RHS Spanish Teacher's AP Syllabus Selected as an AP Exemplar

(September 24, 2012) We are proud to announce that RHS Spanish teacher Penelope Boerum has received the recognition and the honor of having her work chosen by the College Board to be used as an exemplar for the AP Spanish Language course.

All AP Spanish Language teachers are required by the College Board to create and submit for review syllabi of their courses. These syllabi help to inform the development of teacher resources for the AP Course Audit. Among all of the syllabi that were submitted, only four were selected to become samples and shared with other teachers.

The four syllabi were chosen by a team of college faculty and a member of the AP Curriculum Development and Assessment Committee of College Board. The samples were chosen based on the extent to which they demonstrate how the revised curricular requirements can be met as well as the variety of activities, assignments, and assessments presented. As noted, one of the four syllabi that will be used to assist and inform other teachers of AP Spanish was written by Riverhead High School AP Spanish teacher Penelope Boerum. Ms. Boerum began teaching in the district in 2005.

Ms. Boerum received her undergraduate degree in finance from the Techologico de Monterey (Mexico). Her first finance job was as a sales liaison for Projinet, a software company in Garden City, NY. She returned to college and earned her MS degree in Spanish Education (K-12) from Dowling College. Ms. Boerum lives in Wading River with her husband, Tom, and her four-year-old son, Max.

Students in Ms. Boerum’s AP Spanish class used the following adjectives to describe her: “amazing, supportive, gentle, and determined to help her students”.

Liz Scaduto, the K-12 Director of ESL, Bilingual Programs and World Languages, would agree with Ms. Boerum’s students. She states enthusiastically, “Ms Boerum is an inspirational teacher and an integral part of our team of language teachers in Riverhead. We are thrilled to have her efforts and talents recognized on a national and international level.”

Also See: KEEPING FOREIGN LANGUAGE TESTING RIGOROUS & COMPARABLE