AP SEMINAR

Dear Community Members

In the 2024/2025 school year, AHA is offering a South Valley Field Study class with Mr. Jordy Hicks. For this class,  students will be receiving school credit to examine the complex historical/cultural relationship that people/communities have with the natural environment/built environment in which they live. Ultimately, we are looking at the significance of WATER in the shaping of community identity.

The purpose of this project is to engage students with their neighborhood by getting them into the community where they can learn more about the South Valley through conversations with community members, field trips to significant neighborhood sites, and exposure to academic texts that can better inform an understanding of what makes the South Valley such a rich and important place.

We would seek to understand how WATER shapes history (rail, agriculture, environmental, colonial, migrant, etc.), culture (agrarian, ethnobotanical, immigrant, Anglo, native, etc.), the built environment (roads, acequias, houses, municipal infrastructure, etc.) and the natural environment (Bosque, acequia ecology, backyard birds, “weeds”, etc) AND how these community features make the South Valley such a unique place.

In the Fall semester, students will begin by learning as much as possible about the community through engagement activities with local experts and leaders in the South Valley. Legislative representatives, scientists, community organizers, educators, museums, non-profits, and experiential education activities will fuel their inquiry and outreach in the second semester. 

A calendar has been attached to this form for you to reference but some of the dates and locations may change part of the way through the semester. Contact information for both Mr. Hicks and Mrs. Jurado has been provided.

In the Spring semester, during the second half of the program, students will continue their examination of the community through field visits but our focus will shift towards the future. We will look at how members of the local and regional governance structure are engaging with the community to ensure that the South Valley will continue to be a cultural beacon through the 21st century. 

Students will also work collaboratively to collect community narratives on the issues we explored in the class. They will work in teams to interview and record stories from individuals in the neighborhood and curate a library of community wisdom that can be shared with all that are interested.

I hope you will consider joining us on one of our field visits to engage with students and share your perspective and wisdom.

Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have and I look forward to a great year.

Mr. Jordy Hicks - jordy.hicks@aps.edu