The King’s Academy earns nomination for Global Classroom Award

The King’s Academy’s efforts to promote international education and awareness has earned the school a nomination for the second annual Global Classroom Award.

More than 50 schools from around the country were nominated for the award.

Each year, the Council on Standards for International Educational Travel awards schools and educators who take an “enthusiastic role in promoting international youth exchange” by holding a national competition. The schools are selected based on their commitment to promoting global understanding and international education.

Don Wilson, headmaster of the academy, located in Florence, said the school promotes international awareness among youth through its student exchange program and Missions Week.

Wilson said there have been 21 exchange students who visited the school during the past four years.

“I think that for a school our size to have that many exchange students has been a really good thing,” he said.

For the past 10 years, the school has sent students to locations across the United States and the world during Missions Week.

One week is set aside in the spring for students to minister to others either locally, nationally or internationally.

Wilson said students have travel as far away as Washington, New York, Belize, Mexico and England.

Students are exposed to the other cultures through mission work at local homes, schools or churches in the countries are cities they visit.

Three winners will be chosen for the award and each will receive a $1,000 scholarship for students to study abroad, or equivalent funds to put toward increasing global awareness at the school.

One representative from the schools will travel to Hartford, Conn., and receive complementary registration, accommodation, and airfare to take part in the 2009 National School Conference on International Youth Exchange on Feb. 28.

Winners will be announced Dec. 1 on the Council on Standards for International Educational Travel’s Web site, http://www.csiet.org.

The Council on Standards for International Educational Travel is a private, not-for-profit organization whose mission is to identify reputable international youth exchange programs, and provide leadership and support to the exchange and educational communities, according to the Web site.