Roberto Vondrak, Science Department

What is your favorite project to assign?

My favorite project is the pinhole camera. Students today have maybe never used a film camera, besides perhaps a Polaroid. But the pinhole camera lets students design, build and operate an actual camera. The excitement they show when their first picture develops correctly is awesome.

What has been your favorite teachable moment outside of the classroom?

While working with the robotics team, the moment students start to pull knowledge from their math and science classes to help with some problem, you get to see students suddenly realize the power that knowledge has.

What is your favorite Immaculate Heart tradition?

Welcome Day is special. Sometimes freshmen enter a high school scared and overwhelmed. At IH, we welcome the freshmen in with a whole day of celebration. I think this is a really important day and it lets freshmen know they are part of the community.

What is something special about working at Immaculate Heart?

Working with students that care. The environment is less student and teacher and more a community of learners and guides.

What advice would you give to students looking at Immaculate Heart?

Keep in mind that your high school education is more than just what’s taught in the classroom. It’s about the community you mature in and the friends you make along the way.

What is your favorite spot on campus?

The quad. The fact that my classroom opens up to this field is great. I can instantly take my class from indoors to an outdoor learning space.

How did you know you wanted to be a teacher?

I had always loved science but it was my high school chemistry teacher that showed me how much fun teaching could be.

What is a must-watch show that you recommend to all of your students?

The original Cosmos with Carl Sagan. It’s amazing how much we know about the universe—and it’s mind boggling how much we don’t know.

Immaculate Heart High School & Middle School

5515 Franklin Avenue • Los Angeles, California 90028
phone: (323) 461-3651 • fax: (323) 462-0610

A Catholic, independent college preparatory school for girls in grades 6 through 12, Immaculate Heart has been located on a beautiful hillside property in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles since our founding by the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 1906. We celebrate more than a century of nurturing the spiritual, intellectual, social and moral development of students as they distinguish themselves as women of great heart and right conscience.