There’s been a great deal of excitement in 5th grade teacher Julia Kramer’s classroom at the St. Stephen’s Armenian Elementary School in Watertown. It started with a parent, Rosalyn Minassian, volunteering to do the weekly current events discussions with the class. Following her passion for art, she decided to teach about the unsolved heist at the Gardner Museum reaching back to 1990. The students used their computer class to listen to the news report and view the various art work stolen from the museum. They wrote down their observations and questions in their detective book.

The fifth grade students with journalist Stephen Kurkjian, FBI special agent Geoffrey Kelly, teacher Julia Kramer, and principal Houry Boyamian.

After a lively discussion about the stolen art work with Minassian, the students had an opportunity to speak to two investigators of the case: retired Boston Globe journalist Stephen Kurkjian and FBI special agent Geoffrey Kelly. The students’ excitement and quest for knowledge was evident through the hands waiving eagerly in the air. The Gardner Museum’s director of security, Anthony Amore, even invited the 5th grade class for a VIP tour of the museum. “It’s wonderful to see the children so eagerly go in depth on a topic as we provide them with a breadth of opportunities to learn—from computers to art to forensic science to newspaper reporting,” said Houry Boyamian, the principal of the school.