Inspirational Profile: Wakefield High School

In today's Washington Post, Jay Mathews writes about an inspirational retired principal, Marie Shiels Djouadi, who spent over 20 years at Wakefield High School, in Arlington, VA.  A school like many others, with a large immigrant and low-income population,that was failing.  But it has seen dramatic changes since the 1980's, when Dr. Djouadi took the helm.  According to the article,

    "the school has raised state achievement test results significantly for its largely low-income students. It has tripled participation in Advanced Placement tests, while also raising its passing rate on the difficult three-hour exams. Its record, in a school where more than 70 percent of the students are Hispanic or black and at least 50 percent are low-income, led President Obama to make it the site of a major education address last September."

The Interview Process

So, I skipped over an important part of getting accepted into a program under TNTP, and that is the interview.  The interviews are intense events, and can be pretty hard to prepare for.  I went through 2 separate interview events in different school districts both in the mid-Atlantic region. I did not feel that I did very outstanding in my first interview, and that was reflected by them not offering me a position.  Going into the second interview, I was much better prepared and had had a lot of time to reflect upon my first experience.

What I have been doing while I wait

Right now, I am in the in-between time of getting accepted into The New Teacher's Project (TNTP), and actually beginning the program.  It is a limbo period full of waiting and anticipation and everyone I know always asking me what is the status of my new teaching career.  And the answer is always, the status is the same as the last time we spoke, I am waiting for the program to officially begin... sometime in June... I don't know yet the exact date.... or the exact school... or what grade level I will actually be teaching.  Stop asking, I will tell you when something happens. 

So, I have been trying to prepare by working on the recommended reading list, and I have been working on my Independent Study requirements.  The summer training program (called Summer Institute) is where you get your crash course in teaching before the full school year begins in the fall.  The basic schedule has you attending summer school classes in the mornings, and teaching seminars in the afternoons and evenings.  We have been warned that during institute, the days are long (12 hours) and intense.   Prior to beginning institute, fellows are expected to complete their independent study guides and assignments.  The assignments include a lot of reading and a handful of short writing assignments, as well as observing a classroom for a minimum of 4 hours.  So, this has been keeping me busy already.


An interesting note about the text book we are using, which has been produced by The New Teacher Project, is that everyone is using the book for Special Education teachers, whereas in previous years there were different books for General and Special Ed.  The thinking behind this move is that everyone should be familiar with the specific rules and laws of teaching special ed anyway, and a the teaching methods are valid regardless of whether you are General or Special Ed.

Book Report: There are No Children Here

I just completed another book from the recommended reading list, There are No Children Here, by Alex Kotlowitz. It is a story of two young brothers growing up in housing projects in Chicago in the late 1980's. It gives the reader a look at poverty and the many things that come with it- gangs, drugs, violence, death, teen-pregnancy, crime, prison, high-rates of school dropouts – and it focuses especially on how it affects the children. This true story takes place from 1987 to 1989, and one thing that stays with me throughout the whole story is the children's young ages - just a few years older than I was at the same time, but living light years away in another world entirely. Here I am, growing up happy and safe in my middle-class suburb, when only a few hundred miles away are children who live in fear of not making it to their next birthdays.

Book Report: “The Learning Gap”

I mentioned the recommended reading list, and today I am going to discuss “The Learning Gap: Why our schools are failing and what we can learn from Japanese and Chinese Education” by Harold Stevenson and James Stigler. The authors have compiled the results of their academic publications on studies of American, Japanese, and Chinese elementary schools into a book for the lay-audience. They left out the more technical aspects of their findings, and instead give more general descriptions and conclusions of their work. They begin by giving evidence that American school children do in fact perform poorly on basic skills tests compared to children in Japan and China – i.e. The Learning Gap. Let's assume we can all agree with this premise and move on to trying to understand what makes education in these countries different, which might explain why Japanese and Chinese children are out-performing American children.

Kansas City School Closings

Today, the school district in Kansas City, Missouri is making national headlines by announcing that in order to avoid bankruptcy, they will be closing down half of their public schools starting next fall. I grew up in the KCMO metro area and to me, it is no news that their schools are in crisis.

Reading List

The PGCTF staff sent out a list of recommended reading to the fellows in the introductory paperwork we received. I am making it a goal to read as many of the books from the list as possible, and I plan on commenting on the books and any other books I read as I am preparing to become a teacher. For now, I will simply share the list of 16 books, as I am sure it is not a secret meant only for PGCTF members. It seems that the books on this list are not dry, technical textbooks, but are things that would appeal to anyone interested in education and the challenges faced by schools in America. I think teachers, parents, and prospective educators would find them interesting as well.