We are so proud of our 2020 class of Fund for Teachers Fellows and believe Teacher Appreciation Week is the perfect time to begin a weekly series that introduces! Through individual profiles, as well as those focusing on themes these exemplary teachers will pursue in the summer of 2021, you will appreciate these Fellows commitment to their profession, students and school communities.

Today, meet Laurel Cardellichio, science teacher at Croton-Harmon High School in Croton-on-Hudson, NY. Currently, she teaches AP Environmental Science and Regents Chemistry, but she’s also taught Biology, Animal Physiology, Forensic Science, and Psychology. Prior to being named a 2020 FFT Fellow, Laurel earned recognition as a Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms Fellow, Regeneron STEM Teacher Fellow, and her National Geographic Certification.

On her CardClassroom global education guide/blog, Laurel shares her mission statement:

[minti_blockquote]“Create scientifically and geographically literate students who, have passion for discovery of the natural world around them have the knowledge, the confidence and the skills to communicate ideas respectfully and, have the drive to become positive agents of change as globally competent citizens”[/minti_blockquote]

The Fund for Teachers fellowship Laurel designed, not surprisingly, is right in line with her mission. With her grant, Laurel will research traditional knowledge-based agricultural practices in Italy to create partnerships with local farms and learning that promotes traditional farming methods:

• mitigating climate change
• improving food security, and
• conserving biodiversity.

Laurel explained the reasoning behind this fellowship in her proposal:

“Just like my students, I learn best through experience and I propose to immerse myself in the history and culture of traditional agriculture ecosystems of Italy. There are two Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS) in Italy designated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). These GIAHS, dominated by olive groves and vineyards in the Umbria and Veneto regions of Italy, provide significant examples of historical and modern human agricultural practices in harmony with nature. The traditional knowledge based practices conducted in these regions date back to the Roman Empire and smallscale family farms are exemplars for sustainability, biodiversity, and climate change mitigation. My teaching practice will be strengthened as I learn how historic food ecosystems reflect culture and sustainable land management, and how modernization and climate change has impacted them.”

Laurel’s goal for her students is for them to learn how sustainable management of agricultural land must be approached as an ecosystem and how that supports the Slow Food Movement. While she will pursue experiences and information across Italy to support this goal, her students’ work will be tied to farms surrounding their school community north of New York City. Three small-scale farms in Westchester County (Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture, Hilltop Hanover, and Cabbage Hill) will serve as her “homebase” from which she and students will learn best practices and develop mentoring relationships for future research projects.

Her keen interest in land sustainability stems from her personal interest in gardening, professional love of teaching environmental science and unique professional learning experiences.

“As a Regeneron Fellow, I took a course centered on the impacts of climate change on the ability of Athabascan Indians of Alaska to preserve their heritage largely centered on seasonally-based traditional methods for obtaining food,” said Laurel. “When I learned that I was going to Morocco [through the Fulbright program], I immediately started researching environmental issues in the country and the preservation of oases came up. I had never thought beyond movie depictions of the oasis mirage. I am thankful to my host teacher, who brought me to an oasis upon my request. When my research lead me to the GIAHS – completely by surprise – I found out the the FAO also has an interest in preserving human culture in the form of traditional agriculture.”

According to Laurel, the postponement of 2020 grant recipients’ fellowships until next summer gives her that much more time to prepare for an even more meaningful learning experience. COVID permitting, she plans to go ahead with her stateside portion of her fellowship, filming interviews at local farms and aligning her research for use in the classroom this year. This initial contact will lay the groundwork for students’ participation in the farms’ hands on workshops, guided tours and internship opportunities for seniors.

“Although I wish I could have carried out my fellowship this summer, I believe the delay for the Italy part will be very beneficial for multiple reasons. This extra time will allow me to: further develop my video production skills this summer for lesson plans, conduct the local farm research/visits/filming this summer giving me valuable time to better prepare for the two weeks that I will be in Italy ; and learn a lot more Italian so that I may communicate respectfully and effectively to the people I meet on my adventure.”

We are so proud of our 2020 class of Fund for Teachers Fellows and believe Teacher Appreciation Week is the perfect time to begin a weekly series that introduces! Through individual profiles, as well as those focusing on themes these exemplary teachers will pursue in the summer of 2021, you will appreciate these Fellows commitment to their profession, students and school communities.

Today, in conjunction with Asian Pacific Heritage Month, we introduce Joey Cumagun, a special education teacher with the Adult Transition Community Based Instruction (CBI) team at Deer Valley High School in Antioch, CA. Joey currently he has also taught Special Day Class K-3, SDC 6-8 and autism intensive classrooms. A teacher for 32 years, his awards include Mary Allan Teacher Fellow 2019, National History Day Fellow 2016-17, Special Olympics Northern California Teacher of the Season 2015.

Joey enrolled in the Ateneo de Manila University with the intention of pursuing a degree in Engineering; however, after volunteering as a tutor his junior year, he switched his major to Education and started teaching social studies in a general education setting. After meeting his late wife who was a Special Education teacher, Joey added a second certification in this sphere, as well.

In designing his fellowship, Joey recognized a gap in the transition of his students from school to life post-graduation. He teaches 15 students (primary eligibility are (8 students with primary diagnosis of autism, 5 intellectual disability, 1 other health impairment (cerebral palsy), 1 with specific learning disability). Their learning goals cover:

• functional academics, which is how to apply reading and math skills in the real world such as following a calendar or reading a bus schedule
• appropriate communication and social skills to successfully navigate their community, and
• vital employment skills which is the primary rationale of this fellowship.

“As important a goal of getting a job is after high school is to my students, none of them actually gets employed after graduation,” explained Joey. “All my students end up in sheltered, non-work settings. In the state of California, only one out of every four workers with developmental disabilities are working in a community employment settings (according to CA Transition Alliance). On the national level, while unemployment rate is at an all time low, there is no evident increase in the rate of employment of people with disabilities. In my constant effort to find how I can best prepare students with special needs for employment, I researched top companies and best countries that employ people with disabilities. Then I discovered about Omron Taiyo in Japan with a long and reputable history of employing people with disabilities.”

[minti_pullquote align=”left”]Joey will use his Fund for Teachers grant to tour two Omron Taiyo manufacturing factories where the majority of employees have a disability to design a system for a workplace (simulated in the classroom) that is both conducive and motivating for students with disabilities.[/minti_pullquote]

“With this fellowship I will be able to see for myself a work flow system designed for workers with disabilities that I would never see in a textbook or curriculum,” said Joey. “In addition, I will learn more effective ways how to instill positive work values in the classroom, learn ways that Omron implements visual materials, automated signals, and workflow design to support workers with disabilities, and document methodologies and use of Japanese technology that I can bring to my classroom.”

Upon his return, Joey envisions a six-step plan for applying all he experiences in Japan:

1. Create workstations that incorporate workflow systems observed at Omron
2. Implement technology that supports work skills performance
3. Teach and practice positive work values, such as the attitude of punctuality
4. Introduce guided practice lessons that parallel work designs seen at the Omron factory
5. Present a training session during the school’s professional development day and provide handouts and support to
   teachers who are willing to implement whatever they have learned, and
6. Network with community organizations and businesses and policy makers by promoting my students
   employability

Joey has completed 62 marathons, en route to his goal of 100 races.

