academy by giving them food for 1 meal per week. Families are given the opportunity every week to fill out a slip to indicate they need help with food for that week. Between August 2015 and May 2016, Backpacks of Hope distributed over 200 backpacks of food to 20 different families.

In May of 2015, we began to realize that these families were also struggling to buy school supplies. In August of 2015, Backpacks of Hope added school supplies to the donation list and began distributing these items to children in need.

Backpacks of Hope has been blessed by numerous families in the community who have donated non-perishable foods and school supplies over the past few years. On the back side of this letter is a list of non-perishable food items and school supplies that we could use for our children and their families at New Horizons Academy at Sara’s Garden. We are asking you to prayerfully consider helping by donating items from this list. If you feel God nudging you to help, there is a box under the mail boxes in the lobby for donations or donated items can be dropped off at Sara’s Garden

If you have never heard of Sara’s Garden or New Horizons Academy, we would be happy to speak with you about the many services we offer.

Thank you in advance for any help you can give!

Valerie Nafziger
valn@sarasgarden.org
Backpacks of Hope coordinator
Client Services Director at Sara’s Garden
419-335-7272

“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’ “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me,’ Matthew 25:44-45 NIV

School Supplies

#2 pencils (Ticonderoga brand)
Big size pencils
Highlighters
Markers
Colored Pencils
Pencil sharpeners
Pencil Cap Erasers
Dry Erase Markers
Kleenex
All sizes of zip-lock baggies
Glue Sticks
Bottles of Glue (Elmer’s)
Crayons
Rulers
2” – three ring binders
1 ½” – three ring binders
Pencil bags for three ring binders
Tabbed subject dividers for three ring binders
3×5 ruled index cards
3×5 un-ruled index cards
White out tapes (not liquid)
Large metal index card rings
Large pink or white erasers
Pencil Box
Zippered Trapper Keepers
Pocket folders with prongs
Composition Notebooks
Earbuds or Headphones
Construction Paper
Colored Tissue Paper
Scissors
Rolls of Paper Towel
Boy and Girl Backpacks

Non-Perishable Food Items

**Canned Fruit
**Canned Vegetables
Peanut Butter
Jelly
Macaroni and Cheese
Spaghettios
Pancake mix (just add water)
Canned Tuna
Tuna Helper
Pudding Cups
Jello Cups
Ramen Noodles
**Canned Beef
**Canned Chicken
**Spaghetti
**Spaghetti Sauce
Instant Oatmeal
Rice Sides packets
Pasta Sides packets
Baked Beans
Crackers
Noodles and Pasta
Banquet Homestyle Bakes (complete meal kit)
Betty Crocker Helper Complete Meals
Any other non-perishable food items

**Backpacks of Hope has the greatest need for these items.

NHA is Hiring Special Education Teachers/Intervention Specialists

In order to meet the growing demand for student enrollment, we are currently hiring for full-time Special Education Teachers/Intervention Specialists at New Horizons Academy, a private school for children with special needs in Wauseon, OH.

Duties and Responsibilities:

Provide instruction and learning experiences, which contribute to the psychomotor, cognitive, and affective development of each student.
Experience writing IEPs, doing academic evaluations, modifying curriculum, working with an instructional and support team and conferencing with parents.
Strong interpersonal, collaborative, and communication skills.
Strong instructional skills.
Attend IEP meetings on each student.
Comply with Quality Assurance practices.
Design each student’s academic program and behavior goals in accordance with the overall educational plan.
The candidate will be aware that his or her own physical and verbal behavior impacts the client population either positively or negatively and will act accordingly.
The candidate will maintain professional relationships with all other personnel.
The candidate will follow the written policies and procedures.
Experience implementing educational programming for special needs students.
Knowledge in the field of special education and Ohio IEP procedures.

Qualifications:

Bachelors Degree with emphasis in Special Education or Elementary Education.
Teachers / Intervention Specialists with a focus on working with Autistic children is preferred.
ABA certification and/or training is encouraged.
Licensed as a Teacher and/or Intervention Specialist as defined by the Ohio Department of Education.
State of Ohio Licensure required.
Believe in every student
Achieve results
Take personal responsibility
Collaborate
Share a commitment to creating a great school environment
Strong organizational and problem solving skills
Demonstrated record of setting high expectations for students with special needs

Contact Information

David Burkholder
419.335.7272 ext. 104
davidb@sarasgarden.org
www.newhorizonsacademy.org

New Horizons Academy Expansion Update

It’s overwhelming and humbling to consider the growth and success that we’ve experienced at New Horizons Academy at Sara’s Garden over the past two years. It’s so hard to believe that we are getting ready to begin the school’s 3rd year of operation.

As we mentioned in last month’s newsletter, we’ve received an overwhelming demand for enrollment in the school. We currently have 62 students from 16 different school districts across Northwest Ohio enrolled for the 2014/15 school year. To be able to continue to provide the students with small, intimate classroom settings where they can develop and excel, it became clear that we needed more space.

