A Message from Our Principal

December 2025

Greetings Country Place Leadership Academy Students, Families, and Community Members,

The world is in need of leaders. Our students are growing up in world that is always changing and challenging. We are preparing students for jobs that don’t exist. We need students that are deeply engaged in rigorous learning! We need citizens that are ready to positively change the world!

At Country Place Leadership Academy, we believe that everyone can be a leader! That everyone has genius! That change starts with me! That we work to empower students to lead their own learning! And that we educate the whole child through leadership, comprehensive academics, gifted, art, music, integrated technology, and physical education.

Students do not just learn about leadership, mathematics, reading, writing, social studies, and science. Country Place Mustangs are leaders, mathematicians, authors, lawyers, and scientists. We believe in empowered instruction where students learn by doing.

At our school every student is a leader. They have leadership roles in their classrooms and throughout the school. We have students greeting their classmates daily, coordinating field day, planning field trips, and organizing toy drives for the Phoenix Children’s Hospital.

We are a Leader in Me School Lighthouse School. Our school, staff, and students are participating in The Leader in Me Process. Our students and staff learn The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and work to become effective leaders and find their voice.

Come join us at Country Place Leadership Academy, and together we can change the world!

Sincerely,

Dr. Cagle

Dr. Michael Cagle
Country Place Elementary School Principal

Highlighted Math Game

Hello all and welcome to our first installment of the math game of the week. This week, we are going to introduce (or reintroduce, if you know this one) your family to 1-2 NIM. Sophia from Mrs. Ruiz’s class selected this game. We have played NIM with students as young as our kindergarteners!

Instructions:
NIM is a 2-player game. Start with a pile of 10 objects. (They can be anything! Pens or pencils are great, but we play with rocks on the playground!) On your turn, remove one or two counters from the pile. You must take at least one counter on your turn, but you may not take more than two. Whoever takes the last counter wins.

Thoughts to ponder and investigate:
Can you figure out a strategy that allows you to win every time?
Does it matter who goes first? How does it affect your strategy?
Can you make a different version of NIM? One of our fourth graders created 3-5 NIM. Does this change your winning strategy? Why or why not?

Please share your strategies, pictures, and videos of you playing with your homeroom teachers! We will see if anyone can beat the NIM Master, Dr. Cagle, when you return!

Check out more fun games from Math for Love!