Joey’s ultimate goal is to see his students enter the workforce through this network, as opposed to attending adult day programs (bowling, library visits, etc.) in which most students remain for the rest of their lives.

“Essentially, the goal of school is to learn ‘skills to pay the bills,’ said Joey, “but in civic terms, the end outcome of education is to create productive citizens in the community both local and global. This fellowship will help develop a good success story for the community’s effort to engage students in real world learning. This fellowship will be particularly special because it caters to the needs of the special needs population, sending an inspirational message to the students and the school community that all students can succeed, no matter the challenges.”

They gathered data in national parks, followed the Brothers Grimm through Germany, researched the secret to happiness in Southeast Asia, built an aquaponics system in Africa, and conducted interviews in Northern Ireland. Now they apply those experiences in the classroom and they want to share strategies  — and learn your own — for connecting students to global peers.

On Wednesday, February 19th, Fund for Teachers is hosting its inaugural webinar series designed to facilitate learning beyond the initial fellowship experience. All teachers are invited and encouraged to participate. Registration for the event is available here.

A little more about our panel…

Connecticut Fellow Dory Moore connects her students with peers in Michigan and Bermuda using Flipgrid.com. Students in each location design underwater robots to collect water and sand samples, then use the Flipgrid platform to sare ideas and prototypes. This spring, these citizen scientists will meet up in Bermuda (using grant money Dory secured) to test their designs and collect data on the invasive lion fish.

Kate Craven is a library media specialist who helps students practice research skills using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Her fellowship in Germany led to a collaboration through the German American Partnership Program and now map how each country is meeting indicators of the United Nations Global Goals.

 Carly Imhoff uses Empatico to be matched with international classrooms and connect through live video. They are currently sharing projects about climate change and renewable energy. (Her students also taught students in Nigeria about “Baby Shark” and they shared a hand clapping game.) Carly’s students also use Flipgrids to share with peers in Uruguay Lego creations for UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Oklahoma Teacher of the Year and two-time FFT Fellow Donna Gradel developed long-term relationships with a school and orphanage in Kenya that has resulted in two student expeditions there to implement an aquaponics and sustainable food initiative they developed in AP Environmental Science.  Watch her tell her story here.

And Saul Fussiner is a high school writing teacher who has experimented with classroom partnerships between his students, students in other parts of the United States and Ireland.  He has leveraged a virtual pen pal structure using e-mail and Google hangouts, which he talks about in this brief video.

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What questions do you have for these exemplary educators?

Submit them to carrie@fundforteachers.org and join the discussion on February 19th at 4 pm CST.

Register here for the webinar.

On this day in 1911, Suffragettes stormed Parliament in London. All were arrested and chose prison terms. Their leader was Emmeline Pankhurst – the focus of Eric Reid-St. John‘s fellowship.

Eric, a theatre teacher at Spain Park High School in Hoover, AL, researched Pankhurst and the suffrage movement they incited. While in London, he found in Trafalgar Square the location of the 1908 rally for which Mrs. Pankhurst was also arrested (pictured). He then studied with three avant-garde theatres, laying the groundwork for his students’ creation of a play about Lady Constance Lytton, an English aristocrat who disguised herself as a working woman to support suffragettes.

“Through research, I found that I could relate a lot to Constance,” said Rachel Ponder, who played the lead. “However, most of all, I was so in awe of her dedication towards the suffrage movement. Being a part of this creative process has inspired me both as a woman and as a human being.”

 

Ponder and 23 students representing each grade spent three months researching the suffrage movement in the United States and Britain before collaborating on a script and set. Each performer created a character journal comprised of photos, newspaper articles and other primary resources they uncovered. An Oxford professor who authored a book on Lytton Skyped into class to inform students’ research, as well.

“Current events were on my mind when I began this process and they continue to bring about a sense of urgency surrounding women’s rights,” said Eric. “My students took the history of this topic and explored its correlation with today’s headlines. They created a story that allowed people to see that the expansion of equal rights is the natural progression of a free society.”

Reviews are in, and at a state theatre competition, Ponder won Best Actress, her cast mates won Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Ensemble and Deeds Not Words was named Best in Show.

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Update from Eric:

“Several of our seniors from that year’s show have gone on to study theatre at various universities, including Viterbo in Wisconsin (our lead actress from Deeds Not Words studies musical theatre there), University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa; Samford University and Birmingham-Southern in Birmingham; and Emory in Atlanta.

That ended up being my last year teaching in Alabama, as I took a position at a school in Middlebury, VT, the following year. This marks my second year directing the Addison Repertory Theatre at the Hannaford Career Center teaching ART – a class that allows students from area schools to focus on either technical theatre or performance during the school day.

The techniques of devised theatre that I studied along with the suffragettes while in England that summer still impact the way I teach. The students and I have created two plays using devised methods over the past year; one took fables and folk tales and turned them into a children’s show that we toured to five local elementary schools, while the other challenged students to develop a series of short plays that were presented to sold-out crowds over two nights.

The theatre creation techniques I learned will continue to affect the way I teach for years to come. The research into the suffragettes will always continue to influence the way I view the struggle for equal rights. (I have also since been able to take my mother and daughter to the Women’s Rights National Park in Seneca Falls, NY, and have now attended two Convention Days there, annual celebrations that commemorate the first conference on women’s rights in the US).

Thank again for thinking of Deeds Not Words. I believe that was one of the most immediate and important works I’ve been a part of.”

[minti_dropcap style=”circle”]B[/minti_dropcap]ack in the ’80s, when Saturday Night Live was funny, Jon Lovitz did a skit called “Get to Know Me!” espousing how the lives of people (i.e. Steve Martin) benefited from knowing him. We believe the same is true of our 2019 Fellows and are, therefore, beginning a blog series to introduce many of our grant recipients throughout the summer.

For our first installment, we introduce you to a Fellow whose fellowship ranks among the most unique we’ve funded in almost twenty years. Get to know Mick Posner of Conrad High School in West Hartford, CT.

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On why he designed this fellowship…

I am now in my 10th year of teaching American Sign Language (ASL), which was actually the first language I learned as a child because I was born deaf. As a faculty member of my high school’s World Languages department, I work with students in 9th through 12th grade. Students take my class to fulfill their World Language credit and to learn about the deaf community. More than 90% of my students have not been exposed to a sign language system until they take my class. I believe that students enjoy my class because they are being introduced to an entirely different culture that, in a sense, intertwined globally and for many of them, the challenge of communicating in different environments and situations is mutual.

Many people do not know that there are 200+ sign language systems around the world, each with their own grammar, vocabulary, influences and origins. Twice a year, my students complete a survey in order to share their feedback about my ASL classes. Consistently I receive the same inquiries — students have a strong interest in learning about unique deaf communities in other countries, particularly those shaped by linguistic and geographical barriers (such as the fact that deaf people in Cuba who are not allowed to drive and work full-time, among other government imposed restrictions.

(photo courtesy of Nunatsiaq News)

After conducting extensive research, I found very little exists regarding the Greenland Deaf Community (and deaf Inuits), thus leading me to the following learning experience that I wish to pursue: understanding how such an unique population survive in such a remote part of the world, despite their deafness, by becoming a student of Inuit Sign Language (ISL), which is the official sign language system of the Greenland Deaf Community. This fellowshipwill deepen students’ understanding of the human spirit’s resiliency and the importance of continuing learning and pursuing knowledge in sign language systems.