By the time that financing was secured through State Bank, we had only 4 months to complete a 9,200 square foot expansion project to add more classrooms, sensory rooms and Conductive Education intervention space.

We feel so fortunate to have such an amazing team of contractors working on this project for us. They know the importance of this space and what it means to the kids that we serve. They have been tirelessly working around the clock to ensure that the building is completed and ready to use by the start of school in August. We can’t begin to thank them enough for all of their hard work and dedication.

We feel so honored and privileged to have the opportunity to work with and serve such an amazing group of kids and can’t wait to see what the next school year has in store.

Matt Rychener CEO / Executive Director

NHA Expansion in Progress

If you have driven by the Hope Center at New Horizons Academy, you probably have noticed the activity at the east end of the building. The students, staff, administration and board of directors are excited to announce that we’ve broken ground on a new addition.

New Horizons Academy was started during the fall of 2012 with 2 students attending. This grew to 6 students during the second semester for the 2012-13 school year. At the beginning of this school year, the attendance of New Horizons Academy had grown to 27 students. For second semester, an additional 13 students enrolled bringing the total enrollment for the 2013-14 school year to 40 students. For the 2014-15 school year, there are presently 52 students registered.

We have always felt that the Hope Center could accommodate 30 students, thus we have moved 10 of our current older students into the new addition of the hyperbaric center. As you can see, we have outgrown our present facility quickly. Thus, in January, the board of directors had extensive discussions about the future of New Horizons Academy. A decision had to be made. The choices were to add onto the Hope Center or reduce enrollment by telling some families their children could not return for the 2014-15 school year.

After much prayer and reflection it became obvious that God was directing us to meet the needs of the children. The decision of the board of directors was unanimous that we, by faith, begin the process to secure a large loan to double the size of the Hope Center. This entire process has been completed. Our expectations are that by the time the new school year begins, we will have 9 more classrooms, a second, larger sensory room, and a specially designed Conductive Education room. The facility will have special lighting along with rooms that have walls designed to absorb sound. This will help all of our students that have sensory disorders.

We would like to thank the parents of our students for giving us the opportunity to work with their children. We also would like to thank the community for their continued support of Sara’s Garden and New Horizons Academy. Most importantly, we would like to thank God for his continued blessings and provision.

NHA Students Enjoy Academic & Social Growth

As we approach the end of the first semester at New Horizons Academy at Sara’s Garden, we continue to be amazed by the academic and social growth of children, who in the world’s poor perception were not able to succeed or develop into independent learners.

Many of the students have met and exceeded the academic IEP (Individual Educational Plan) and/or behavioral goals, which had been set prior to attending New Horizons Academy. As we contemplate how and why these academic and behavioral improvements have occurred, we think about what is important to children as they grow into independent adults.

It is important for children to be truly loved and to feel safe in their environment. Because of the small classroom population, the intervention specialists at NHA are able to provide that special learning climate which creates a culture of safety and caring. Students who need those unique minutes for special hugs or words of encouragement find them in these settings. The small group settings also provide time and attention for effective problem solving in positive and stress-free surroundings.
All children desire success. Once children have experienced success, they strive to experience it again. Success builds upon success, which once again builds a positive learning climate. Many of those who now attend NHA had previously not experienced success. Success is now prevalent and an exciting daily occurrence.
Children not only want to be safe, loved and successful but also need to give to others who they are and what they have. To assist the children in accomplishing these goals of giving, the staff at New Horizons Academy has developed several special programs, which enhance the values of giving and caring and also create opportunities to express and demonstrate such values.
- The students at New Horizons helped to prepare a Thanksgiving feast. Academic goals were incorporated into the preparation of this meal. In other words, academic and hands-on experiences took place during this event. It was exciting to observe students encouraging each other while working together to complete this project. The most excitement transpired in witnessing the older children serving the meal to the younger students. The thankfulness from the smaller children, who would not have been able to accomplish this meal alone, to the older children was truly rewarding.
- During the Christmas season, the staff established a motivational reward system, which included the collection of reward points or coins for successes within each classroom. The children chose other students to whom they would give gifts purchased with their reward points or coins. The reward points and coins were used by the students to purchase donated gifts which were then given to “Adriel Foster Children.” Another class mixed, cut-out, baked and frosted cookies which were donated to “Heartland Rehabilitation Center.” These same students then caroled their way through Sara’s Garden Hyperbaric Center, cheerfully entertaining the grateful clients.

All of these projects, not only served academic purposes but, helped to develop an environment of caring, sharing and success which all children need to eventually become independent learners.

In approaching the next semester, NHA is excited to welcome eleven new students and three additional teachers. This increases our enrollment to thirty-six (36) full-time students and three (3) part-time students. The fifth through ninth graders will be attending classes in the new addition to the hyperbaric facility due to expanding growth in enrollment. The Board of Directors and NHA administration will continue to operate with the same philosophy that has supported the electrifying academic and social growth of our students kindled in the first semester.

As always, do not hesitate to make contact should questions or concerns arise.