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About the
Founder, NANCI R. AIKEN, Ph.D.
 After
reading my curriculum vitae (presented below), often people ask me what made
me start a charter school! The answer is that I’ve had a life long interest
in education and the health of children. I have learned from the best: (1)
my parents, who were both physicians with a passion for nutrition, and (2)
successfully raising five healthy children of my own. During my childhood
and early adult life, however, I also observed that most people do not
practice healthy eating habits. I also noted that, while changing dietary
habits is beneficial to the body at any point in life, the ideal scenario is
to instill good basic food and eating habits in children from birth. With
this goal in mind, I designed and developed the Nurtured Body Program.
I first applied the Nurtured Body Program (a
method of educating families in optimal nutritional practices) to an
academic setting in a private K-12 school that I founded in Socorro, NM, in
1980. Parents and staff were educated in good simple nutritional practices
before the school year began, and were provided with suggestions and menus
to help them make changes (if needed) in their family eating habits.
Nutrition at the school site was carefully controlled. Children were not
allowed to bring any candy or other highly processed foods to school,
including those containing refined sugars or sugar substitutes.
In 1981, I also began a nutritional counseling
practice in New Mexico, during which I collected further data on the effect
of diet on health and well being as a result of changing eating habits.
These findings were presented at several national nutrition conferences.
In 1984 I returned to school to complete my
doctorate in physiology and nutritional biochemistry. After working in
science for a number of years, including teaching and doing research, I
discovered that huge numbers of children are currently on medication for
behavior and learning problems. This finding fueled my resolve to return to
my passion – working with families and nutrition to support positive
behavior in children as an alternative to drugs. As a result, I presented
the Nurtured Body Program to Howard Glasser, Director of the Center for the
Difficult Child in Tucson. We added a family nutritional counseling
component to the Center for the Difficult Child program for clients desiring
to improve their basic nutrition and eating habits. The Nurtured Body
Program produced very positive effects on children’s behavior and health.
At one of Mr. Glasser’s workshops on the
difficult child that I was attending, a parent asked if there was a school
where Glasser’s positive behavior modification program, the Nurtured Heart
Approach, was used. At that time, there was not such a school. This very
simple question sparked the idea of starting a charter school and hence the
Children's Success Academy – a public charter school – was born.
Children’s Success Academy opened in the fall
of 2000, where positive behavior is supported through the Virtues Project
and the Nurtured Heart Approach along with the Nurtured Body Program. I
have now been able to bring all the various skills that I have learned – as
a mother, as a scientist, as a private school founder, and as a nutritional
counselor – to my passion for education. Providing a peaceful, positive and
healthy environment for students is an exciting culmination of my life, and
I am happy to be able to bring this dream to fruition. |
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I encourage and welcome your questions:
childrenssuccess@qwestoffice.net
Link to the
Enrollment Form to download, fill out, and send to the
P.O. Box Address
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NANCI R.
AIKEN
CURRICULUM VITAE |
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EDUCATION |
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1977 |
B.Sc. in Microbiology |
University of Maryland,
College Park, MD |
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1984 |
M.Sc. in Chemistry (Biology) |
New Mexico Inst. Mining & Tech.,
Socorro, NM |
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1990 |
Ph.D. in Medical Sciences (Physiology) |
University of New Mexico School of Medicine, Albuquerque, NM |
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1993 |
Research Fellow in Radiology |
The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore,
MD |
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RESEARCH AND PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE |
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2000-current |
Founder, Executive Director |
Children's Success Academy,
925 E. Bilby Rd., Tucson, AZ 85706 |
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1999-2000 |
Research Assistant Professor
School of Medicine |
Dept. of Biochemistry, College of Medicine
University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ |
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1995-1998 |
Research Associate and Lecturer
School of Medicine |
Dept. of Biochemistry, College of Medicine
University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ |
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1996-1998 |
Faculty & Staff Campaign
Committee Member |
University of Arizona Foundation ,
Tucson, AZ |
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1993-1995 |
Research Associate
Phospholipids in cancer |
Fox Chase Cancer Center; Dept. of NMR & Medical
Spectroscopy; Philadelphia, PA |
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1990-1993 |
Post Doctoral Fellow
Single Neuron Imaging |
The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Dept.
of Radiology, Div. of NMR, Baltimore, MD |
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1986-1990 |
Research Assistant and Lecturer
School of Medicine |
Chemistry Dept.; Physiology Dept.,
School of Medicine, Albuquerque, NM |
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1984-1986 |
Research Assistant
Red blood cell aging |
Dept. of Biochemistry, School of Medicine,
Albuquerque, NM |
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1982-1984 |
Teaching Assistant
Diabetes metabolism |
Dept. of Biology
New Mexico Inst. Mining & Tech, Socorro, NM |
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1981-1985 |
Owner, Counselor
Nutritional counseling |
Diet Center of Socorro; Socorro, NM |
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1980-1984 |
Founder, Director and Teacher |
Arcadian School (Grades K-12); Socorro, NM |
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1978-1980 |
Research Assistant
Cell membrane transport |
Nutritional Biochemistry
Dept. University of Maryland, College Park, MD |
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1977-1978 |
Research Technician
Malaria research |
Immunoparasitology Laboratory,
Navy Medical Research Institute, Bethesda, MD |
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ACADEMIC HONORS & AWARDS |
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1991-1993 |
Training Award, National Cancer Institute: "Research
Training in Oncology Imaging,"
The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore,
MD. |
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1992 |
Post Doctoral Fellow Travel Award to 11th Annual Society for
Magnetic Resonance in
Medicine Meetings (SMRM), Berlin, Germany. Awarded
by SMRM. |
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1991-1992 |
The Johns Hopkins-Weizmann Institute Cooperative Program.
Visiting Scientist Award for sabbatical to the
Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel. |
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1990 |
Graduate Student Travel Award to 10th International
Biophysics Congress,
Vancouver, B.C. Awarded by International Union for Pure and
Applied Biophysics. |
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1976 |
Elected to Sigma Alpha Omicron, Microbiology Honorary
Society,
University of Maryland Chapter, College Park, MD. |
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ACADEMIC SERVICES |
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International Society of Magnetic Resonance in Medicine |
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American Association for the Advancement of Science |
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PUBLICATIONS |
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For
publications please click this link:
Publications |
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