ISL is a dialect that is centralized around vocations (a large percentage of their vocabulary is focused on being able to communicate related to hunting and fishing) and survival skills.  It is a language based purely on livelihood and survival in a very remote section of the world and would be a strong evidence of sign language’s relevance to a community that depends so much on a particular dialect to survive. There’s not many other languages like this, particularly in the form of a sign language system.

Celebrating the news with Principal Julio Duarte (left) and Superintendent of Schools Tom Moore

From this FFT experience I will have my students actively involved in the creation of online resources regarding different deaf communities around the world. In this project, students will include locations of community, what makes them unique, how they interact with the rest of their community at large, and the identification of unique signs necessary for survival.

On learning he is a 2019 Fellow…

When I first found out I was an FFT Fellow, I was overcome with an extraordinary sense of relief. The grant was something I had worked diligently on for four months, stemming from an idea I had from over a year ago based on articles I read the previous summer — quickly, that feeling turned into so much joy. My students were really excited for me — after it was announced, I asked if I could have a few minutes to call my wife. My 5th period class (that was when it was announced) voiced their support and understanding.

The impact on students already exists — I received several congratulatory and well-wishes emails from parents who shared that their students came home and told them about the FFT award. Along with a few additional parents who contacted me via social media, some of my seniors shared that they wish they could stay in high school for another year so they could hear about the experience (of course, I will see if I can extend an invitation to them when the time comes.)

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Mick is the only member of his family who was deaf, yet his parents believed in having ASL as his first language, which he learned before English. You can learn more about his life experiences and his own family from the A&E documentary “Born this Way Presents: Deaf Out Loud.” He and his wife also own Posner Inclusion, a consulting firm that creates bridges between businesses and unique markets, such as the deaf population.

Pixar’s Coco familiarized many with the tradition of Dia de los Muertos, or “Day of the Dead.” And before Nancy MacBride‘s fellowship to Oaxaca, Mexico, the annual holiday inspired Voluntown Elementary’s singular art project honoring Latin American history and culture. Now, the celebration honoring life and death is just one in a series of year-long art opportunities linked with Latin culture in a preK-8 school that only offers 60 hours of social studies instruction annually.

“Voluntown, CT, is a rural, homogenous community with only one school (ours) where only 1% of students have other languages spoken at home,” explained Nancy. “The insular culture creates challenges for children to learn about different cultures and accept the differences in others. I felt our students needed cultures, not walls, so I designed a fellowship to make it happen.”

Usually Fellows’ implementation of their summer grants begins upon their return to the classroom, but Nancy started the learning when she applied for her FFT grant in the fall of 2017.

• Through the school’s PTO and a local Mexican restaurant’s sponsorship, three groups of Mexican folk artists visited the school.
• Older students read Esperanza Rising in English and created ofrendas, or altars, for loved ones who’ve passed away.
• Kindergarteners created multi-media collages of a Mexican desert landscape.
• Second graders learned Zapotec weaving techniques.
• Fourth graders read and illustrated a Mexican legend and painted portraits of Frida Kahlo.
• Fifth graders created metallic masks inspired by Pre-Columbian versions.
• Multiple grades watched PBS’ “Craft in America” episodes on Mexican art and were introduced to an artisan Nancy would meet on her fellowship.

The “pre-learning” culminated in a community Noche Mexicana last spring, attended by students, their families and government dignitaries.

This summer, students followed Nancy (a working artist herself) via Instagram as she lived out the learning they shared the year before. Nancy spent a month in Oaxaca, staying in a community that caters to local artisans, taking language classes, sketching World Heritage Sites and experiencing Pre-Columbian and folk art in surrounding museums and cultural centers. She practiced weaving through the Weaving Oaxaca initiative alongside a twelve-year-old teacher whose family has dyed natural wools and created art for generations; she also worked with Zapotec ceramist Adrian Martinez for a week. The highlight was visiting the artist studio of Magdalena Pedro Martinez, whom students came to know through the “Craft in America” series.

This fall, Nancy’s experiences in Mexico continue to inspire projects and discussions with students. Fifth graders are preparing to create wooden assembled animals inspired by Mexican alebrijes. Sixth graders are creating their own versions of sculptures modeled after artifacts Nancy brought back from Josefina’s Oaxacan workshop. And beginning this week, students of all ages will have the opportunity to join a new Spanish Club Nancy initiated as an elective.

Perhaps more importantly, students have a new appreciation for “our neighbors to the south,” according to Nancy. As a volunteer with the Voluntown Peace Trust, she collaborates with the Hartford Catholic Worker to bring urban minority children out of the city to enjoy the surrounding nature. Nancy’s leadership as a role model through this effort, combined with the cross-disciplinary learning she provides, is creating a new culture in the school community.

“My admiration of artists from other cultures helps break down the walls and build bridges to other cultures for students,” she said. “My Fund for Teachers fellowship wasn’t just about the place visited, or knowledge, skills and capabilities I gained; it also moved appreciation of Mexican culture from my head to my heart and that passion is now spreading to my students.”

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Nancy (pictured with a state selectman and superintendent at Noche Mexicana) has taught art for 31 years, a career that has included teaching sculpture to widows and orphans in Zambia and earned her Connecticut’s Outstanding Elementary Art Teacher award. She frequently exhibits her own work in galleries and museums, which you can see on her website. (Top picture of students dressed as Frida and her fawn at the Noche Mexicana.)

More than 100 families entered the Meriden Public School District in Connecticut last year from Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. Consequently, Mariah Abatan and Marjorie Eager quickly became more than teachers at Hanover Elementary — they became a lifeline for displaced, confused and scared English Language Learners (fifty percent of whom also presented with speech and language impairments and learning disabilities). Scrambling for strategies to best help these children, they discovered a U.S. News and World Report ranking of “The Best Countries to Be an Immigrant” with Sweden at the top of the list. That’s where they find themselves today, World Refugee Day 2018, on their FFT fellowship.

“We are committed and passionate to empower and inspire our students to dream and achieve their dreams by becoming resilient, lifelong learners despite the challenges they are facing,” wrote the teachers in their grant proposal. “This is a difficult task due to our limited understanding and knowledge of educating immigrant students, lack of resources and minimal training from the district.”

They crafted a fellowship to bridge that gap and are debriefing with educators at two Swedish schools where refugee students first register, as well as participating in a conference at Stockholm University titled “Exploring Language Education: Global and Local Perspectives.”

“We are inspired by the resilience, kindness and courage of the immigrant and refugee families we have met – both here in Sweden and our classroom in the US,” said Mariah. “It is encouraging to witness united voices of a community committed to helping and empowering each other in the midst of traumatic, life-altering events. We urge you to take advantage of the opportunity to make a positive impact in your community by supporting immigrant and refuge families.”

Watch this video of 2017 FFT Fellows’ journey documenting the refugee crisis in Western Europe and the student impact that followed.

“We want our students to feel and know that they are important and helpful to others, as well
as they can add value to their lives by learning from others,” added Marjorie. “In order to have a better community, we have to build tolerance, trust, empathy, and mutual understanding. It is essential/critical to us, that students value their background history and understand the richest of their contributions and contributions of their peers in Sweden.”

