by | Mar 3, 2023 8:51 am | Comments (2)
NHPS image
At Conte West this school year.
Home visits, award ceremonies, and morning announcements to Conte West scholars that “every day counts” and “it’s cool to be in school” helped the Wooster Square magnet school decrease its chronic absenteeism rate by 13 percent since the start of the school year.
Continue reading ‘Principals Chart Path To Students' Presence’
by | Mar 2, 2023 3:12 pm | Comments (39)
Laura Glesby File Photo
Kimber: 2nd time the charm.
Six years after the local Board of Education turned him down, Rev. Boise Kimber took his quest for permission to create an all-boys charter school to the state — and succeeded.
by | Mar 2, 2023 9:47 am | Comments (0)
Maya McFadden photo
At Celentano School's final Black History Month celebration of the year.
Eighth-grader Akiellea Gooden honored her Jamaican roots on stage in front of her Celentano School classmates by sharing a quotation from a Black political icon and historical Caribbean compatriot, Marcus Garvey: “A people without knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.”
Continue reading ‘Celentano School Assembly Celebrates Jamaican Connection’
by | Mar 1, 2023 11:56 am | Comments (19)
Paul Bass photo
Diving in: Leslie Blatteau at WNHH FM.
School fights and lockdowns. Teacher flight. Staff shortages. Fights for funding. Calls for more elected school board members — and a school board willing to meet in public in person. A search for a new superintendent at a crucial juncture for public education.
Fourteen months into her presidency of the New Haven Federation of Teachers, Leslie Blatteau has found herself in the middle of these and other pressing public controversies. As a public school parent, as a New Haven teacher with 16 years in the classroom, and now as a labor leader, she has thought long and hard about these issues.
by | Mar 1, 2023 9:05 am | Comments (3)
Maya McFadden Photos
BOMUS second graders in cup-stacking competition.
Special education teacher Rebecca Smith shows off hula hooping skills.
Hula hooping, dance parties, coloring, and team cup-stacking competitions helped the students and staff of the Barack H. Obama Magnet University School (BOMUS) decompress mid-school year.
by | Feb 28, 2023 6:04 pm | Comments (16)
Zoom image
At Monday's online Board of Education meeting.
Thirty-one applicants from across the country have thrown their hats in the ring to be the next superintendent of the New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district.
by | Feb 28, 2023 4:00 pm | Comments (5)
Paul Bass Photo
Tuesday’s snow day gave Huân Ngô time to catch up on grading papers and preparing his students for New Haven’s jobs of tomorrow.
Continue reading ‘The Word On Maple Street: STEM? 'Snow Sweat’
by | Feb 27, 2023 3:21 pm | Comments (45)
Reader Contributed Photo
Shots fired at Orange and Lawrence.
Thomas Breen Photo
Lawrence Street, where officers found 20 shell casings.
(Updated) Less than four hours after drive-by gunfire locked down 10 city schools, police made arrests they believe are connected to the case.
by | Feb 24, 2023 2:10 pm | Comments (25)
Maya McFadden photo
NHPS's Ekaterina Barkhatova, Rosalyn Díaz-Ortiz, Michael Soares, Kristin Bengtson Mendoza, Keisha Redd-Hannans, and Pedro Mendia-Landa, at City Hall.
NHPS image
New Haven public school leaders pitched alders on doubling the district’s number of ESOL teachers and adding 18 more multilingual coaches — at a combined annual cost of $4.14 million — while mapping out classroom staffing needs at a time when more and more students enter city schools speaking a language other than English.
by | Feb 24, 2023 1:44 pm | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen photo
Wilbur Cross Principal Matthew Brown on Friday.
One month and one day into his new job as principal of New Haven’s largest high school, Matthew Brown hopes to help make Wilbur Cross “the premier urban comprehensive high school in the state of Connecticut” — even as he, his colleagues, and the school’s 1,642 students face head on the challenges presented by pandemic-era disruptions to public education.
Continue reading ‘New Principal Sets Sights High For Wilbur Cross’
by | Feb 24, 2023 12:31 pm | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen photos
Cross football captain Giovanni Melendez (right) with fellow student-athletes at Friday's presser.
Wilbur Cross athletic fields and track, now under construction.
Wilbur Cross student-athletes like football captain Giovanni Melendez looked forward to firmer synthetic-turf footing and a home-field setting to be proud of next season — at a press conference marking $4.35 million in mostly state-funded renovations to the East Rock school’s athletic complex.
Continue reading ‘Wilbur Cross Celebrates $4.35M Sports Complex Overhaul’
by | Feb 22, 2023 6:25 pm | Comments (11)
Maya McFadden photo
At the first public-input superintendent search meeting at Barack Obama school.
The city’s search for a successor for the public school district’s soon-to-retire Supt. Iline Tracey is about to enter its next chapter, now that public-input meetings and focus groups are done, the public survey has closed, and the job posting has just one more day before coming down.
by | Feb 22, 2023 4:48 pm | Comments (8)
Paul Bass file photo
Educators rally outside City Hall for full school funding last March.
City teachers will be getting a 15 percent pay raise over the next three years — while a new math-and-literacy tutoring initiative will be getting $3 million in federal aid to get off the ground — thanks to two recent education-focused votes by the Board of Alders.
Continue reading ‘Teachers Union Contract, Fed-Funded Tutoring Plan OK'd’
by | Feb 22, 2023 12:14 pm | Comments (14)
Laura Glesby Photo
Newly re-confirmed Board of Ed VP Matt Wilcox at Tuesday's alder meeting.
