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As summer begins, we wish all of our families a season filled with rest, adventure, sunshine, laughter, and maybe at least a few days without checking the school calendar. Thank you for another wonderful year of partnership, support, and community. We look forward to seeing returning families in the fall and welcoming new families into our program next school year. To our graduates and promoting students, congratulations on reaching these important milestones. Your next chapter awaits!
On behalf of the BCIC board, I want to extend our deepest gratitude to all of our BCIC families for your participation, enthusiasm, generosity, and unwavering support of both the Chinese Immersion program and BCIC. This year was full of growth, celebration, learning, and connection—and none of it would have been possible without you and this amazing community. Like every school year, this one came with its share of challenges, unexpected changes, shifting schedules, and the occasional logistical puzzle worthy of a graduate-level problem-solving course. But through collaboration, resilience, and a shared commitment to our students, we continued to move forward together. The strength of this community continues to shine brightest not when things are easy, but when we work together through the complicated moments.
This past year was packed with memorable and meaningful experiences that strengthened our program and brought our families together. We give thanks to those that walked with or cheered along the sidelines at D220’s Miami Nights Homecoming Parade in cool shades on a sunny, hot day. We sampled mooncakes and participated in Chinese cultural activities at our first ever community wide Mid-Autumn Festival at Countryside. Students and families saw the future doors that CI could open while strengthening community connections at our annual Career Exploration event which we partner with Xilin School. BCIC supported language development and community as younger students practiced songs and listened to stories at our K-2 Storytime event at Barrington Area Library, while our upper elementary students enjoyed playing games and using more of their Mandarin language skills at our 3-5th Grade Games event. In honor of the Year of the Fire Horse, CI families, friends, teachers administrators, and alumni gathered at BHS to partake in our greatest and largest Lunar New Year Party and fundraiser complete with an outstanding lineup of cultural events. Current middle school students served on a panel to curb any fears of our incoming 6th graders and their families at BCIC’s Transition to Middle School Panel. We were amazed by the language skills of our elementary students at the annual Character Bee! We are incredibly proud of and thankful for the 29 graduates BCIC honored at their CI High School Graduation Party. Congratulations!
BCIC welcomed families to hear from our esteemed guest speakers across our 5 open board meetings this year. Honored speakers included: Becky Wiegel, Director of Language Programs, Grants, & Family Engagement who will be shifting to a new role within the district; Dr. Kathryn Wolfkiel, BHS World Language Department Chair who is retiring; former Directors who served on the BCIC Board (Alex Bernardi, Mary Cook, Cory Flahaven, Jay Murphy, & Jennifer Naddeo); and Nate Rouse, Director of Equity, Race, and Cultural Initiatives.
BCIC and families additionally supported and participated in D220 events including their first annual Embracing Diversity: Multicultural Night and Parent University for Chinese Immersion. We enjoyed being a part of Barrington’s Winterfest tradition as well as Multicultural/Art/Reading PTO events at our elementary schools. We partnered with our community at large by making Thanksgiving cards for Greencastle residents and hosting booths at events like Barrington’s KidFest as well as promoting our CI program through storytimes and crafts at many local preschools.
Through generous family donations as well as personal donations, BCIC was able to not only organize and partake in these great events, but we were able to also support our classroom teachers and staff. BCIC ensured that teachers who needed additional classroom materials got those through our wishlist initiative. Every Mandarin CI teacher was also given a mid-year arts and crafts stipend to provide a special cultural art opportunity to the students in their classroom. Throughout the year, BCIC reminded our teachers and staff how appreciated they are with holiday gifts, teacher appreciation gifts, complimentary tickets to our Lunar New Year and Graduation Parties, and horse pins. These gestures are small compared to the impact our educators make, but we hope they serve as a meaningful reminder of how valued and appreciated they are.
Our students were also directly and profoundly impacted by your generosity and BCIC support. Whether through cultural programming, enrichment opportunities, celebrations, classroom support, or simply seeing their community rally around them, each child benefited in countless ways from a strong and engaged parent organization. Thank you for helping us create not just a program, but a true community.
Of course, none of this would be possible without the incredible teachers, staff, and administrators who make our program thrive every day. We are deeply grateful for your dedication, flexibility, patience, and passion for our students. I'd especially like to thank Mrs. Weerts and Mr. Yu for serving as teacher liasons to our BCIC board.
Leadership transitions are an important part of keeping our organization strong, and we are excited for what is ahead. Please join me in welcoming our Board of Directors for 2026-27.
Leeann Chang, President leeannchang@bcic220.org
Deepta Ramesh, Vice President deeptaramesh@bcic220.org
Matthew Benkert, Treasurer matthewbenkert@bcic220.org
Erin Lales, Secretary erinlales@bcic220.org
Zaoli Zhang, Director zaolizhang@bcic220.org
Kate Xu, Director katexu@bcic220.org
Tracy Lauffer, Director tracylauffer@bcic220.org
Jen Crawford, Director
Annie Xiang, Director
There are 2 additional open seats on the BCIC Board for the 2026-27 school year. Information about joining the board will be shared in a newsletter in the fall. Until then, please reach out to BCIC at bcic220.org if you are interested joining the board or even just being a volunteer!
I would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to all of our current board members for their service this year. Serving on BCIC takes many hours behind the scenes—planning events, managing finances, coordinating volunteers, answering questions, advocating for the program, and ensuring the countless details all come together successfully. I am incredibly grateful for each of you.
Becca Patchak*, President
Deepta Ramesh, Vice President
Leeann Chang, Secretary
Yiming Wang*, Treasurer
Michelle Chase*
Zaoli Zhang
Erin Lales
Matthew Benkert
Kate Zu
Tracy Lauffer
*I’d like to recognize and sincerely thank the outgoing board members whose years of service have made a lasting impact on BCIC. Thank you to Yiming Wang for 2 years of dedicated service and Director Michelle Chase for an incredible 10 years of service to our families and students. Your years of leadership, commitment, time, energy, and dedication have helped shape this organization in countless ways; your contributions will be felt for years to come.
Serving as your BCIC President this past year and on the BCIC Board for the past 7 years has been such an honor. Thank you for the tremendous privilege of serving our CI community.
With gratitude,
BCIC President, Becca Patchak |