Educating refugee and immigrant students is a growing trend in Fund for Teachers fellowships. This summer, five teachers are pursuing this topic in various and unique ways, including:

• Alissa Davis (Hopkins School – New Haven, CT) who is retrace the steps of Longfellow’s heroine, Evangeline, from Nova Scotia to New Orleans to Philadelphia and producing maps and a lesson plan that revives a forgotten tale of refugees and provides students with an intimate exposure to this deeply relevant issue;
• Amber Neal (Almeda Elementary – Houston, TX) who is experiencing Tanzania’s history, language, culture and educational climate to deepen understanding of African refugee students and develop learning experiences that enhance global awareness, celebrate cultural differences and enrich classroom discourse;
• Anne Tomalin (Chapel Hill High School – Chapel Hill, NC) who is joining the University of North Carolina’s World View China Study Visit Program for educators, to observe China’s educational practices and spark ideas for more effectively supporting the school’s Asian refugee students;
• A team from Julia de Burgos Elementary in Phildelphia that will explore the homelands of students, 86% of whom identify as first or second generation immigrants from Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, to implement a rigorous, culturally relevant program for the student
  body;
• Anya Wislocki (International High School for Health Sciences – Elhurst, NY) who will research work of environmental activists in Bolivia and Peru while strengthening Spanish language skills to prepare newly arrived immigrant students for college study in the sciences; and,
• Maribeth Dann and Phil Landolt (Hermann Middle School – Hermann, MO) who are blogging as they explore Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand, to create learning focusing on modern immigration to America and inform seventh graders’ projects on why people leave their homelands.

“We know that we would have been able to teach our immigration unit without this opportunity, but we know we will do a much better job after this experience,” said Maribeth. “Through many of the poignant experiences we had in Vietnam and Cambodia we can empathize with why a family would feel the need to uproot their entire life in search of a life that does not include war and oppression. It is a decision that we in the States are very lucky that we do not need to make.”

The American embassy’s relocation to Jerusalem and ensuing violence underscores the importance of students’ having a working knowledge of Middle East politics, culture and history. Often in an attempt to increase their own understanding as much as their students, teachers design FFT fellowships focused on the Arab-Israeli conflict. The insights they bring back to class informs learning (and sometimes introduces the unrest for the first time) across a variety of disciplines and age ranges.

Sharolyn standing at the most contested piece of real estate on earth – the Dome of the Rock.

For example, Sharolyn Griffith’s students in her homogeneous community of Afton, WY, weren’t even aware of the conflict in the Middle East and held stereotypes that needed to be addressed with facts. She used her FFT grant to examine Israel and Jordan with a National Geographic contingency to provide students with a well-rounded and informed perspective on one of the world’s oldest religious and geo-political conflict regions. Her itinerary included sacred sites, a Palestinian refugee camp, UNESCO World Heritage sites and school visits.

“In class, we did an activity where we had to decide how to divide up disputed land for the Palestinians and the Jews,” said Jillian O’Connor, a sophomore at Star Valley High School. “After reading backgrounds on both groups and listening to Ms. Griffith’s experiences, I quickly came to the decision that finding a right answer was impossible.  After a long debate, my group did the best we could, which was no where near perfect.  Learning about the good and the bad things occurring in the Middle East has made me much more invested in the current events happening in Jerusalem and Gaza and other places and I would love to learn more.”

Jay, Katie and John touring Hebron and an Israeli settlement.

For their fellowship, the teaching team of Jay Pitts-Zevin, Katie Laird and John Kearney (Alta Vista Charter School – Kansas City, KS) partnered with Seeds of Peace, an internationally-focused conflict resolution organization. On average, the teaching team spent 12-14 hours a day meeting with Israelis and Palestinians and listening to their stories. “It was some of the most demanding work in terms of intensity, intellectual effort and emotional depth that we’ve done,” they said.

John, a World History teacher, now teaches with increased credibility about the context surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian issue. English I and II students use interviews Jay and Katie conducted of displaced people in Palestine to create narratives, modeling the writing process their teachers used on their fellowship blog: research, pre-writing, post-writing and real-time reflections.

Read about their experiences on the blog created for students to follow.

Liz Shulman chose to learn from Palestinians and Israelis who’ve learned to live together. These strategies now shape how she teaches students non-violent skills for navigating life in Chicago.

“This year alone, several students of color have missed class due to attending funerals for loved ones who have been shot, or have come to class while homeless,” said Liz, freshman English teacher at Evanston Township High School. “To complicate things further, the community where I teach also has a lot of wealthy families. This dichotomy causes both populations in the school to have very different experiences while in the same building.”

After documenting successful practices at Neve Shalom, The Parents Circle and Just Vision, Liz re-crafted her curriculum.

Liz’s view of Jerusalem from Hebrew University.

“Now, we read Warriors Don’t Cry, and students talk about race, class, and gender and how these intersect all the time.” said Liz. “This led to our discussions of structural and institutional racism in the U.S. When we talked about the Middle East, students were able to apply these same lenses to the conflict and talk about intersectionality.  Since we’ve been talking about systemic power all year, students were able to talk about the different power dynamics in Israel/Palestine.  We’ve also talked about the different organizations on both sides that want peace, similar to grass roots organizations in the U.S. Overall, they’re frustrated about what is happening but are taking solace in understanding that most people on both sides want peace.”

Melissa at the Dome of the Rock.

These are just a few of our FFT Fellows who learn in the Holy Land how to support students’ global awareness and peace-building skills. This leadership represents the catalyst behind all FFT fellowships — the students.

“Meeting people who live on both sides of conflict everyday and seeing such hope in their eyes for a peaceful future was inspiring,” said Melissa Tynes, teacher at Houston’s Spring Woods High School who observed on her FFT fellowship coexistence efforts in Tel Aviv, Ramallah and Jerusalem.  “My experiences in the Middle East encourages students’ contemplation of how different peoples with a long history can coexist and collaborate to improve the lives of many.”

(Banner photo credit: Nicole Pelletier, Boston FFT Fellow who spent two weeks in Israel and Palestine with the International Fellowship of Reconciliation, an organization dedicated to conflict resolution and sustainable peace.)

In 2000, the English Language Learner (ELL) population at Fargo High School barely hit 3%; 15 years later, refugees and immigrants make up 10% of the student population. Leah Juelke, ELL specialist, makes it her mission to welcome and educate these teenagers and, so do their peers native to North Dakota, thanks to the school’s Partnership for New Americans.

The initiative mirrors the Sheltered English Instruction model, a strategy Leah researched on a Fund for Teachers fellowship. To better reach her students, largely emigrating from in and around Tanzania, Leah attended a Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol Workshop there to learn from Tanzanian, Kenyan and American secondary teachers about ways to simultaneously teach language, content and academic skills.

Leah (center) taking part in the Sheltered Instruction workshop in Arusha, Tanzania.

“When I set out to complete my fellowship in Tanzania and South Africa, I knew that I would learn something more about my students, but what I didn’t know was that my experience would completely change the way that I teach,” said Leah. “My eyes were opened to the rugged ways of life that many of my students come from. I couldn’t help but to make connections between the refugees in South Africa and those in North Dakota. South Africa’s current xenophobia movement mirrored what is happening in North Dakota.”

