Like Harrison Ford I am Frantic....frantically seeking a Dominican Ministry of Education Code


Back in the early days of Makarios, I remember as a board member having discussions and making decisions about whether or not we would try to become recognized by the Dominican government, which we decided to not pursue. What this means is that our students still go to the public school in the afternoons (there are two sessions) since the government doesn't see Colegio Makarios as a recognized institution. If a student were to move they would have no credit for their time with us if there were to go to Colegio Makarios exclusively We were really at a place where we needed to decide if we are going to merely come along side of the public school or if we were going to pursue being a recognized school and not need to share our students any longer.


I am really pleased to share that we decided to pursue recognition by the Dominican Ministry of Education. This is actually no small task. It has involved many conversations with many schools on the island and a change in curriculum school-wide. Our first step was to obtain our non-profit status in the D.R. We should have that officially in a few weeks. My vice-principal, Johan Castillo, and I have been working on a hefty document that is needed which is basically our school on paper.....and in Spanish! Who is Mak, why is Mak, who does Mak serve, who has worked with Mak, what did they do, how have we grown, what do our buildings look like, what are our resources, what is our mission, what are our values, what is our vision, how are people hired, what do we teach, what are our goals, etc.


While we have been piecing together this document, we also realized that a lot of our students were in a different grade than they were in the public school—for various reasons. We needed to remedy this, so on Monday, 18 November we basically started school again. Some students had new classrooms, new teachers, and new grade levels. We had to actually add a class as our students in 4^th grade are in 5^th grade in the public school. We had to put them someplace on a campus that really had no more space—so, Makarios bought a piece of land right next to our existing land and now the 5^th grade is in a casita which is super fun! :) I am humbled by the Makarios staff and how they have handled all these changes and were able to make the Big Day o' Change seem like any other day! It was a seamless transition and all the credit goes to God and the outstanding teachers of Colegio Makarios.


Please pray that we can get our code and be able to better serve our students by having them all day.