Category Archives: Deep Creek Middle School

Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Book Camp

This week, Deep Creek Middle School is hosting its first Book Camp. The enthusiastic campers are reading together, writing poetry, playing word games, and learning more about the publishing industry. Organized by former DCMS teacher Megan Kelly (2006 – 2010) and assisted by DCMS alumna Jhane Gibson (2011), the camp’s main texts are The Strange Case of the Origami Yoda and Wonder. Campers will interview the authors of both books, as well as the Head of Macmillan Publishing’s Caribbean Division, in order to learn more about how books are created.

The first day’s activities included creating their own Origami Yodas, designing postcards that will feature their poetry, and writing six-word memoirs to introduce themselves (it’s harder than it sounds!). A few of the awesome memoirs: “My brain means everything to me,” “I’m nice and beautiful, don’t hate,” “Sometimes the strong aren’t strong enough,” and “My headaches come from Nicki Minaj.” The fun has only just begun at Book Camp!

You can read more about Book Camp here.

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Deep Creek Middle School

Maxey in the Classroom at DCMS

Chris Maxey has been teaching grade 9 math at DCMS for the past 6 weeks. He is balancing the needs of preparing for a government exam with the best practices of using math as a language to analyze and communicate about interesting questions in our world. Here he is pictured working through statistics problems about a mango farmer under the mango tree.

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Deep Creek Middle School

Community Outreach Event on Haitian Bahamian Relations A Great Success!

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Over the course of the semester we have worked closely with Deep Creek Middle School to help improve problems facing the community here on Eleuthera. Our group assisted Moesha Leary’s project on Haitian Bahamian relations in attempts to combat the discrimination of Haitians in The Bahamas. Moesha, her DCMS peers, and their Island School Community Outreach buddies planned an event to educate the community about Haitians’ culture and to celebrate the similarities and differences between Haiti and The Bahamas. The event was a success and had a great turn out. Many people were inspired by what they saw and heard there. They left with a new perspective of the Haitian community in The Bahamas. The documentary “Can You See Us?”  which chronicles the struggles of young Haitian Bahamians and the discussion that followed the film were among the highlights of the night. The evening had a fiery ending as both the Bahamian and the Haitians gave performances specific to their cultures including a fire show. It united the beauty of the two cultures and brought people together. You can read more about the event in an article in The Eleutheran newspaper here.

- Kira, Kyle, Will, Moesha, & Dana

Alumni, Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Grade 8′s Visit US Boarding Schools

DCMS 8th graders Lance Pelecanos, Breanna Leary, Bronthaye Rolle and Keniesha Pinder recently toured some boarding schools in Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama. On the way home, they got to have a lovely evening socializing with John Head (IS F’99) and Ted Griffith (IS S’02), also members of the Alumni Advisory Board (AAB). The students stayed with the Griffith’s and from these photos, you can see it was a memorable evening. To date, twenty-eight DCMS alumni have earned scholarships to US boarding schools.

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Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Community Outreach Project on Lionfish

Deep Creek Middle School student, Yanni Giannakopulous (grade 9) is leading both Island School and DCMS students through a project to educate local fishermen and restaurant owners on Eleuthera about the market for Lionfish. At the conclusion of the project, the students plan to hold an educational outreach event at a local restaurant where they bring together suppliers and consumers to learn more about how to cook the fish and create a market for this invasive species.

In order to prepare for this final event, the students heard a presentation by Nicola Smith from The Bahamas Department of Marine Resources. She shared some of the latest research on the species. The students are also learning all about safe handling of the lionfish, since their spine rays are venomous, from lionfish researcher at CEI and alumna, Skylar Miller (S’03), as well as delicious preparation of the fish from Island School sustainable chef and alumnus Emery Long (F’04), shown in the photos below. During this Community Outreach class, the students were being filmed by ZED, a French documentary film company who are currently on campus. ZED specializes in natural history, science and adventure and has been working on an invasive species documentary featuring lionfish and will be shooting lots of underwater footage with the lionfish research team at CEI.

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Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Grade 9′s are Boarding School-Bound!

We all have been waiting in anticipation for the five Deep Creek Middle School students who applied to boarding schools in the United States to hear back from the admissions offices. We are proud to announce that all five students who applied have received placements and scholarships from the schools to continue their studies abroad next year!
  • Ashley Gibson – St Margaret’s School, VA
  • Moesha Leary – Christchurch School, VA
  • Lionel Johnson – Woodberry Forest, VA
  • Yanni Giannakopoulos – The Ross School, NY
  • Treshae Clarke – Wilbraham and Monson Academy, MA
Thank you to all of those who helped in some part of the process whether as mock-interviewers or to homestay families in the US who host on long-weekends! And congratulations to Ashley, Moesha, Lionel, Yanni, and Treshae!
Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Students Present at Green Conference in Denver

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On February 26th, three students from Deep Creek Middle School departed for Denver, Colorado to attend the National Green Schools Conference where they had been invited to present their work to students from all over the United States. Eighth graders Keniesha Pinder (Tarpum Bay), Shanice Symonette (Rock Sound) and seventh grader Zachary Carey (Tarpum Bay) delivered poster presentations on “How to Create a Recycling System at your School” and “Middle School Aquaponics.” The audience was students and teachers who were interested in creating sustainable changes in their communities. “People were really excited about our ideas, a lot of people said they wanted to try aquaponics at their schools”, explains Shanice.

DCMS students also had the opportunity to attend workshops given by student and professionals that pertained to environmental topics that interested them. “I’ve learned all kinds of things that I want to do at DCMS and in my own settlement” says Zachary Carey of Tarpum Bay. Some of the more impressive workshops had students dreaming up ideas to use to improve their school and island. Some of these ideas include: developing Continue reading →

Deep Creek Middle School

Prince Harry is Coming!

Next week, Prince Harry is visiting The Bahamas as part of the royal family’s tour of the Commonwealth to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Last week, Deep Creek Middle School received a call from the office coordinating the Prince’s visit. We were told that the Prince had heard about our school and was very impressed with what he had read and so they were requesting a student representative to meet with Prince Harry to talk about the youth environmental movement in the islands. Here is a picture of Moesha Leary, grade 9 and President of the Eco-Club, as she got the news that she would be the student representative. Stand by for more photos of the Prince and his new buddy Moesha!

Deep Creek Middle School

Mrs. Carnetta Ferguston Returns to Visit the Cape

On February 17, Mrs. Carnetta Ferguson from the newly launched National Parenting Center of the Ministry of Education visited Cape Eleuthera today, where Jennie Freeman was hosting the Deep Creek Middle School advisory board meetings underway. Mrs. Ferguson was an early supporter of The Island School, having been instrumental in bringing UNESCO to Cape Eleuthera in 2001. Her support of the Deep Creek Middle School includes her popular “Fly Like an Eagle” speech from the DCMS 5th year anniversary celebration in 2006. Welcome back!

Deep Creek Middle School

Vote for DCMS Students’ Youth Activism Projects

For several weeks, the DCMS grade 9 students have been studying youth activism. Our class brings students, teachers, and community members together to create a vision for a more positive world. In the first two weeks, we learned about young activists all over the world and throughout history, brainstormed social and environmental issues in The Bahamas that we want to solve, and went out into our community and interviewed leaders. Then, each of us chose an issue that matters to us. We all made surveys, gathering information for our research. After collecting data, we wrote letters to the editors of different Bahamian newspapers! Now, we’re writing up our project proposals on Facebook. Please read about them and then VOTE for the projects  you want to see happen!
By Kenya Polidor – grade 9