“It’s really opened my eyes to all the different cultures that are here in the Fargo area,” said one native Fargo student speaking of the Partnership. “And it’s helped me see that there are a lot of different ways of living life.”

As part of the Green Card Voices initiative, last year Leah and her English Language Learners published their personal narratives in a book called Green Card Youth Voices: Immigration Stories from a Fargo High School (for purchase here). This compilation now serves as a vehicle to generate awareness about the immigrant experience and includes links to the students’ video narrative, a study guide, and glossary to help teachers use the book as an educational resource when teaching about immigration.

Watch a trailer for the book and meet the authors.

“The Journey to America project helped me share my story and understand my classmates more,” said Aline, a junior from Congo. “Before, I didn’t talk about my life in Africa because it was so sad, but now my family and I talk about it and we have come to peace.”

This year, Leah was named North Dakota’s 2018 Teacher of the Year and received her honor from the governor and in front of her students and school community at a surprise ceremony in the Fargo High School gymnasium. Afterwards, her mission continued to be her clarion call.

“I’d like to encourage people to be open-minded, and to know that diversity is a wonderful thing,” she said. “By being educated more about other cultures, it just opens a lot of doors. And getting to know our neighbors is very important.”

Last summer, Amanda Kingston studied Carol Gilligan’s stages of moral development outlined in the book In a Different Voice by journeying through the history of women in Italy, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France and United Kingdom. With the research, interviews and artifacts collected, she created a new, cross-cultural class called “The Female Voice,” which culminates today – the International Day of Women – with the display of capstone projects.

“The class went beautifully!” said Amanda. “Students were so engaged and are so excited to share their final projects and about what they’ve learned. They each created a piece representing their biggest takeaways. We even had them do a mini-Fund proposal a few weeks ago; they proposed their own ideas for fellowships to learn more and grow as scholars around female voice. A few actually studied places they’re visiting this summer or over spring break and are planning to see some of the museums, homes, monuments, and sites they researched.”

In addition to these projects, the class dialogued about what it means to include silenced voices at the table so they are free and valued to speak, and how they can better support diverse learning in the classroom.

“One of the challenges we’re wrestle with is where we do and don’t hear voices of women in our world , along with other groups of people historically oppressed,” said Amanda. “I want them to learn how to listen to and make room for a different story, or to share their own story if they are part of a group that has been silenced.”

Click here to read more about Amanda’s female-focused fellowship.

From Idaho to Omo — that’s how far Christine Corbin went to help her students redefine beauty and identity.

An art teacher at Boise‘s Riverstone International School, Christine was researching ideas for a portrait-painting unit when she found photographs of the Omo River Valley tribe in Ethiopia. She immediately wanted her students to paint these “hauntingly beautiful” people, so began with the inquiry question, “What is beauty?”

“My students went bonkers,” said Christine. “Who are these people? What is their concept of beauty? And how is their view different from ours? were just a few of the questions I took with me to Ethiopia last summer on my Fund for Teachers fellowship.”

For four weeks, this sixty-something-year-old traveled alone in Africa with a dishonest guide, lived in areas of extreme poverty and traversed remote areas experiencing conflict between the government and various tribes. These conditions paled in comparison to the learning, however. “I was able to immerse myself completely in the beauty of the unknown and be amazed at what it taught me,” she said.

She’s now teaching her students about the art, customs and culture of the people with whom she fell in love. Eighth graders completed a photography unit based on her research, which included replicating versions of the images Christine brought back from her fellowship. She spent time with the Karo tribal people, whose face and body painting became the inspiration for students’ photo shoot assignments. The finished products (i.e. faces) appear in books they produced using Shutterfly. After a cross-curricular mask-making unit in conjunction with the music teacher this spring, her students will exhibit their art in a school-wide event at the local community center.

Christine’s students shared their take aways from the unit on beauty:

“Beauty is pure, simple, and happy. The Omo Valley tribes gauge their lips and ears and scar their bodies to be beautiful. It is pure and beautiful to them. We used our photography to portray our emotions and the emotions of the tribes. Beauty is different for everyone.” -Alease

 

“My concept of beauty is a person who is confident and wise,” added Soloriana, another student. “I believe that cultures everywhere continue to redefine their definition of beauty. Beauty changes from culture to culture.” -Soloriana

 

“It’s important to understand others’ ideas of beauty. The Omo River Valley people use their painted bodies, scarification, lip and ear gauging to express themselves and their ideas of what is beautiful to them. People aren’t typically used to those types of things as something beautiful. It is important to understand what other cultures think is beautiful.” -Aiden

 

“They saw beauty in showing how tough they were and in their ability to endure pain. Using photography, I expressed my concept of beauty as seen by the Omo River Valley tribes. We got to create our own headpieces and used paint, flowers, scarves, jewelry, and makeup to express ourselves in different ways. We used angle, lighting, and special effects to create a story. A face can tell a story.” – Salma

An unintended outcome of the art study was learning about the Gibe III Dam and it’s potentially devastating impact on the Omo River Valley tribe. Her students are now brainstorming on how they can help save the people with whom they also fell in love.

“My personal and professional perspective has profoundly changed,” said Christina. “My research drove home the fact that, as an educator, I have the power to be the catalyst for change. Everything I say and do in my classroom must motivate my students to be original thinkers to impact our interconnected world, especially the marginalized and disenfranchised who have no voice or power.”

This February, Fund for Teachers is celebrating Black History Month by highlighting some of our Fellows’ journeys to bring a better understanding of the African American experience to all students. In this four-part blog series, we’ll be diving into everything from the Transatlantic Trade to student advocacy. This week, we are taking a deeper look at how history is taught with our Fellows Pearl Jonas, Kristen Peterson and Melissa and James Petropoulos. Read on to learn more about their experiences in the classroom and how they are honoring Black History Month in their schools.

History shouldn’t be subjective. Facts are facts. Who records and repeats the facts, however, often determines the truth that’s shared. Pearl Jonas, teacher at Science Leadership Academy in Philadlephia, PA, strives to reduce the risk of fragmented history by teaching with artifacts and primary sources. To teach African American history to freshman in an urban setting, she used her Fund for Teachers grant to go to where the African Americans’ history began — the Transatlantic Slave Trade in Africa.

Classwork at The Dakar Institute of African Studies, combined with excursions to historical sites such as Goree Island, once the largest slave-trading center on the African coast, now informs one of five different African history units. The first two units of her African American history class now include primary sources, concepts, and debates that she collected and engaged with while in Senegal. Topics such as the   Negritude literary movement and Islam in Africa, as well as discussion about how oral tradition influences history, also help students reconsider previous misconceptions.

“This kind of framework is not available in textbooks,” said Pearl. “We now spend time breaking down the Transatlantic Slave Trade and learning about why it happened so we can gain a deeper understanding of what drives people and a society to commit crimes against humanity.”

While Pearl chose to design a fellowship focusing on the pre-history of slavery to construct an accurate and mindful curriculum, Melissa and James Petropoulos realized that the curriculum they taught was simply wrong. Textbooks used at Rowayton Elementary School in Norwalk, CT, stated that slaves in Connecticut were “treated as family,” giving students false perceptions of enslaved Africans in New England. James and Melissa designed a tour of sites associated with slavery during America’s Colonial period to give students the real story.

