Dominican Sister of Hope Mary Elizabeth DeBoer, OP counts her eleven years at Immaculata Catholic School in Durham, NC as a highlight of her teaching ministry. She served as principal at Immaculata School from 1969-1980.

When Sister Mary Elizabeth arrived at Immaculata as a first-time principal, she was met with a supportive pastor.

“He made you feel like you could do almost anything, and you ended up doing almost anything,” Sister remembers.

With the help of the staff, she worked to revamp the school into a multi-age, multigrade learning environment. First through third grades were in one classroom, fourth through sixth in another. Each classroom had one teacher and a variety of texts and teaching modules. Uniforms were nixed, and the individuality of each student was emphasized.

“Each kid was different,” Sister Mary Elizabeth said. “Each kid was learning differently. Some kids were reading on their own, and kids were teaching each other, which was the secret of it all. The younger ones were watching the older ones. It was amazing how they could learn.”

Sister Mary Elizabeth recalls that the setup allowed ample time for individual work with each student, and implementing modalities that worked on an individual level. Sometimes she used flashcards, other times sight reading to teach reading to students.

“I can still see this one little girl having such a struggle learning to read,” Sister Mary Elizabeth said. “All of a sudden, she looked at me one day and she said, ‘I think I can read!’ And she could.”

Sister Mary Elizabeth was bolstered by involved parents who volunteered in the classroom and even cooked lunches for the class. Although it took some time for the community to agree to the multi-age setup, they eventually became her biggest support.

“I can still remember saying to parents, ‘Tell me, do you still have an ice box?’ They said, ‘Well no, we have a refrigerator.’ ‘Well why did you change?’ ‘Because something was better and did a better job.’”

Sister Mary Elizabeth’s classroom did a better job, indeed. As she remembers fondly, “It really worked.”

Dominican Sister of Hope Nancy Erts, OP also served at Immaculata from 1967-1971.

“I loved it,” she recalls. “The people were just great. I had opportunities for a lot of creative type learning.”

Among the highlights of Sister Nancy’s tenure teaching science, math, and religion, she remembers especially loving field trips and out-of-the-classroom learning. Her classes did experiments sponsored by Duke University, picked up natural specimens from nature, and even toured the airport.

In one lesson, Sister Nancy emphasized to her students that plant life is “very sensitive to different sounds and energies that come from the natural world.”

Immaculata was founded by the Newburgh Dominican Sisters in 1909. Now, on Immaculata’s 115-year anniversary, Sister Nancy hopes that the students are still passionate about delving into a world of learning, rather than seeing their subjects as narrow.

“I believed a lot in experiential learning,” Sister Nancy said. “My hope for them today is that they will continue to learn to appreciate not only academics but actually experiencing the different disciplines that they’re learning about.”

From all of us at the Dominican Sisters of Hope, we wish the Immaculata family a blessed anniversary! May your studies –and your lives– continue be faith-filled. Your integrity, exemplary work, service, and love of God and others is preaching in our world. May the preaching continue!