SALT LAKE CITY — Our Cool School of the Week is home to some of the state’s best and brightest students, as well as the alma mater of some notable Salt Lake City alumni: Ensign Elementary School.
"The best thing about Ensign is our community. The people that we get to work with every day are amazing, and our kids are well-behaved and respectful and really smart,” said Principal Erik Jacobson.
Every day, the students listen to morning announcements and classes start the day by saying: “It’s a great day to learn something new!" Ensign Elementary also has unique classes called Curriculum and Assessment (C&A) classrooms that house students from two grade levels.
"The idea behind that is we're blending kids of different ages just like in the regular workforce," said Ms. Hamilton, the teacher of a 5th and 6th-grade C&A class.
"I love this class because I can learn from all my classmates and I can learn from different grade levels so I can make new friends every year," said one C&A student.
Ensign Elementary students and staff soar to another level of excellence — partly because their mascot is the Eagles and partly because they have a strong community.
"From the parent perspective, our school is really the coolest because of the community it's the kids, the faculty, the leadership," said Juliette Stewart.
"I like the teachers and I like the activities that we do because they're engaging and fun," said one student.
In my opinion, one of the best parts about Ensign Elementary is the school's view. Students and staff also take advantage of the beautiful nature that surrounds them.
"Ensign is a cool school because we focus on place-based experiential learning which connects science, English language arts, math, and social studies to real-world experiences," said Kris Kaly.
One way the students do that is through nature journaling.
"It's helped me just kind of calm down after a hard day at school," one student said. "When you come up here, it's peaceful to learn new things about plants."
One of the students' favorite parts about Ensign Elementary is that they have family groups.
"Family groups is where there's a bunch of kids, kindergarten through sixth, that go to one classroom and do fun activities like make cards for the people in the hospital," said one student.
This week, Granite Credit Union graciously awarded Ensign Elementary Counselor Andrea Sline with a donation to benefit the school community.
"We are here to support this really cool school," said Ileana McDonald, Granite Credit Union's director of community relations. "We just would like to give you a little donation so you can use it the best way you desire."
"We are going to use this money for mental health support for all of our students because mental health matters and it's important," Sline said.
FOX 13 wants to highlight a school in your neighborhood. If you want to nominate a Cool School, you can send information via email to news@fox13now.com.
