Escola Americana do Rio de Janeiro

Alumni from the Class of 1994 recently had a reunion to reconnect and reminisce about the good old times at the Gávea Campus! This gathering is a testament to the long-living bonds formed within our community. Cheers to the Class of 94!

Barra Middle School students recently embarked on their annual Via Sapientia adventure, with their destinations being the towns of Itatiaia (Grade 6), Tiradentes (Grade 7) and Cachoeiras de Macacu (Grade 8).

Via Sapientia is designed to foster personal growth and develop essential life skills as they are left to explore, discover and collaborate with their peers and teachers. It was a weekend filled with fun, learning, and lifelong memories.

Gávea Senior Betina S. is part of the project Conectadamente, that aims to improve the mental health of students from public schools through psychological support.

Originally made in São Paulo, Betina brought Conectadamente to Rio as her volunteer project. Students from the public school Joaquim Abílio Borges are able to have up to 30 free psychotherapy sessions per year.

Betina realized the importance of taking care of her mental health during the pandemic. After that, she wanted to help other students who might not have therapy as a financial priority in their families.

Congratulations for such an amazing project, Betina!

Gávea Senior Pedro L. is part of a group of high schoolers who created a national competition on investments. The Brazilian High School Investment Competition (BRHSIC) wants to inspire young people to dive into the world of finances in a responsible and engaging way.

Pedro already had plans to teach basic economics to children in Rocinha. His interest in finance education led him to join forces with friends, and the resulting competition gathered 90 teams with 2 to 6 members who came from schools in different states.

The best performing teams will present their projects to economists at Vinci Partners, one of the supporters of the BRHSIC along with edtech Real Grana. The goal for 2025 is to expand the competition to more states and include students from public schools.

Congratulations, Pedro!

Gávea Middle Schoolers had their Via Sapientia trip last week. Each grade went to a different town in the Rio and Minas Gerais states: Grade 6 went to Itatiaia, while Grade 7 spent their days at Tiradentes and Grade 8, at Cachoeiras de Macacu.

The Via Sapientia trip aims to empower students with tools to be more resourceful, responsible, and independent. Throughout activities such as hiking, camping, bike riding, swimming and exploring natural biomes, they had a wonderful weekend of team bonding and personal growth.

Lower School Music students received a very special crowd: their own families! In the Lower School Music Open House, parents and guardians visited the Music classes at Barra and Gávea to see up close what our Little Panthers have been learning in musical theory and practice.

Recognizing that each student has distinct aspirations, our counseling team supports them in exploring their career goals and identifying the university that aligns best with their individual journey.

EARJ is proud to be a Full IB World School, offering the International Baccalaureate curriculum from Preschool through Senior Year with the Primary Years, Middle Years, and Diploma Programmes.

IB learners go beyond the classroom, driven by their curiosity to explore the world. An IB education inspires students to foster a balanced academic and personal life while nurturing a lifelong love for learning.

With the IB curriculum, students gain the skills to succeed at top universities worldwide, as they learn to conduct academic research and confidently share ideas, all while keeping an open mind for new experiences.

Middle School students recently completed an unit on Bullying Prevention, which ended with an insightful lecture by educational psychologist Roberta Melin.

With the theme "The Power of Words", the presentation addressed how verbal abuse is a common type of bullying, and emphasized the importance of communicating in a respectful way among peers. Keeping a healthy environment at school is the responsibility of our community as a whole!

Every school year, we have the pleasure to receive guest speakers from different areas of expertise to build on what students have learned in class.

This October, we were visited by a few guest speakers at Barra and Gávea. Check out what they have been up to!

🌳 Environmental Education: Wolff Klabin and Amanda Klabin explained the process of making cellulose and reforestation to Lower School students at Gávea.

🎭 Arts at College: Daniela, who currently attends SVA - School of Visual Art at New York, talked to Barra Upper School Art students about concrete possibilities to pursue a creative career path at university.

🔑 The Key to the Enigma: Writer and former EARJ teacher, Simone Lopes, has launched the exciting gamebook “The Key to the Enigma: A Mysterious Archaeological Expedition in Egypt”, and talked to Barra Grade 6 and 7 students about mystery storytelling in her new book.

📚 Booktok Influencer: American writer Courtney Henning Novak, who recently went viral in Brazil for her passion about Brazilian literature, talked to students from Grades 7-9 about her project to read A to Z books from all around the world.

Every day had a wonderful surprise for the Barra Lower School classes at the Surprise Readers Week!

Parents and special guests were chosen to read a selection of our Little Panthers’ most beloved books. But here’s the catch: students only discovered who was the mystery reader the moment they came out to tell a story.

The element of surprise kept our LS students on the edge of their seats! It was a memorable event put together by class teachers, Room Parents and the PTA.

Gávea Seniors Andre H. and Keiran O. have created a lens prototype for accessibility in computer interfaces for people with disabilities!

They explain their groundbreaking project in the following paragraphs:

"The basis of our project is a type of technology called electrooculography. It measures signal patterns from eye movement and can be used to interface with a computer to facilitate communication with people that don’t have the ability to interact with computers through normal means.

