I began mentoring the youth in my hometown of Brunswick, Georgia when I was just 16 years old.  Teaching and guidance were a part of me before I ever knew what I "wanted to be when I grew up".  I worked at after-school and summer camps, led youth group activities, and umpired local youth baseball games until I entered the University of Georgia on scholarship.

Once there, I began my studies in Early Childhood Education.  My courses focused on educational psychology, special education, multiculturalism, and mathematics.  During my time as an undergraduate, I began working for a state-funded mental health organization providing group activity therapy to children with emotional behavior disorders.  This experience eventually led me to begin offering counseling in the homes and schools of these young people.  I worked closely with licensed counselors to develop behavioral goals.  I then assisted the children in achieving those goals in their homes and communities.

One year before graduating, I began offering counseling to foster children and their estranged parents with the goal of family reunification.  I assisted parents with their court-mandated case plans and provided parenting classes to improve success rates after reunification.  I also worked with the foster children to help re-build relationships with their birth parents while also maintaining a positive experience at their foster placement.  On weekends, I ran "The Granny House", a small home placement for foster children that had no other place to go.  While the youth were there, I served as their parent, mentor, teacher, and counselor until we could find a relative or foster home for them.

Seeing a need in our community to provide alternatives to incarceration for our teenagers, I started Impact Counseling and Consulting.  Shortly after the project began, I graduated Summa Cum Laude from the University of Georgia and then began studying Law at Georgia State University.  Within 18 months, Impact Counseling was the largest provider of counseling to juvenile offenders in northeast Georgia.  We were able to keep 183 of our first 200 clients out of juvenile detention centers.  To do this, I led group counseling sessions on issues ranging from anger management to substance abuse. I also provided college and career counseling, GED training, and job placement assistance.

In 2008, I moved to South Korea to teach at English Zone Academy. While there, I developed the curriculum and initiated adult English classes for local chemical engineers.  I also provided one-on-one counseling and English lessons to Korean students seeking to study in the United States.

In 2010, I began teaching IELTS training classes in Vietnam to students intending to study internationally.  In addition, I served as the English language professor at Infoworld University.  When possible, I also taught both elementary and high school classes at the American International School in Ho Chi Minh City.

After leaving Vietnam, I was chosen to be a principal for the brand-new satellite Primary School campus of an international school in Tanzania.  While there, I developed the administrative and physical structures of the school.  I improved upon existing policies from the school's main campus and helped to push advancements in the areas of parent involvement, cross-curricular learning, health and hygiene, and green practices.  I assisted in the design of after-school programs, a winter camp, a school playground, and football fields.  During my tenure, our school was the fastest-growing international Lower Primary school in Tanzania with consistent growth rates of 15% over the first three years.

I spent 2014 and 2015 as the Head of the English Department for the Liceo Cientifico in Salcedo, Dominican Republic.  The Liceo Cientifico is the Dominican Republic’s first STEM magnet school in the country.  There, I developed the most rigorous English curriculum in the country, using proven methods of assessment.  I designed entrance exams, led workshops in teacher training, and, most significantly, prepared my students to complete the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL), the prerequisite for entering any international university. 

I now seek to share with other educators my experiences in developing schools and counseling programs in the US, Asia, the Dominican Republic, and Africa.  I have two beautiful children and an unquenchable desire to provide a world-class education to them and our community.  I believe in setting high expectations for all learners and emphasize teaching students to be stewards of the earth. My experiences serving students from a variety of abilities, cultures, and socio-economic backgrounds has led me to be a staunch advocate for teaching to an array of learning styles.

Hola!  My name is Franco Rodriguez and I am very excited to work with ISLA Academy.  I am from Colorado in the United States, but most recently, I worked in Shanghai, China, where I taught in IB-PYP international schools for five years.  Prior to China, I lived in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam for two years where I taught in an IB-PYP candidate international school, and in Seoul, South Korea teaching at an English language school for one year.

My IB-PYP experience has been extensive and rewarding.  I really believe in the IB-PYP curriculum as it promotes the development of each student’s intellectual, emotional, social, and physical self.  Students will inevitably become caring, active, life-long global learners.  IB-PYP uses an inquiry-based approach to teaching and learning that encourages students to think about their prior knowledge, ask questions, find out new information, sort that information, decide how they can further their knowledge or skill acquisition, reflect on what they have learned, and take action with local or global issues.  

My experience with the IB-PYP curriculum includes planning and collaboration with teachers and administrators both in the school and at various regional conferences and professional development opportunities.  I have attended IB-PYP sanctioned conferences on Concept-Based Learning, Language in the Classroom, the beginner course called Making the PYP Happen, Assessment, Transdisciplinary Learning, and other non-PYP sanctioned conferences such as Differentiation in the Classroom.  At each of these, I was able to meet other PYP teachers in China and across Asia, discuss how they interpret the PYP teaching and learning, and gain resources and ideas of how to implement PYP in the classroom.

In addition to my experience inside of schools, I have tried to use my free time in creative and helpful ways in my community.  I volunteered at orphanages in South Korea and Vietnam teaching students about music and reading to them.  In Shanghai, I helped form a folk band, wrote many songs in five years, and played for many audiences surrounding Shanghai and Beijing.  With that band, we toured Mongolia and stopped in at orphanages and shared our musical experiences with them as well.