Evidence of a slave’s resistance through sabatoging work – toe prints in the brick before it went into a kiln.

“In that erroneous history book, slavery was trivialized and in many other books there was little focus on the dignity of the enslaved,” said Melissa. “We wanted to make a clear point through this fellowship: humanity trumps slavery.”

The husband/wife team drove from Connecticut to Louisiana, stopping at museums and sites that honor the culture, beliefs, relationships, and memory of enslaved Africans. They now integrate a new story into history lessons, accompanied by artifacts and interviews collected from their fellowship.

“Rather than teaching about slavery from the point of view of slaves being victims, I now demonstrate how they were heroic, resistors and contributors to our shared American history,” said James.

As a white teacher in an urban district, Kristin Peterson, teacher at John A. Johnson Achievement Plus Elementary in Saint Paul, MN, realized that her own lack of knowledge about her students’ heritage hampered their learning and self-esteem. She identified the new National Museum of African American History & Culture in Washington, DC, as the most reliable resource for learning about the accomplishments and hardships African Americans endured during the past 300 years. On her fellowship, she spent four days roaming six floors of galleries in the Smithsonian Institution’s newest museum, photographing exhibits and filming presentations and interviews with museum staff. She also purchased items for students to experience the museum in multi-sensory ways, such as basket weaving kits, quilts, music, maps and even a cook book.

“While I understand that I can never fully empathize with the experience of African Americans, I feel like I now have a very rich understanding and insight for what people went through and what their lives were like,” said Kristin.

Kristin has since incorporated technology into lessons in order to share her experiential learning.  A “Virtual Field Trip Kit” houses catalogued items that can be checked out to teachers and students, as well. She also placed her research on a district-wide drive for access by every Saint Paul Public Schools teacher. Kristin is a perfect example of the ripple effect one fellowship can have in a learning community. Not only are her immediate classroom students benefitting (as future students will for years to come), but also students throughout the school, her colleagues and even teachers whom she doesn’t know.

Documenting exhibits at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

These FFT Fellows pursued knowledge in response to learning gaps. In Kristin’s case, her own understanding was enhanced in an effort to encourage students with their history. For the Petropouloses, the state’s incorrect information is what needed to be addressed so their students could learn true history. And Pearl used her grant to seek information that wasn’t available anywhere else. Fund for Teachers is honored to serve as a bridge that takes exemplary educators from where they are to where they want their students to be.

We thank Kristen, Pearl, Melissa and James for sharing their experiences and their students’ learning. Make sure to check our Black History Month feed on our blog here. Next week, we’ll be exploring the topic of identity with more FFT Fellows. Stay connected and find out when it’s live by following us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

https://youtu.be/YBqWNcvOd08?t=1s

Margret Atkinson’s language arts students in Zachary, LA, lead a double life. When not studying literature on historic and contemporary Upstanders, they operate an Educational Corporation aimed at engaging communities on the importance of choices that honor others. Initial investments by Donors Choose and Think It Up seeded the creation of their The Upstander Brand, a six-department, student-run business that produces bookmarks, stickers and wristbands advocating for empathy in action. To date, students have raised $1,000, splitting revenue between capital costs and donations to St. Jude’s Children Research Medical Hospital and the American Cancer Society.

“Students are learning skills essential for success in the 2020 workplace, as articulated by the World Economic Forum,” said Margret, who researched World War II Upstanders across Europe on two Fund for Teachers fellowships. “They’re learning cognitive flexibility, critical thinking and emotional intelligence while cultivating their own autonomy and moral paradigms.”

See students interviewed about their Upstander Brand by the CBS affiliate in Baton Rouge, LA.

Seventh and eighth graders founded the nonprofit in 2016 after deeply resonating with Margret’s fellowship research rooted in the Holocaust.  Students now self-select one of six departments at the beginning of the school year to create products, forge collaborative community relationships, and produce podcasts, newsletters and blog posts about their mission to create global good.

Meet The Upstander Brand’s leadership team on the video above, produced by the PR/Marketing team and visit Margret’s website to learn more about her fellowships and their role in catalyzing student impact.

Today, 42 women will be sworn into Congress, the most in US history.  Susan B. Anthony and her British counterpart, Emmeline Pankhurst, would be proud of these activists, and also students of Eric Reid-St. John’s at Spain Park High School in Hoover, AL.

With his Fund for Teachers grant, Eric researched Anthony, Pankhurst and the suffrage movement they incited. While in London, he found in Trafalgar Square the location of the 1908 rally for which Mrs. Pankhurst was arrested (pictured). He also studied with three avant-garde theatres, laying the groundwork for his students’ creation of a play about Lady Constance Lytton, an English aristocrat who disguised herself as a working woman to support suffragettes. “Through research, I found that I could relate a lot to Constance,” said Rachel Ponder, who played the lead. “However, most of all, I was so in awe of her dedication towards the suffrage movement. Being a part of this creative process has inspired me both as a woman and as a human being.”

Ponder and 23 students representing each grade spent three months researching the suffrage movement in the United States and Britain before collaborating on a script and set. Each performer created a character journal comprised of photos, newspaper articles and other primary resources they uncovered. An Oxford professor who authored a book on Lytton Skyped into class to inform students’ research, as well.

“Current events were on my mind when I began this process and they continue to bring about a sense of urgency surrounding women’s rights,” said Eric. “My students took the history of this topic and explored its correlation with today’s headlines. They created a story that allowed people to see that the expansion of equal rights is the natural progression of a free society.”

Reviews are in, and at a state theatre competition, Ponder won Best Actress, her cast mates won Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Ensemble and Deeds Not Words was named Best in Show.

This weekend marks the 48th anniversary of Ireland’s Battle of the Bogside, a riot between Protestants and Catholics that initiated a three-decade conflict known as “The Troubles.” FFT Fellows Saul Fussiner and David Senderoff (New Haven Academy – New Haven, CT) are currently in Ireland researching this period of history and share their experiences below…

We teach a Facing History & Ourselves course for sophomores called “History, Legacy, Judgment and Justice,” which deals with how societies attempt to heal after long periods of conflict. We originally taught this course using the case studies of South Africa and Rwanda, but five years ago, in response to student surveys, we switched our second study to be Northern Ireland. We shaped a unit to include an inquiry activity and some quick background on the history of the Republican/Unionist divide, some lessons on Northern Ireland’s Civil Rights Movement and on Bloody Sunday, some classes on the period of the Troubles (especially 1972-1998) and activities and an assessment based on the Good Friday Agreement and its legacy. After teaching on Northern Ireland for several years now, we wanted to learn more about the background of this crisis–the long history of British colonialism and Irish resistance–that led to this struggle in the first place. And we wanted to see how this struggle is remembered, on both sides, in the lands where it took place.

On our Fund for Teachers fellowship, we are gathering relevant materials across Ireland and Northern Ireland. Along the way, we are gaining awareness and knowledge to help students contextualize the Irish situation (both before and after partition) and demonstrate how people behave in groups.