The goal here is to create a cost effective circuit design that is commercially viable and widely available, keeping overhead low and keeping consistent reliable signal readings.

What we have so far is a proof of concept circuit that we turned into a research article which is currently in the process of being reviewed, and we're also currently in the process of testing with a larger number of subjects.

This will culminate in research which incorporates a brain computer interface setup, that we intend on sending to a peer reviewed journal to share our findings."

We are very proud and excited for the next steps. Congratulations, Andre and Keiran!

Today we celebrate Teacher’s Day in Brazil. It is one of the many occasions to show our appreciation to EARJ’s teachers and teacher assistants who inspire, nurture and empower our students every day.

Although it’s a national holiday, we would like to warmly extend our celebrations to all the expats in our faculty that chose Brazil as their place to teach.

Thank you, EARJ teachers, for sharing your knowledge and kindness with our community!

Our Barra Little Panthers had a fun and exciting Spirit Week! Each day had a different theme:

Monday: Minions Day
Tuesday: Twins Day
Wednesday: Favorite Sport or Team Day
Thursday: Color Day
Friday: PJ Day

The Spirit Week is one of the events that make students look forward to school and show their creativity with costumes, shaking things up in the classroom. We love it!

Every child brings a unique spark to our school community, and we are grateful for the laughter and energy they share each day. We believe that each great achievement starts with a child’s imagination.

From our younger Panthers to our older ones, who are kids at heart, we wish a great Children’s Day!

The S.O.S. Pink Week is an event organized by the S.O.S. Club that focuses on cancer awareness.

Throughout the week, students had activities such as bake sales, hair donation and auctions, with talks by Dr. Hisbello da Silva Campos (Lung Oncologist), Maria Luísa Barambo (Biomedic) and Dr. Gabriela Novis (Pediatric Oncologist), about risks and early signs of cancer.

We also had the Remembrance and Ribbon Walls, which are spaces for our community to pay a heartfelt tribute to loved ones who have battled cancer.

We would like to recognize the great efforts of S.O.S. members, who did their best on behalf of the event. And thank all professionals who attended, including Gabriela Ballan who did the haircuts on the hair donation day!

Storyteller Andy Wright, from New Zealand, stopped by to share traditional stories with EARJ students!

In a cultural exchange, he told our Panthers about local traditions such as Haka performances and the fish of Maui.

By engaging students with captivating narratives, expressive voices, and interactive elements, our reading activities aim to enhance their language development, spark curiosity, and encourage creativity.

Andy Wright is a fourth-generation storyteller who brings 30 years of storytelling experience across more than 50 countries.

The EARJ violinists have gathered in a recital to celebrate student Eleanor L.’s recent achievement: she concluded the first volume of the Suzuki Method!

We encourage students to pick up an instrument to develop their creativity and motor skills, and discover hobbies, or even a possible career path.

We have new inductees in the National Junior Honor Society! The new members received their membership certificate and the group celebrated the quarter 1 MYP students.

The NJHS recognizes students who exemplify leadership, citizenship, and provide educational opportunities.

Barra Grade 8 art students dove into the extensive work of José Francisco Borges at Museu do Pontal.

Borges is a Brazilian folk artist who works with xylography, a printmaking technique that uses wood.

Our art students are constantly learning about different art techniques to build repertoire for their own art styles. At the end of the school year, they have their own exhibition.

We are proud to have teachers from different places and backgrounds in the world! With our multicultural faculty, every teacher is unique and brings something valuable to our community.

The first ever Science National Honor Society event at EARJ was a success!

Upper School students from the IB DP (Grade 11) and IB MYP (Grade 10) were teachers for a week and received their younger peers from IB PYP (Grade 3) to do scientific experiments related to Grade 3’s current unit of inquiry.

And the older students could also learn from the fresh and creative points of view of our Little Panthers! It was a week of discoveries for everyone.

The Annual Cardboard Challenge is here. Students from Grades 3 to 5 let their creativity and resourcefulness flow as they built different games, all made of cardboard!

Our makers of the Cardboard Challenge worked on their pieces from scratch, going through idealizing, planning and building. As they develop essential skills such as problem-solving and teamwork, they can also build a sense of value for their own hard work.

At the Rocinha Fun Day, kids from the Rocinha community were invited to join us for a morning of fun! Some of them are part of student-led EARJ programs, such as RASA and Proyecto Rociña.

The Rocinha Fun Day is a traditional student-led event organized by the National Honor Society. We had almost 100 kids and 45 committed student volunteers, who prepared activities such as sports, party games, inflatable toys, crafts, and a delicious snack.

Students Tong Q. (Grade 12) and Vinicius S. (Grade 8) have won National Silver and Regional Gold medals for the 18th Brazilian Mathematics Olympiad (OBMEP).

The OBMEP is a national project aimed to encourage the study of Mathematics by students in public and private schools.

They have both ranked among the top 450 students from private schools of the whole country, displaying an excellent grasp on the subject. Congratulations!