AOC teachers Cindy Male, Patti Lewis, Mary Miller, Katherine McPhillips, Hannah Girman & June Wiechman will be giving presentations (in the area of their teaching expertise) to their LPS twinning partner and students. In addition they will be attending an in-service with LPS teachers from Nablus and the West Bank in which they will be creating collaborative videos, which is a perfect venue for continuing ongoing communication between our schools. The in-service will be provided by Dr. Joe Gaston and is a program that activates higher-order thinking skills and practice in all of the thinking talents presented by Talents Unlimited. We hope to provide links to these videos on this blog. Also, Kelly Lomax, Director of Talents Unlimited, will be joining the Nablus team. She’ll be training five assistants who will assist the two Talents Unlimited certified trainers from Nablus at their workshops.
Hannah, Greg, Cindy, Katherine, June, Bob, Ann, Mary, and Patti
Meet Cindy Male
Cindy Male has lived in Cincinnati, Ohio her entire life. She is a wife, mother and now a retired junior high teacher. All of her teaching years (25) have been in Catholic schools in both Cincinnati and Kentucky. In the 44 years of marriage, her husband Greg and she have raised five wonderful children Christy, Kevin, TJ, Brendan and Jon. Their sons have increased the family with so far, three beautiful new daughters. Two of their sons were married this year.
Cindy and Greg have also been blessed with two grand-babies Eleanor and Kieran and with a third baby girl expected January 1st. They are both enjoying the new titles of Nana and Papa immensely.
This will be Cindy’s second trip to the Holy Land.Her first was in 2012, when she was a junior high math teacher at St. James of the Valley. It was on this trip that she met Nadia Tuffaha, a talented and dedicated math teacher from St. Joseph School in Nablus, Palestine, very quickly a special bond was formed. Math teachers can find each other like the song says, “across a crowded room”. Since 2012, Nadia has been Cindy’s twinning partner and friend. She is Cindy’s “little sister” and she so looking forward to personally meeting Nadia’s family, visiting her home and city and visiting her school in Nablus.
Cindy is also looking forward to seeing Wafa ‘Abu Zant . She and Nadia, are the Talents Unlimited instructors for the Patriarchate Schools in the Holy Land. Greg and Cindy have hosted Nadia and Wafa in their home and driven to Mobile, Alabama to visit them when they were training to be instructors for Talents Unlimited in the Holy Land. They did many things together while visiting Cindy and her husband in Cincinnati: in the classroom, sightseeing and at the OCEA Convention and….. oh, of course the shopping! Cindy learned that these ladies LOVE to shop, especially for their families!
Cindy favorite sights in the Holy Land are: the Sea of Galilee, the River Jordan, the Garden of Gethsemane and the steps next to Caiaphas’ residence. This year she is more excited to be visiting the Holy Land sights and seeing them with her husband, Greg, and her new daughter in law, Hannah, and seeing them through their eyes as well as through Hannah’s camera lens.
Meet Greg Male
Greg is a life long Cincinnatian and husband to Cindy. As she said, they have five great kids, two (soon to be three) wonderful grandkids and their boys have brought three beautiful wives and one special lady friend into the family.
Although not a teacher himself, for many years Greg has graded papers, dropped off forgotten papers to school, met parents and heard about the good, the bad and the ugly, all thanks to Cindy.
Greg was recruited by She Who Must Be Obeyed (Cindy) and Nancy Hemminger to join HOPE in 2012 and so he did what he has done successfully for 44 years, he smiled and nodded and signed on. He is a member of the Board and acts as Secretary and Treasurer for HOPE.
Enjoying his and Cindy’s recent retirements, Greg is looking forward to his first pilgrimage for several reasons: traveling and experiencing the Holy Land with Cindy and new daughter, Hannah; visiting friends Nadia and Wafa and meeting their families; fulfilling his opportunity for pilgrimage as a Knight of the Holy Sepulchre; visiting schools of the Latin Patriarchate; and seeing, listening, breathing and living in the land where Our Lord, his Mother and his Apostles walked.
Meet Hannah Girman
Meet Hannah Girman. Hannah is the daughter in law of Greg and Cindy Male, who were introduced above this one. She was born in South Korea and raised by wonderful parents in Indianapolis, Indiana. She has one younger sister, Maria who is also in Indianapolis. Currently, she teaches art to grades Pre-K through 8th at Cardinal Pacelli School of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.
This will be Hannah’s first trip to the Hold Land. She is hoping to visit Bethlehem and see the Church of the Nativity. She also is looking forward to immersing herself in the life and culture of the people of the Holy Land.
Hannah along withe her mother in law Cindy will be twinning with Nadia in Nablus. Cindy knows Nadia very well and Hannah is looking forward to getting to know her too. She hopes to share stories, resources and ideas with the Nadia and other teachers in Nablus. She also hopes to share a wonderful and mutually beneficial relationship with the teachers and their students. She hopes that their friendship and faith continues to grow for years to come. And she hopes to bring back all of her experiences to share with friends and family, and to encourage other teachers in the Archdiocese to participate in this wonderful journey to the Holy Land.
