Bilingual Education Experts

Smart Bilingual School began in 2008 with teachers María and Ivon Pacheco offering tutoring and leveling services in English. We saw the need to create an environment to support children due to the lack of English language proficiency. As we noticed the growing needs, we decided to expand the facilities. In 2009, we moved to larger premises, seeing the opportunity to accommodate more children with these needs, and thus we gradually grew in both population and services.

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Over time, we implemented occupational therapy and speech therapy services, and a year later, psychology. This formed the therapeutic team of SBS. After a long period of offering therapy and tutoring services in English, we began to notice that the city lacked an educational institution focused on enhancing students' skills in a more therapeutic manner. In August 2016, we decided to open an early stimulation program for babies, involving a physiotherapist with a sensory approach to develop the program. It was successful, including 7 children who were the pioneers of the program: María José Escocia, María Paz Cotes, Miguel Ángel Alarcón, Mariana Rocha, Juliana Zúñiga, Shaddia Muvdi, and Emily Torres.

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This proposal was well received in the city of Santa Marta, as this service was not very common in the city. Seeing the program's success, we decided to form a school with the same sensory approach as the stimulation program. María Inmaculada Pacheco, who worked for Colegio Bilingüe Santa Marta at that time, started the first course called Walkers on September 26, 2016, with 4 students: Valentina Zamora, Luis Rivadeneira, Arturo Mercado, and Sara Guerrero. Soon, more children of different ages began to arrive, so other grades like Toddlers with 15 children were opened, and new teachers were integrated: Diana Manjarrez, Cindy Rodríguez, and Iris Rodelo, with Carmen Torres as the secretary.

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In January 2017, Ivon Pacheco joined the team to support the grades where English was taught, with a population of 12 children, as she worked as a teacher at Colegio Bilingüe Santa Marta. In 2018, Olga María Pacheco joined the project in the area of psychomotor development, completing the partnership. As a complement to the admission processes, we had the support and advice of a speech therapist, psychologist, and occupational therapist. In 2018, the first parents' association was formed, convening parents Margarita Rodríguez, Ena Peñalver, Carlos Santrich, Diana Gonzalez, and Alexandra Goenaga.

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Smart Bilingual School emerged from the initiative of two teachers who always had the ideal of offering an educational service focused directly on the development of linguistic, sensorimotor, and social skills to form more and better bilingual citizens, capable of building a promising future for our city day by day. Smart School began its work in a residence in the Bavaria neighborhood of Santa Marta, with the necessary facilities and resources to provide its students with comprehensive training. After two years of service, the need arose to improve processes and seek better facilities that would allow students to develop in an adequate, safe, and suitable environment.