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Maya McFadden |
Jun 21, 2024 11:56 am
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Williams and Blatteau: Human-centered schools a priority.
The New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district began the school year scrambling to hire educators to address a teacher shortage.
It’s ending the school year with the announcement of staff cuts to come.
To the leaders of the city’s two classroom-facing unions, that mixed messaging is a problem — and reflects the broader challenges of understaffing, budget crunches, and inconsistent communication across the district. It also underscores the imperative of putting students’ needs first.
LeQuire (right) and students at Tuesday's "goodbye picnic."
Hillhouse rising senior David Coardes discovered his love for painting thanks to high school art teacher Rebecca LeQuire.
On a sunny afternoon at Lighthouse Point, he gathered with a handful of classmates to say goodbye to LeQuire — not because Coardes is graduating, but because LeQuire is leaving the district after what she says have been years of complaints insufficiently addressed by central office.
This will only be happening at Hillhouse this summer.
It turns out that only one public pool, at Hillhouse High School, will be open this summer — despite the public school district’s initial plans to have three of its five pools in good enough condition to be available for open swim.
Jaysen Anthony Threet: "I don't even know if words can explain."
After losing his father Louis Ortiz and four other family members in a matter of months during his time in high school, Metropolitan Business Academy senior Jaysen Anthony Threet didn’t think he’d cross the graduation stage.
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Dawn M. Slade |
Jun 17, 2024 2:33 pm
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This Citizen Contribution was submitted by Dawn M. Slade of DMS Public Relations.
Guilty or not guilty? That was the question considered in the mock courtroom in the auditorium of King-Robinson Interdistrict Magnet And IBSTEM School, from 4:15 – 5:30 p.m. on June 12, 2024, as members of the King-Robinson Mock Trial team tried the case of the People v E and T.
The young lawyers included: Kaleb Perez, Keerome Suggs, Keysean Wagner, Tyrique Thigpen, Tyler Thigpen, David Samules, Joshua Dennis, and Amir Fludd. David Samules was an attorney and an expert witness (forensic pathologist), and Joshua Dennis was an attorney and one of the eyewitnesses (a white-haired fisherman).
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Maya McFadden and Arthur Delot-Vilain |
Jun 14, 2024 4:52 pm
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Graduation split-screen: 104 8th-graders celebrate at Fair Haven School ...
Arthur Delot-Vilain photo
... as eight 8th-graders prepare to move on up from Brennan-Rogers. Pictured here: Jovanna Coardes, Ca’Nayza Smalls, and Teneshia Harrington.
More than 100 eighth-graders walked across the stage in Fair Haven Friday morning to celebrate graduating from one of New Haven’s fastest-growing schools — at the same time that eight of their peers on the far west side of town gathered for a much smaller ceremony at one of the city’s fastest-shrinking schools.
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Jabez Choi |
Jun 14, 2024 10:59 am
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Jocelyn Juarez: Proudest moment was "handing in my last assignments."
On Bowen Field for Thursday's celebration.
When Jocelyn Juarez entered Hillhouse High School as a freshman, she struggled with a disability that inhibited her ability to walk. She often relied on her mother for support.
But on Thursday, at Hillhouse’s graduation ceremony at Bowen Field, Juarez confidently strode across the stage to receive her diploma. Her mother watched from the stands with tears in her eyes.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 14, 2024 9:34 am
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Mission accomplished, at Cross’s graduation ceremony.
Aspiring electrician Nakarie Wills, pediatric nurse to-be Nathalie Hiraldo, and future music producer CheMi “CJ” McGee all walked across the Wilbur Cross graduation stage — taking big steps closer to their post-high school dreams.
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Arthur Delot-Vilain |
Jun 14, 2024 9:26 am
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Paul Panagrosso: "I'm a lucky man to be here today."
Eighty years after officially graduating from what was then called New Haven High School, 98-year-old World War II veteran Paul Panagrosso walked across the stage with Hillhouse’s Class of 2024 on Thursday to receive his diploma.
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Eleanor Polak |
Jun 13, 2024 6:22 pm
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Kevin Barranco Carvente: “Most proud of the fact that I made it.”
When Kevin Barranco Carvente entered his freshman year at Hill Regional Career High School during the height of the pandemic, he had to take his classes from home, behind a screen. When in-person learning returned, he was met with masks, table dividers, and empty seats.
But on Thursday, after years of perseverance and improving conditions, Barranco Carvente graduated alongside 134 of his Career classmates — in person.
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Laura Glesby |
Jun 13, 2024 3:16 pm
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Dev chief Piscitelli (right) with developer Winstanley: NHPS part of "ecosystem of growth."
City/NHPS Presentation
Laboratory and classroom space in 101 College designed for NHPS students.
Fifteen high school juniors from Hillhouse, Wilbur Cross, and Career have been selected to join cancer researchers and vaccine developers this fall in bringing to life a long-awaited College Street biotech hub.
Alexandr Lavranchuk and Nike Desis: Trying to get a better handle of what queer students experience at school.
Old Lyme teen librarian Nike Desis was on a mission: to figure out how to be a better ally for queer and trans young people.
