Panama City Trilingual teaches multilingual immersion classes for children age 2 to 15 and grades Preschool through 8th grade and looks forward to offering this educational opportunity to more children every year.

HISTORY

•  The Panama City Trilingual School was founded in 2012 as a private educational co-op after the closure of Renascence International School. Renascence International School was a private trilingual school located in Panama City that provided multilingual studies in Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.

• Kellie Dingus and the founding parents valued the precociousness and mental growth that multilingual studies encouraged in their children. They also wanted to provide the students with the opportunity for fluency via language immersion in an environment with small class sizes and personalized instruction that allowed for students to be challenged based on their ability.

• The Panama City Trilingual School grew organically from there, what started with 4 students quickly grew to more than 100 students. While parents were attracted to our approach, the real draw was our results. The Youth Chinese Test is an international standardized test of Chinese language proficiency. It assesses young foreign students' abilities to use Chinese in their daily and academic lives. (more information at http://english.hanban.org) Thus far, our students have garnered the following achievements:

  • 6 of our students have passed the YCT4

  • 11 students have passed the YCT 3

  • 25 students have passed the YCT 2

  • 46 students have passed the YCT 1

  • We have had 3 students travel abroad with programs to China for Chinese studies.

• The Panama City Trilingual School incorporated in 2019 and is dedicated to the mission of continuing to expand our students’ access to linguistic, academic and cultural studies that will prepare them for bright futures.

For most American parents, seeing and hearing a 5-year old speak Mandarin Chinese or Spanish with an native accent makes a lasting impression.

mission

The Panama City Trilingual School prepares students to be globally aware and confident in their leadership through rigorous academics including fluency in Spanish, Mandarin Chinese, and English.

• Our students gain global awareness daily during their instruction through interactions with our staff of skilled teachers and our curriculum that is designed to cultivate awareness of nations, people and cultures beyond America. This curriculum is reinforced by linguistic immersion and specific studies related to understanding the world at large.

• We instill confidence in our students by giving them independence when working through challenges and problem solving themselves first. We believe that our students must ultimately maintain responsibility for their performance and success to learn this trait.

• We expect our students to apply themselves to their studies in a strict and disciplined fashion whether they are in class or at home. We set clear expectations and measurements for success for our students to follow.

• We approach fluency through immersion, meaning that we provide a full education within each of our target languages to include language arts, math and sciences. All instruction for a target language is delivered solely in the target language by teachers who are native speakers.

values

Our values are what guide our staff and students in our interactions with one another and the world.

• We value cultural diversity, interaction and communication.

• We believe that Integrity is the foundation of fruitful  communication.

• We believe that rigor and discipline predict success.

• We value the pursuit of excellence in all actions that are undertaken.