Our fellowship focuses on museums, tours and arts events that provide a nuanced background on Irish and Northern Irish history. Initially, we intended to research only Dublin and Belfast, but are now expanding to a wider range of places, including Limerick, Galway, Sligo, Derry and County Down. We also are documenting our visit with photography and video showing some of the places we visit; we are especially intent on conducting interviews.

Our ever-expanding agenda has included:

• Glasnevin Cemetery Museum (provides a comprehensive and interactive tour through Irish history)
• the Kilmainham Gaol Museum (contains the history of Ireland’s largest jail from the pre-partition period from
  1798 until the Irish Civil War of the 1920’s, including the detainments and sometimes executions of the
  leaders of the major Irish rebellions in that period)
• the Little Museum of Dublin
• the GPO Museum (documents the 1916 Easter Rising, which was
  headquartered at the General Post Office, or GPO)
• Derry walls walking
  tour
• the Apprentice Boys of Derry Museum
• the City of Derry Museum (the largest collection anywhere
  regarding Bloody Sunday)
• Ulster American park in Omagh
• Mural tours in Belfast and Derry
• Stormont
  Parliament in Belfast
• the Somme Heritage Center (focused on the legacy of the Irish in World War I), and
• Corrymeela Peace Community in Northern Ireland, where one of our visiting teachers is
  a community member.

These activities are the backbone of our fellowship, helping us to build a comprehensive background for our course. By walking in the places where history was lived, one discovers interesting details about it, such as when I visited Alabama and saw with my own eyes how close King’s church was to the Montgomery state house and how close the projects of Selma were to the church where the marches were planned. In addition to everything else, we are spending much of our time in the North with the family of one of the teachers who visited us at our school two years ago, and he is a guide for us during our Belfast excursions.

Why teach about Northern Ireland in an urban school district in Connecticut?

We do so because the Good Friday Agreement represents what author Penn Rhodeen has referred to as the most successful example of a political solution to a major conflict in our time. Through dialogue and compromise, Nationalists and Loyalists were able to bring an end to thirty years of police brutality, bombings, kidnappings, murders, gangsterism and riots to forge a lasting – if precarious – period of peace. The warring factions in America’s own political system have been far less successful at dialogue and compromise, creating our current situation of mistrust of government and political institutions at home.

When we teach the Civil Rights Movement in American History, that teaching rests on an understanding of a long history of America and a feeling for the present day in our country. We are looking to replicate that long view and awareness in our understanding of (and teaching of) the Civil Rights period and Troubles period in Northern Ireland. We want to be able to “read between the lines.” We are both trying to become better historians of this place, and in order to do so, we wanted to experience it first hand, through interviewing of people there, and through studying in some of its most important museums and taking some of its tours and in walking
from here to there, literally, on its streets. The content of our Northern Ireland unit is always growing, and this fellowship will help us to become better resources for our students to understand this complex and confusing history.

There is an inquiry activity that we always do right near the beginning of the Northern Ireland unit, where students try to piece together clues to the puzzling struggles in Northern Ireland. Clippings and photos and statistics and maps and excerpts from interviews are examined and students create questions and inferences. We do a similar activity as they get into the specifics of the Northern Irish Civil Rights movement. Later, a big paper activity guides students through the escalation of violence in the 1970’s that followed Bloody Sunday. These are activities that can be added to and rejuvenated with the interviews and the video and photographs that we bring back.

For background information on The Troubles, the 1981 BBC documentary series directed by Ian Stuttard and compiled of key first-hand historical footage, is a good place to start. We also created this blog we’re maintaining throughout our fellowship to help document our learning throughout this grant and beyond.

 Saul teaches History, Civics and Facing History & Ourselves at New Haven Academy. Previously, he was Assistant Professor of Film Studies at Hunter College. He has screenwriting credits on two produced films and regularly performs as a live storyteller with the Institute Library Group and the Story City Troupe. Saul has led workshops for other teachers on storytelling, student social action projects and the Holocaust and was a teacher with March of the Living in Poland in 2012 and 2014.

Dave found his niche in education while searching for a way to inspire people to seek achievements through willingness and determination. His “false starts” in the military and as an extremely amateur musician paved the way for higher learning. Always a New Haven Public School teacher, he has taught middle and high school, focusing on critical analysis and inquiry skills.

(Photograph of Dave and Saul at Lough Gur with their “I’m a Fund for Teachers Fellow” sign)

As tensions heated up this summer between Russia and the United States, Kathy Morse served as a self-appointed ambassador of education, researching the arts in St. Petersburg, Novgorod and Moscow. She returned to ACES Wintergreen Interdistrict Magnet School in Hamden, CT, with insight into how the arts plays such a vital role in Russia’s past and present culture and shares a few of her experiences below…

Before leaving on my fellowship, I asked my fifth graders to journal their impressions of Russia. Their input framed my research, which I will now use as the foundation for their sixth grade social studies class. Together, we will now look at our diverse world through the common lens of art, specifically, the music, dance and architecture I experienced with my Fund for Teachers grant.

For three weeks, I observed how culture is a driving force in Russia. In St. Petersburg, also known as “Venice of the North,” I explored the arts, history and geography of the city (the famed music conservatory, the Vaganova Ballet Academy and the State Hermitage Museum) while attending the Stars of the White Nights Festival. Specifically, I dove into the compositional techniques of Dimitri Shostakovich and his inspiration for his Seventh Symphony during the winter of 1941.

Listen to an extract from Seventh Symphony here.

Next, I traveled to a city fixed in time, Novgorod, which lies between St. Petersburg and Moscow. At its peak during the 14th century, Novgorod was one of Europe’s largest cities and was recognized by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 1992. Novgorod has maintained itself as a historical center and it is possible to get a glimpse of what Russia looked like hundreds of years ago going back as far as the Middle Ages. This gave me a deeper historical context of Russia.

Continuing on to Moscow, I spent three days exploring the Kremlin, Red Square, St. Basil’s Cathedral, museums and attending performances at the Bolshoi Theatre. These sites are the most iconic, so I wanted students to know what they mean for the Russian people, as well as the importance Moscow plays in our world today.

Understanding WWII through the eyes of the Russian People by exploring Victory Park and the Museum of the Great Patriotic War (WWII) in Moscow was an extensive history lesson. This country lost more than 25 million citizens to battle, starvation, disease and Stalin’s Terror.  The museum also emphasizes the important role the United States and other Allies played in securing victory over Nazi Germany.

Using the Lincoln Center Education model of inquiry (practicing skills like noticing deeply, posing questions, making connections, and empathizing), my students and I will now be able to explore the Russian culture through the study of the arts of St. Petersburg, the history of Novgorod and the political importance of Moscow while making real world connections to other curriculum areas including literature, history and geography. If we Westerners hope to understand this enormous country, we might intelligently begin by trying to understand the culture which drives this mysterious country. That’s where we’ll begin in my class.

Kathy Morse (pictured in a Moscow subway station) graduated from Duquesne University with a degree in Music Education/Music Therapy while pursuing her passion of performance on the
French Horn.  Her first job was with the State Orchestra of Mexico. Upon returning to the United States, she earned her Masters Degree from Yale University and toured world wide with various ensembles. She has carried her passion for music into the classroom for the past 26 years and has led teacher workshops for Carnegie Hall and the New York Philharmonic.

