December 2024: The Loomis Family
Lisa Furman was born and raised in the city of Pittsburgh. Mt. Washington to be exact! From kindergarten through high school, she attended Pittsburgh Public Schools. After graduating, she persisted through an initial college drop out, then began college courses at community college, and transferred to Cal U where she graduated with a Liberal Arts B.A. In 2008, Lisa became a staff member at the Children’s School were she was able to take advantage of tuition support to earn her Master’s degree in Early Childhood Education.
During this time, Lisa’s not-yet husband, Carl, moved from New England to Pennsylvania to start his own college experience. It wouldn’t be until several years later when a mutual friend from church invited Carl to visit the church and to meet Lisa. They became friends and got married in July of 2013. By 2017, Carl and Lisa became business owners through the purchase of their existing recruiting business.
Lisa and Carl were happy DINKs (Double Income No Kids) but were contacted in the spring of 2022 by a distant family member who reported a family need. Two children were in need of a permanent placement. Over the following year, they built a relationship via ZOOM (one happy gift resulting from COVID!); and in October 2023, they traveled to Florida on a mission to bring back Robbie, a 9-year-old boy and Shea, an 11-year-old girl. In February 2024, the adoption was finalized. Their home has never felt fuller and richer!
November 2024: A Family Tradition
Hi Children’s School Families! We are Ben, Camila, Holden, and Maisie Perovich. Even though this is Maisie’s first year attending the Children’s School as a member of the Red Room, she is the fourth in a line of family members who have attended the school before her. Maisie is preceded not only by her brother, Holden, who graduated from the Children’s School in 2019, but also by her cousins Alexis and Luna who attended the school in 2014 and 2021 respectively. Moreover, Maisie’s grandmother, who is also known as Mrs. Perovich, taught for many years at the Children’s School before taking the role of an educational administrator.
Maisie is a passionate, lively, and curious child. She loves dressing up as a princess ballerina and putting on a show for her family. In her spare time, she loves coloring, dancing, stealing her mamãe’s makeup, cooking with her father, and pretending to be her teachers. Maisie’s mother is from Brazil, so she’s constantly immersed in both Brazilian and American cultures and can speak both Brazilian Portuguese and English. Some of Maisie’s favorite foods are pão de queijo, brigadeiro, and sweet avocado.
October 2024: Beautifully Diverse Community
During September, the friends in all our classes got to know each other by sharing information about themselves and their families, which prompted us to discuss similarities and differences so that we can better appreciate the diversity among us. The “All About Me” projects in the preschool and prek/kindergarten give children and families an opportunity to get to know each other better. You will be able to see these projects at the October 23rd Open House!
This year, we have 64 families with 67 children in Children’s School programs, including 16 only children. Twenty-two of these families are new to the school. Among our families, we have two in which one parent is a Children’s School alum, and 18 children have one or more older siblings who attended here. Ten of our families have a parent who is a current graduate student, researcher, staff member, or faculty member at Carnegie Mellon.
About 33% of our children are dual language learners (22). This year, we have families speaking at least the following languages besides English: Arabic, Brazilian Portuguese, Dari, Farsi, French, Gujarati, Hmong, Hindi, Japanese, Kannada, Korean, Kyrgyz, Marathi, Nepali, Russian, Spanish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Urdu.
In addition to nurturing their children, the adult family members in our school have a wide variety of professional and volunteer roles in the community, including in the arts, coaching, communication, construction, education, engineering, finance, government, health care, housing, hospitality, law, manufacturing, marketing, media, retail, social services, undergraduate or graduate student, technology, trades, transportation, etc.
Our families live in and around Pittsburgh, including Bradford Woods, Braddock, Cranberry, Dormont, Downtown, Fox Chapel, Gibsonia, Greentree, Homestead, East Liberty, Mount Lebanon, Munhall, Oakland, Oakmont, Penn Hills, Perry North, Point Breeze, Regent Square, Robinson, Ross Township, Sewickley, Shadyside, Sharpsburg, Schenley Heights, Squirrel Hill, Swissvale, West Mifflin, and Wilkinsburg.