So, on Wednesday night, they made the 30-mile trek to New Haven’s Ninth Square to take a deep dive into LGBTQ+ students’ rights, at a workshop hosted by the New Haven Pride Center.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 12, 2024 3:32 pm
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Theodosia Ross (center) with foster mother Arlene Wright, biological mother Tara Wills, and grandmother Christina Bradley.
Families swarm Parish Hall to watch Riverside students cross the stage.
Riverside Academy senior Theodosia Ross walked the stage to receive her high school diploma that, less than a week ago, she didn’t think she’d get — but she did, despite a long journey through foster care, not being motivated to attend school, losing her father, and battling depression.
Ross was one of Riverside’s 12 graduating seniors who received their diplomas Tuesday afternoon. The class of 2024’s graduation, held at Betsy Ross’s Parish Hall on Kimberly Avenue, was a small but mighty one for New Haven’s last remaining alternative high school.
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Thomas Breen |
Jun 12, 2024 2:00 pm
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Youth & Rec’s Gwen Williams and Ronnie Huggins, ready for summer.
More than 700 young New Haveners have above-minimum-wage jobs waiting for them this summer if they accept employment offers from the city’s youth and rec department — thanks to a recent bump in funding for the city’s Youth @ Work program.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 12, 2024 11:43 am
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At Monday's school board meeting; Karen Wilkinson and Minnie Evans.
As New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) Superintendent Madeline Negrón grapples with the prospect of staff layoffs for next school year, long-term substitute teacher Maria Threese Serana called for more recognition of subs like herself who have been filling classroom vacancies daily since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
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Jabez Choi |
Jun 11, 2024 11:12 am
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Sunjai Yancey Williams, watering broccoli pots in the Ivy St. Community Garden.
First-graders Amayah Williams and Anastasia Rivera: Making dog treats for the animal shelter with "love."
Lincoln-Bassett School fourth-grader Sunjai Yancey Williams carefully poured water into a pot of broccoli sprouts. Her eyes were focused. The second she finished with the pot, they eased in relief.
She and her classmates were inside the greenhouse at the Ivy Street Community Garden for their Newhallville school’s “Community Day” — and helping the garden grow was part of the programming created by Assistant Principal Eva Schultz.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 7, 2024 3:30 pm
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Hilarie Alden: Now, officially, a "life changing" teacher.
“She pushes you to be your best self.” “She’s always positive.” “She makes school fun.” “Her good mood in the classroom influenced me to do better things outside class.”
Those words of praise and so much more were offered by Worthington Hooker parents and students on Friday as they shared testimony about this year’s “Life Changing Teaching” awardee and Hooker second grade teacher, Hilarie Alden.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 7, 2024 12:17 pm
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Alex Lewis and Lisa Rodriguez celebrate Lewis' $500 college scholarship.
Hillhouse senior Alex Lewis began high school feeling isolated and insecure amidst online-only classes during the pandemic. All that changed when he joined the school’s Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC), which gave him the confidence he needed to feel like he too could go to college.
With the help of his sergeant and the local teachers union, Lewis received a $500 boost to chase that post-high school educational dream.
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Laura Glesby |
Jun 7, 2024 9:01 am
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794 Dixwell Ave.
The leaky roof of 794 Dixwell Ave. will soon get fixed, with the help of $300,000 from the city, in time for a new all-boys charter school to open there in the fall.
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Maya McFadden and Jabez Choi |
Jun 6, 2024 6:20 pm
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Adult Ed's Class of 2024 celebrate on Thursday.
Zamirah Jackson: "I am superwoman."
While flaunting a pink-gem-encrusted graduation cap reading “Mommy Did It!,” seventeen-year-old Zamirah Jackson crossed the stage Thursday to get her high school diploma from the New Haven Adult Education Center — never forgetting the long journey of balancing motherhood with accomplishing her academic goals.
Incoming ninth-grader Chrisette Kendall didn’t go into Hillhouse High School’s extracurricular fair looking for anything in particular. She left wanting to join the cheerleading team, the math team, and the Brown Girls Cooking and Conversation Club.
Superintendent Madeline Negrón: “There is no simple solution."
Cost cutting options, including $6M in staff.
Sixty-one public school jobs could soon be on the chopping block, as the superintendent laid the groundwork for layoffs to possibly come to help close a nearly $12 million budget gap.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 5, 2024 9:35 am
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Inside Isabel Senes' ESL class Tuesday morning: NHPS's English language learner student enrollment has increased from 4,199 to 4,626 since October.
Career High School freshman Cecilia translated the sentence, “The horse is under the desk,” from Spanish to English in her head before saying the words out loud to her classroom conversation partner Enmerl — as part of a playful exercise in an English as a Second Language (ESL) class designed to help city public school students from a variety of linguistic backgrounds get up to speed in English.
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Maya McFadden |
Jun 4, 2024 9:14 am
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Biliteracy ceremony honoring the superpower of knowing more than one language.
Cross seniors Fernando Aroca, Paola Velasquez, and Anthony Perez: All recognized for Spanish proficiency.
During the school day, Paola Velasquez often pauses in the Wilbur Cross hallways to help out fellow students whose first language is also Spanish. She helps her peers know where their classes are, what the school bells mean, or what a teacher is asking of them.
Those skills were honored by the city’s public school district at a recent ceremony uplifting 176 “biliterate” graduating seniors who are proficient in languages ranging from Spanish to German to Pashto to Mandinka.