I teach high school Spanish, serve as chairman of the National Network of State Teachers of the Year (NNSTOY) and am an FFT Fellow. All three of these roles converged in December when I co-led a group of 50 Connecticut FFT Fellows in a one-day workshop asking the post-fellowship question, “What’s Next?”

NNSTOY is a professional association of teachers leading in policy, practice and advocacy. Our national organization’s primary membership consists of State and National Teachers of the Year, as well as finalists. NNSTOY’s mission is to engage ALL educators in leadership opportunities that promote relevant policies and best practices. One way we accomplish this goal is by providing workshops designed to train and grow teacher leaders. The sessions are rooted in the Seven Domains of the Teacher Leader Model Standards. It was my privilege to host this opportunity for my FFT peers and guide them in developing  the skills and dispositions that will allow us to extend our impact beyond the classroom.

As FFT Fellows, we are committed to integrating into our classroom practice the learning that results from our fellowships. We learn, return and can’t help to reflect on the question: “What’s next?” It is easy to create lessons as a result of our fellowship experiences. NNSTOY’s Teachers Leading workshop is special because it allows Fellows to explore how to scale the impact of those lessons beyond individual classrooms. During the session, we spent the day discussing our current and potential roles as teacher leaders and agents of change and considered how we could shift teaching in a way that ultimately impacts more students.

In my presentation, I elaborated on the shift from teaching students to collaborating with adults. The goal was for Fellows to consider how they could expand their impact post-fellowship and promote positive, sustainable change in their schools, districts and beyond. Practically, this meant demonstrating how to facilitate highly effective teams, navigate the change process, and create and implement action plans – new skills for most teachers. In the weeks ahead, NNSTOY will virtually reconvene the Fellows on a webinar to assess how they’re doing and how we can further help them scale their fellowship impact.

As a Fellow I am extremely grateful for the professional learning experience that FFT made possible for me, and through my sharing of NNSTOY’s work on teacher leadership, I felt that I could pay it forward. And so, while our Teachers Leading workshops are normally fee-based, I asked the executive director of NNSTOY if we could provide this training to FFT Fellows at no cost in order to extend their summer learning. She enthusiastically agreed and shared that only by empowering great teachers to lead will we be able to effect real change in education. With teachers leading, I firmly believe that we can improve outcomes for all children and help them to live the lives they dream.

A previous Connecticut Teacher of the Year, Chris Poulos (Joel Barrow High School – Redding, CT) is National Board Certified and teaches all levels of Spanish, while also serving as an adjunct professor at Fairfield University. He previously served for two years in a hybrid role, splitting his time between teaching in his district and working alongside policymakers as a Teacher Leader-in-Residence at the Connecticut State Department of Education.

2018 Update: Since submitting this story, Diego shared this story:

 

“FFT was transformative, probably the best PD I have done as an educator. My fellowship in South Africa included a visit with Christo Brand, one of Mandela’s former prison wardens who eventually became Mandela’s friend, confidant and served with him when he became president. It worked out beautifully, as Mr. Brand visited my school in Fall of 2015 and FFT allowed me to travel for my fellowship in December of that year, so we stayed in touch and I had the chance to learn first hand about what it was like to be next to Mandela. This picture of Christo and me is right after visiting Robben Island on a beautiful crisp morning in Cape Town.

 

I’ve continued to use what I learned in my fellowship with my classes. All of my students read a chapter from Mandela’s Robben Island: The Dark Years, his memoir of his imprisonment, in a class called LeadServe, where we think about citizenship and civics. 

 

Teaching this class led me to be selected as one of 20 national fellows working with Citizen University, based out of Seattle, to think of new ways of bringing citizens together and engaging the through public “Civic Seminaries.” I trace this work directly to my learning as an FFT Fellow.”

by, Diego Duran-Medina – Estes Park, CO

For most of my social studies students at Eagle Rock High School, social justice is perceived as very US centric, mostly revolving around American historical figures like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. I designed my Fund for Teachers fellowship to expand students’ knowledge base to an international context by researching social justice in South Africa. For two weeks, I explored the history, impact and legacy of apartheid and Nelson Mandela to gather lessons for students as they begin defining their own path within our progressive, restorative-justice based alternative school. In doing so, I’m facilitating students’ understanding of issues around social justice movements by comparing and contrasting the Civil Rights Movement with apartheid and reconciliation.

Standing outside Mandela’s cell on Robben Island.

My passion for this fellowship comes from having spent over a decade developing my own curricula around issues involving access, social justice, civil rights, definitions of citizenship and exploring what it means to belong and exclude in different contexts. I have never been a traditional teacher relying on textbooks; instead, I prefer to create learning experiences around current events, historical narratives and issues that my students are interested in. This has to do with my own development as a student who always enjoyed history, but found it to be a subject that can often be reduced to static dates, rote memorization and mythology of “great (white) men.” My passion is driven by the fact I want students to know I continue to expand my knowledge and to actively seek new answers with new questions by traveling to a country and culture that I have never visited, but has always fascinated me – South Africa.

I chose to spend my fellowship observing and researching the Mandela Museum in Mthatha, the Apartheid Museum in Johannesburg, Mandela Square and the Mandela House in Soweto, because I believe that these places offer a perspective that can only be experienced by visiting and have become part of Nelson Mandela’s myth and legacy. By visiting sites over multiple days, I gathered detailed and thorough information to supplement my teaching and curriculum. I also interacted with educators and museum personnel to connect with those who were able to provide personal insight into Mandela’s life and legacy. As a result, I added an important layer of an international focus with an in-depth study of a historical figure beyond the usual pantheon of Civil Rights figures from the US context. My curricula will deepen with a specific example of social justice and a comparative model with apartheid for looking at slavery, oppression and freedom.

On January 6, I started a class called LeadServe, taking a hard look at what it means to work for democracy in different contexts: the two primary examples we will use are Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela. Students will learn though readings, historical context, connected facts and artifacts collected from my fellowship. They will develop a notion of history that moves beyond facts and moves from the impersonal to the personal (i.e.“What does this history mean for my own life?”) They will also develop skills in comparing and contrasting cultures, movements, societies and historical figures, specifically the U.S. and South Africa.

Being awarded this fellowship solidified for me that I can be a teacher who focuses on social justice and that my work has real meaning and substance. These stories need to be told to students in a way that goes beyond the classroom or the textbook, and the example I am setting by
traveling to South Africa is much more powerful than just a lecture on apartheid.

There’s a certain inspiration and renewal of the spirit that happens when I pursue these personal passion projects and it helps inject my career with new energy and
focus. Also, as I advance in my career, I am committed to making sure that younger teachers understand the power of experiential learning for their practice and are able to implement similar experiences in their classrooms and curricula.

Learning through travel is the most powerful combination for connecting the classroom and community, the learning with the doing, and the present with the past. Therefore, I am extremely grateful for this opportunity and treasure the days I spent in South Africa, both learning and reflecting on my practice. I consider it an honor to have been selected as a Fund for Teachers Fellow and entrusted with representing myself, my school and my country.

Eagle Rock School is a full-scholarship high school for 72 adolescents who are not thriving in their current situations, for whom few positive options exist and who are interested in taking control of their lives and learning. Eagle Rock is also a Professional Development Center where educators from across the country learn how to re-engage, retain and graduate students. Diego plans to use his fellowship learning in both settings.