As any working military spouses know, it can be frustrating to start over in an unknown area every few years. For Army wife Stephanie Gonzalez, having her own school was always a dream, even as a small child - the only question was where. Opening the Rubber Room in Dupont fulfilled this dream. She initially met her husband, Mike, in second grade, at Altus Air Force Base in Oklahoma. They reunited again in high school, but this time at Hahn Air Force Base in Germany. She married her infantry soldier in 2001, and together they have four children, ages ranging one to nine.
Since becoming an educator in 1991, Stephanie has obtained two advanced degrees in education, as well as a K-8 certification, several grade 6-9 certifications and a Montessori certification. In addition to being a K-8 classroom educator, she has also been a school administrator and an instructional systems designer, creating Math, Science, Technology, and Language Arts instruction for such companies as Harcourt, Houghton - Mifflin, Microsoft, LEGO and Discovery. While her main focus is the Rubber Room, she still works as a freelance instructional systems designer for these companies, as well as reviewing curricula for Teach Engineering, a national K-12 technology and engineering education project.
"The Rubber Room programs are innovative, engaging, relevant, project oriented classes intended to ignite a fire of curiosity, intrigue, and excitement in each learner," says Gonzalez, "These were facilitated by myself and my brother Matt Wilson, who is also ‘Harry' from the PBS kids' show Cyber Chase". Together, the sister brother duo facilitated camps out of the Rubber Room, focused on school aged children. "10 families participated in these initial camps. They asked me if I would consider creating programs for their younger learners, and I told them ‘Absolutely!'. Then, the Rubber Room Academies for Math, Science, Technology and the Arts (ages two-six) was born"
Our year round early learning academy is an integrated Reggio Emilia, Montessori and national standards program. "We incorporate elements from each of these programs into our pedagogy (education). We also design individuated student plans for every child, monitoring and adjusting each child's program within the context of their social, academic, behavioral and cognitive needs." The student/teacher ratio at the Rubber Room never exceeds five to one. On hand, they have an American Sign Language instructor, an art teacher, a music teacher and a personal fitness teacher.
For more information about the Rubber Room, including membership, enrollment and prices,  please visit www.boomboomrubberroom.com <http://www.boomboomrubberroom.com