Meet Patti Lewis
Patti Lewis and has been in the teaching world for 25 years! She has taught pre-school, reading intervention, and technology in both public and private schools. Her favorite subject is what she has been doing for 19 years and that is being a media specialist. Patti gets to foster a love of literature and support teachers in all of their content areas. She was born a l-o-n-g time ago in Akron, Ohio, but call Cincinnati her home which includes being an avid Bengals football fan and lover of all things Cincinnati. Her family includes her husband, John of 43 years, 3 children, Michael, Lisa and Jon and their 7 children -her beloved grandkids! She believes the most important thing to have in life is faith and a sense of humor!
This is Patti’s first trip to the Holy Land! She cannot put into words how excited she is to make connections in this most holy place on earth. While her husband was in the military they traveled to many places, but the Holy Land is a place that makes her feel a great deal of “awe” as well as humility.
She cannot wait to see everything. Since this is her first time traveling to the Holy Land, she is excited to be a part of this new culture. She knows she will have favorite places and cannot wait to have this experience.
Aside from the holy places, Patti is eager to meet people from the Holy Land, the living stones! She also is looking forward to getting to know her fellow experienced pilgrims and using their experiences to help her get to know this new place. She can’t wait to experiment with new foods and she loves to shop!
Patti’s twinning school is in St. Joseph in Nablus and her twinning teacher is Lubanna. She will be staying with principal Abeer Hanna and her husband. She has heard wonderful things about all of them.
Like teachers, Patti loves seeing other classrooms. She hopes to see and learn new ideas and strategies to bring home to her students and community. She is open minded about what she will accomplish. Patti is open to what happens both from our end and her twinning teacher. She is excited to learn from their methods and curriculum, maintain relationships and leverage technology to make this happen.
Meet Mary Miller
Mary Miller was born in Cincinnati, Ohio to Bob and Betty Hagerty. She is the fourth of ten children. She has seven brothers and two sisters. She grew up in Pleasant Ridge and now live in Milford, Ohio. She has two children: Claire and Brian. Claire is married and Mary is now a grandmother to Nola Jane. Brian lives in Mt. Lookout and is a successful financial advisor for an area bank. Mary is in her 35th year of teaching at All Saints School. She teaches the fourth grade. In her free time, she coaches multiple volleyball teams for her parish, refs volleyball, and loves to spend time with her extended family.
This will be Mary’s first trip to the Holy Land. There are so many sights that she is looking forward to seeing. She is excited to see the Jordan River where Jesus was baptized and the Mt of Beatitudes where Jesus gave His Sermon on the Mount.
Mary is also excited for the opportunity to interact with her twinning teacher Lubana and her students in Nablus. Mary’s hope from this experience is to create a lasting relationship where ideas and practices will continually be shared. She plans to maintain the relationship by becoming prayer partners, having pen pals between their students, and through technology (e-mail, blog, skype, etc.).
Meet June Wiechman
June was born and raised on the west-side of Cincinnati. She comes from a large Catholic family with seven brothers and sisters. She attended Catholic schools her entire life (1st grade through college: Our Lady of Lourdes, Mother of Mercy and the University of Dayton). She currently lives in Georgetown, OH. She has 4 children, ages 15-24. June has taught for 25 years: eight years at St. Dominic (2nd grade) , three years at Mt. Orab Elementary (3rd grade), 4 years at Georgetown Elementary (5th grade), and currently in her tenth year at St. Michael School in Ripley, Ohio, a small school 35 miles east of Cincinnati along the Ohio River with approximately 70 students. June teaches 5th-8th grade religion, reading and science.
This will be June’s first visit to the Holy Land. She is looking forward to seeing the Sea of Galilee and Jerusalem. She is eager to meet her twinning partner Ebtisam, who is a 7th and 8th grade science teacher. She is curious to see the similarities and differences between schools in the Holy Land and the AOC. She hopes to learn new things from her partner teacher, students and school.
Meet Katherine McPhillips
Kathrine, or Miss M as her students call her, is in her second year of teaching third and fourth grade at St. Michael Catholic School. She says she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else! She graduated from Bowling Green State University in the summer of 2015 with a bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood Education with a Generalist Endorsement. This endorsement enables her to extend her licensure to teach up to fifth grade.She is specially certified to teach third grade reading in accordance with the Ohio Department of Education guidelines in assisting students who have difficulty reading.
Katherine was raised in a Catholic family and has upheld the Catholic traditions and rituals throughout her entire life which has provided her wisdom and guidance in teaching religion to her students. Her personal teaching philosophy is that all students have the right to receive an education that allows them to learn, apply, and express their knowledge in a manner that best fits their learning style.
Blessings on All!
What an incredible and talented group! I cannot wait to see the links to the videos that you create!