Board of Education Vice President Matthew Wilcox won another four-year term on the city’s school board — after alders debated how to assess his leadership over a school system grappling with low attendance, a reading instruction overhaul, and severe teacher shortages.
Continue reading ‘Alders OK Wilcox's Ed Board Reappointment’
by | Feb 21, 2023 10:55 am | Comments (0)
Maya McFadden Photo
Sixth grader Mahki in Platt's art class.
A “House of Video Games” took shape line by line beneath sixth-grader Mahki’s pen — as Edgewood School students brought Detroit’s fabled Heidelberg Project into their New Haven classroom.
In the process, the students discovered how public art can transform blighted homes into objects bursting with color, life, and beauty, and they continued their monthlong celebration of contemporary Black artists and changemakers.
Continue reading ‘Student-Artists Build Houses Out Of Blight’
by | Feb 20, 2023 1:45 pm | Comments (3)
Laura Glesby photo
Doing the solar system dance at Harris and Tucker preschool.
Tysin, a 4‑year-old budding outer space enthusiast, had a question for the special guest from NASA who had come to visit his Newhallville preschool: “How can I touch a star?”
Continue reading ‘Black Stars Shine Bright In Preschool's Orbit’
by | Feb 17, 2023 2:26 pm | Comments (8)
Contributed photos
Hillhouse's cheer team, led by coach Michelle Sepulveda (below).
Hillhouse High School cheerleader coach, truancy officer, and former West Rock/West Hills Alder Michelle Sepulveda opens up about her work inspiring and training young athletes — and making sure that students go to class, at a time of high chronic absenteeism across the New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district.
by | Feb 17, 2023 2:13 pm | Comments (8)
Maya McFadden photos
At Friday's Black History Month celebration at Barack Obama School. "What Black history means to me is that I get to celebrate the Black people who made the world a better place," said one student.
Students honored after "caught being STRONG."
Perfect attendance, Black trailblazers, and the ability to gather in-person as a school again were all causes for celebration Friday, at a student-and-staff-led Black History Month event hosted by Barack H. Obama Magnet University School.
Continue reading ‘Obama Students "Caught Being STRONG" At Black History Celebration’
by | Feb 16, 2023 4:34 pm | Comments (12)
Maya McFadden photos
Attendees at Wednesday's superintendent search community meeting. Top row, left to right: Robert Gibson, Sean Reeves, Margaret Mary Gethings. Middle row: Kim Rogers, Rev. Joseph Champagne, Kelvin Rutledge. Bottom row: Shafiq Abdussabur, Shannon Mykins, and Leslie Blatteau.
Troup School reading instructor Pamela J. Tonge needs the next superintendent’s help in bridging the divide separating administrators and parents from teachers like herself, who work daily to help young students catch up to grade-level literacy despite a lack of classroom resources and respect.
by | Feb 16, 2023 8:42 am | Comments (3)
Allan Appel photo
Malek Alkhalawe at Common Ground Wednesday.
When Malek Alkhalawe graduates from Common Ground High School this spring, he will already have in hand several serious Google IT certifications allowing him to start his own business online while studying computer engineering in college.
Continue reading ‘Common Ground Lands Grants For Student-Led Projects’
by | Feb 15, 2023 9:49 am | Comments (2)
Thomas Lamb, Viviana Conner, and Michael Finley: 2-yr contracts approved.
The next schools superintendent already has key members of their executive team in place — even though the search has only just begun for a new district top administrator — now that the Board of Education has approved two-year contract renewals for New Haven Public Schools’ (NHPS) chief of operations, chief of staff and assistant superintendent for instructional leadership.
Continue reading ‘Contracts OK'd For 3 Top Schools Officials’
by | Feb 14, 2023 4:53 pm | Comments (11)
Laura Glesby photo
Hillhouse teacher Raven Mitchell: "We take on more than what's in our contracts."
Frustrated by years of working extra jobs to support her family, Fana Hickinson nearly left the teaching job she loves at New Haven Academy — until a draft union contract promised her a salary increase that convinced her to stay.
by | Feb 14, 2023 12:48 pm | Comments (19)
Laura Glesby Photo
Jonathan Berryman at union rally: "We are not a cookie cutter district."
The city’s teachers union envisions a school system less reliant on test scores, more attuned to students’ emotional and cultural empowerment, and more pliable to input from every corner of the school community.
Over 20 teachers and allies gathered outside City Hall to call for the next superintendent to act on those values — and for a transparent, inclusive process for selecting the next top school administrator.
by | Feb 10, 2023 2:55 pm | Comments (27)
Lucy Gellman / New Haven Arts Paper Photos
"Ms. B" helping a student-actor get ready for Newsies, Jr. in January.
Briana Bellinger-Dawson left her “dream job” as an arts educator at Nathan Hale School earlier this month after deciding that she could no longer afford to work part-time and not receive the support she needed to get her teaching certification.
Her departure has left a community of Morris Cove families already feeling the beloved teacher’s absence — and speaking out about their frustration that the city’s public school district didn’t do enough to hold onto a life-changing role model who went above and beyond to bring performing arts to city students.
Continue reading ‘Praise, Frustration Follow Star Teacher's Departure’
by | Feb 10, 2023 11:47 am | Comments (31)
Thomas Breen photo
Shafiq Abdussabur at Thursday's public hearing: "Not amused" by mayor's pitch to drop residency requirements for some city dept. heads.
Leaders of the city’s teachers union called for the school board to have two additional elected members — and for the mayor to be stripped of his ed-board voting powers.