By Rohan Keith Andresen ’12
THE ROUNDUP
On a stifling hot Friday afternoon, Loyola Academy director Ms. Kendra Krause waits for the last of her students to be picked up by their parents.
The 32 sixth-grade students of Loyola Academy, the new middle school on Brophy’s campus, have just finished a 47-hour school week filled with reading, math, physical education, science, social studies, religion, Latin and drama.
Beginning at 7:15 a.m. and ending at 5:30 p.m., the sixth graders pack each day with academia and enrichment.
Still, even the end of the last day of a long week, student Jose Gomez runs up and down the stairs and asks Ms. Krause questions about plans for the next few weeks at school.
She recognizes their seemingly endless reserve of energy.
“I think the adults are going to get tired before the kids do,” Ms. Krause joked as some of the last students came running down the stairs from the second floor of Loyola Hall.
As the last student runs to his mom’s car, Ms. Krause says goodbye and shouts after him, “Thanks for being awesome!”
A student being picked up by his parents is not the norm, however.
Loyola Academy provides a bus and van that pick up and drop off students daily as well as bus passes to the students who need them.
She said she was afraid that some of the students would have dropped out because of the distance from their homes, in addition to the rigor of the school.
On the contrary, the school hosted its first Parents’ Night Aug. 24 where parents responded with “tremendous reactions.”
The students who attend Loyola Academy are “from less affluent, poor backgrounds, who don’t have the advantage of the grade schools or parent’s with a college education to help them study,” said the Rev. Eddie Reese, S.J. in an earlier interview with The Roundup.
Ms. Krause walked to the air-conditioned classrooms of third floor Loyola Hall, where Loyola Academy operates.
Two students who have older brothers still in school at Brophy are waiting there, playing a board game.
These two students are part of the 32 who were accepted from 74 applications.
“It (the school) is for intelligent people,” said Angel Gutierrez, attendee and the younger brother of a Brophy student.
Ms. Krause said she hopes the students will be able to acclimate easily to the Brophy community once it is their turn to enter high school.
The stated expectation is that Loyola Academy students will continue into Brophy after eighth-grade.
Gutierrez already expressed interest in becoming involved with the Brophy community.
“I want to be on the football team…I want to be the quarterback,” Gutierrez said.
Another student, Erik Fernandez also stated his intent to participate at Brophy.
“I want to follow my family tradition,” Fernandez said. “I want to play basketball too.”
Brophy students have also shown an interest in becoming involved with Loyola Academy by volunteering to help tutor and spend time with the kids at lunch and after school.