EPHRATA — A school district has all kinds of children in it, and those children learn at different paces. Some have learning disabilities and need a little extra help, while others excel in one or more academic fields. 

Programs for those students with a talent for one or more academic endeavors go by different names — talented and gifted, accelerated learning, enrichment — but at Ephrata schools it’s called the Highly Capable Program. The Ephrata School District has the Highly Capable Program, or “Hi-Cap,” as educators sometimes abbreviate it, at Columbia Ridge and Grant elementary schools and Parkway Intermediate School, meaning students can get the benefit of extended learning through sixth grade. 

“This year, we've been doing STEM lessons,” said Alicia Keegan, who teaches the HCP classes at Columbia Ridge Elementary School. “We've been learning about movement for the entire year, and specifically movement with automobiles and how that impacts neighborhoods. This has gone in many directions, because now my primary kids are actually building bridges.” 

That’s the first and second graders, Keegan explained. The third and fourth grade class took a different approach. 

“In my intermediate class, we are now doing robotics,” she said. “They are programming, using code, their own robots and they're seeing how speed impacts turns and how it impacts the balance of the robot and things like that. It's taken quite a dramatic turn, and we all started in the same place. We all started talking about speed, what that looks like in vehicles and how that impacts a neighborhood. The first activity that both of my groups did is we actually built a neighborhood with little cardboard cutouts.” 

Keegan came to choose the topic through surveying the students’ parents, she said.  

Marshall Bilodeau, who teaches the Highly Capable classes at Grant Elementary, has done STEM in the past but is taking a musical approach this year. 

“This year, I have a group of musicians that has come into my Hi-Cap class,” Bilodeau said. “So, I wrote this class called Beats and Bytes. It’s kind of like a Chromebook music lab. The class explores digital music, how to create beats and melodies, sound effects, any kind of music that you love.” 

There’s no set formula or curriculum for Highly Capable classes, although Parkway Principal Jeremy Vasquez said the district is trying to work one out. In the meantime, the teachers have the freedom to choose their own curricula.  

Naileah Shaporda, the Highly Capable teacher at Parkway, has led her fifth and sixth graders through a series of projects only loosely connected to each other. The one they’ve been doing the last few months is a student-run newspaper called the Parkway Post — as reported on by the Columbia Basin Herald last week — but this year they’ve already done a research project for Women’s History Month, where they studied woman who have impacted the world. That was followed by an art unit where they created their own animated film. During the winter Shaporda’s class created a winter ecosystem diorama that’s now on display in the entry hall. 

“We learned about the animals that live there,” Shaporda said. “We learned about tundras, forests, wetlands, how (animals) adapt to survive, the types of plants that thrive in in the cold environments.” 

Some of the students had some help from their parents; others did everything on their own, said fifth grader Viviene Springs. 

“(My mom) got me a hot glue gun and some stuff from outside, and then she 3-D printed the animals, but I painted them all,” Viviene said. “One person used clay for her animals, and her dad helped her paint the mountains in the background.” 

Their next project will be an invention — nobody yet knows exactly what kind of invention – to help the environment in some way, Shaproda said. The students will come up with their own ideas and then submit them like on the TV show “Shark Tank.” 

“Our students are going to Shark Tank-pitch their idea for their invention, and then we'll vote, and whoever wins, we'll get it 3-D printed,” Shaproda said. 

The Wild-West nature of Highly Capable curriculum is a benefit because children’s talents and gifts come in an endless variety, Keegan said. 

“Sometimes the kids have one avenue that they're really strong in like say, the subject of math,” she said. “But often what we get are kids that are highly capable in many different areas and oftentimes the word talented comes with being highly capable. Talent can be musical arts, it can be dramatic arts, like theater or it can be something that they're painting or drawing. Being highly capable simply can mean needing an enrichment, and our job is to try to figure out what type of enrichment is going to be appropriate for those kids in that particular season of their learning.” 

The students come to the Highly Capable Program in different ways, Parkway Principal Jeremy Vasquez said.  

“Parents can request their kids be evaluated,” he said. “This whole week, all fifth graders are being tested to see if they qualify for Hi-Cap or not, and if they do, they will be in Hi-Cap next year. At the elementary schools they do it as well, and if they are qualified for Hi-Cap, when they come to Parkway they're in Hi-Cap and we just keep it going.” 

The effect the Highly Capable Program has had on the students is noticeable, said Viviene’s mom, Tammie Springs. 

“She's definitely improved with her reading,” Springs said. “And it totally coincides with her joining the Highly Capable (class). At the beginning of the year, she was supposed to read, like, 40,000 words in the first quarter, and let's just say it by (this time in) the school year, she's over 2 million words. She's just gone crazy with her reading, and everything has improved as a result.” 

The benefit of Highly Capable class slops over into the rest of the students’ education, Bilodeau said. 

“They understand that if they don't get their regular class work done, they can't come into Hi-Cap, because the regular classroom teachers struggle sometimes because (students) are being taken out of their regular subjects to be in the enrichment class,” he said. 

Maintaining the students’ enthusiasm for the Hi-Cap program is no challenge at all, Keegan said. 

“The kids come in motivated, and we as teachers just really want to suit their needs and enrich what they are already developing in their own lives, so it's fun,” she said. “I haven't had anybody who doesn't want to come to Hi-Cap … The biggest challenge I have (is) kids who have recommended to me, ‘Can we can we come earlier to Hi-Cap? Can we stay later?’ And the truth is, I always have to tell them no.” 

Bilodeau’s experience has been similar, he said. 

“(Highly Capable) is in a spot in the schedule where … it butts up against their recess time, and so they wind up using some of that time for their projects,” he said. “They really are into it. I have to kick them out. I'm like, literally, I have to go. You kids have to leave now.” 

Having lessons, they’re eager to learn has an effect on their attitudes toward the rest of their schooling, Springs said. 

“(Viviene) is getting straight A's in everything,” Springs said. “She's got this drive that she wants to succeed now, and she takes a lot of pride in being able to … There was one kid (on the Parkway Post project) that was kind of messing around in, I think, a Google document. She's like, ‘I'm going to have to have a talk with him. He's not taking it seriously enough.’” 

It’s not just the students who love the Highly Capable classes, Keegan said. 

“Working with talented kids is one of my passions in life, and I'm super excited that I've been able to do that for three years here in this district,” she said. 

    A portion of the winter ecosystems diorama students created in the Highly Capable Program at Parkway intermediate School in Ephrata.
  

    Highly Capable Program teachers Alicia Keegan, left, and Marshall Bilodeau stand in Bilodeau’s classroom at Grant Elementary School in Ephrata.