SPANISH FORT, Ala. — Dianne Bernasconi has lived her family and consumer science curriculum her entire life, and it’s precisely that practicality she hopes her Spanish Fort High School students leave her classroom grasping.

“These are things every child needs to learn to be independent,” said Bernasconi, who joined SFHS in August. She teaches her students everything from food and nutrition to child care, home interiors and personal finance.

“We really should call this program ‘wellness’ because I’m teaching the art of better living through so many areas. We make academia relevant. We put into practice what they learn in the core academic classes,” said Bernasconi, who actually wrote Baldwin County Schools’ online personal finance course and teaches it in the evenings.

A New Orleans native who earned her bachelor’s degree in marketing and merchandising before deciding 22 years later to pursue a master’s degree in education, Bernasconi relocated with her family to Baldwin County four years ago from Massachusetts for her husband’s job. In her seventh year teaching — including two years in Massachusetts — she has worked at both Spanish Fort and Foley middle schools before being asked recently to take the leap to high school.

Editor’s Note: This is the 10th in an ongoing series designed to introduce readers to some new faces in the Spanish Fort feeder pattern.

Two more teachers will be featured in the Oct. 6 Spanish Fort Sun.

See the rest of this story in the Oct. 1 Spanish Fort Sun—on stands through Oct. 5—and available at The Bulletin and Spanish Fort Sun office, 1805 Main St., Daphne.