Week of January 16th

UAI Staff News

Volume V

Issue 19

January 16th, 2018

[School Days 83-86]

Announcements

Another Lady Eagles Victory!  This past Friday, the Lady Eagles emerged victorious in their win over Uncommon Charter bringing their record to 8-1.  Now in 2nd place in the division, the Lady Eagles are having another fantastic season and are looking ahead towards the playoffs.  If you missed Friday's game, the Adams Campus Lady Eagles (#2 in the Division) are at home again on Wednesday.  There are only two home games left in the regular season: (1) Wednesday 17JAN18 vs. Boerum Hill School 7 Digitial Tech (#8) and (2) Wednesday 07FEB18 vs. John Jay (#1).  So, come support our team and show that UAI spirit!  Spectators will be allowed at both home games!

This Time of Year.  Last week was a challenging week at dismissal for some of our students.  This is definitely a symptom of the time of year.  The end of a marking period, and in particular the end of a term, often exacerbates the levels of stress our students experience.  In particular, for students who are struggling academically, this time of year will spike their anxiety and feelings of inadequacy.  For some, turning to violence is a relief to these feelings.  For others, they withdraw in class or sometimes even go so far as to stop attending school.  These last two weeks before the start of the new semester is the time when relationships matter the most for our students and families.  Communication is key and paying attention to signs and signals that indicate need is crucial.  This week, check in with advisees to see how they are coping with the end-of-term stress, and check in with your students, particularly the ones who are failing, to see how you can support their re-engagement in your class.   

This Week's To Dos

Prepare for Regents Week.  Regents Exam week begins next week for the high school students.  HS teachers will have full schedules.  If you have questions about your schedule, please touch base with Joanna or Brodie.  During non-proctor or grading times, please be available in your classroom or tell Joanna or Brodie where you are.  There are times when teachers are needed to fill in and must be on call.  Please use your time when you're not proctoring or grading to work on your unit and lesson plans for February.  These will be a focus of our PD on 29JAN17, and all of the first week of February's lessons will have to be complete and linked to your pacing calendar by the end of that PD day.  Use the time you have now to get ahead.  Middle School teachers will have Monday PD time to get a jump on their lesson planning.

How do students know which tests they are taking?  Ms. Joanna and Mr. Brodie will be posting lists on the student floors by Thursday.  However, students have already been registered for exams and can check their program in Skedula.  Look for courses that are "unscheduled" aka don't meet.  Those will be the exams for which students are registered.  If students are registered and do not want to take an exam, send them to Joanna or Brodie.  If they are not registered and DO want to take an exam, send them to Joanna or Brodie and they will help them sign up.

Prepare for Full Staff PD on January 29th.  Our next full staff PD will be on Monday, January 29th.  Middle School students will not be in attendance for that day.  All staff will report to room 409 (except for those that have already signed up for external PD opportunities).  The main goal for Monday's PD is to prepare and plan for the launch of the spring semester.  Specifically, you will need to come to that PD with your unit and lesson plans for first two weeks of February.  You should use collaborative planning and prep time this week and next to prepare for the 29th.  At the end of the day on the 29th you will be submitting unit and lesson plans for review and comment.  Also, any teacher who signed up for a full formal observation can expect that their formal will take place during those first two weeks.

[REMINDER] Prepare for Upcoming Midyear Reviews.  Reviews will begin next week!  As a reminder, please reflect on the following.  Please bring the blue items with you for the review.

• Focus School Goal.  Our main priority goal this year is to increase instructional rigor and student intellectual engagement [Rigorous Instruction & Collaborative Teachers].  To achieve this, we have focused on through improved planning & assessment.  Between now, and your midyear review, reflect on  your progress with the following:

• Improvement in Planning (e.g. UAI Pacing Calendar, Narrative Lesson Plans, Backwards-Designed Unit Plans)
• Impact on Student Learning (e.g. samples of Student Work with your feedback, Student achievement (analysis of student grades in course or performance on tests/benchmarks), Student Academic Growth)
• Growth in Co-planning with Peer Teachers/Coaches (e.g. quality of planning, quality of lesson execution (Advance Observations) impact on student learning, outcomes of co-planning survey - please click the link to take it now) 

• Second School Goal.  The second goal that we will discuss during midyears is our school goal around increasing Strong Family Ties.  Our goal is to increase strong family community ties by increasing both quantity and quality of in-person and phone interactions between teachers and families.  This year, each student in your advisory should have had at least 4 interactions and at least 1 in person, all documented in Skedula:  1 welcome to UAI phone call in September; at least 1 in-person visit during MP1, MP2, or SLCs; and at least 2 10-15 minute phone calls for MP1, MP2, or SLC.   Specifically, review and reflect on the following data points:
• Number of successful contacts (in person and phone) per advisee (as evidenced by Skedula anecdotals) 
• Growth Advisee attendance rates from September (you can see this in Skedula)
• Academic Performance of Advisees from MP1 to MP2 (again Skedula)

• Midyear Reflection and Refocus. The Midyear is your opportunity to stop, review your various data points, and reflect on your growth and development.  As teachers, we often get too wrapped up in keeping students doing and busy and we don't make the time to step back and evaluate longer-term progress as shown through student thinking and achievement.  This is one of the big times in the year to take stock of our work thus far.  Where we are strong, we will continue. Where we struggle, we will analyze and refocus spring goals for growth.  Here are some logistical things to keep in mind
• First Year at UAI?  Teachers who are in their first year at UAI or are up for tenure can expect to be scheduled first for their reviews (schedule will be released next week).   More explicit details on the Midyear will come in next week's blog.  For this week, look back at your planning documents and reflect on your student outcomes (Do your lesson plans result in positive student outcomes? How do you know? Why or why not?)
• Are you up for Tenure this year?  Teachers who are coming up for tenure are required to submit a formal portfolio of any of the documents or data points listed above.  These will become part of their final portfolio of work to be submitted for tenure recommendation.  The portfolio consists of three parts (1) a letter explaining why you merit tenure and how the documents you submit are illustrative of your growth and achievement (THIS YEAR - we will add more later); (2) samples of student work (with feedback that shows how students used your feedback to improve performance; (3) complete UAI Pacing Calendar with linked samples of Narrative Lesson Plans and all Units are Linked.
• Everyone else?  You will have the same reflection question:  Do your lesson plans result in positive student outcomes? How do you know? Why or why not? - most importantly, how do you plan to show Kiri/Annie your progress through planning documents and student work? 

SEL Update