Week of August 20th

UAI Staff News

Volume VI

Issue 2

August 20th, 2018

[Summer Edition]

[8 Weekdays until the start of School Year 2018-2019]

Announcements

Getting Ready to Learn.   On Monday, UAI will be officially back and launching the 2018-2019 school year!  This summer flew by, and now we are gearing up to welcome back all of our staff, families and students.  

Next week, the building is open from 8AM-4PM to any and all staff who want to come in and get ready for the school launch on September 5th.  There will also be per session (training rate) available to staff from 9AM-2PM on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to meet in teams, prepare classrooms, and plan units and lessons for September's launch.  Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday time will be flexible for you to schedule with your planning partners as you see fit.  

To be approved for per session work, pleas complete this form by 3PM on Monday, 27AUG18.  If you are attending outside PD that week, please also complete the form.  You can also earn training rate per session for the same activities before or after your outside PD.  Goals for this paid time need to include

• Goal #1:  Complete Room Set Up.  There will only be about 30 min for final room set-up time on the 5th and 6th of September.  So, to give you more time to get oriented and situated, I'm inviting you in early.  Here are some things I need you keep in mind during set up:
• Moving Furniture.  Don't move anything heavy by yourself.  Our custodians will be around that week to help.  Please don't drag things across floors.  The floors are beautiful now, and we don't want them scratched up prior to the start of school.  Help is available!
• Trash and Hallway.  Don't leave anything in the hallways.  If you are tossing things, please put them in trash cans, OR stack near trash cans, clearly labeled "Trash" so our custodians can pick them up.
• Wall Prep - Use blue wall adhesives to hang things on your walls.  Staples and tacks the paint, causing an enormous amount of work for our facilities staff.
• Goal #2:  Complete Planning Prep.  
  
• Complete this Pacing Guide (or equivalent LDC modules or submit one of your own) with links to your Unit and Lesson Plan

Your Narrative.   As I mentioned in the last post, each of you has a path and a reason that brought you to working in schools and to UAI in particular.  Continue to think about what brought you to your work at UAI.  We will be starting our PD on Tuesday 04SEP with these questions:

• Why do you choose to work with kids (in your field as teacher, para, or administrative support) and why did you choose to pursue this work at UAI?
• What brought you to your work (what's your personal history)?  What do you hope to achieve with and for students at UAI?

UAI School Logistics.  Click here to see next year's program.  It still needs to be uploaded and finalized, but this draft is pretty close to final.  The tabs also include current student lists.  In particular for our incoming classes, enrollment is a little volatile for the first few days of school.  Please keep in mind that these rosters will not be final final until after the 2nd week of school.  

To Do This Week

<<Reminder>> Summer Ordering.   If you have not already done so, please submit your order for at least your first unit via Shopdoe.  General Supplies have already been ordered for teachers and you will receive a UAI teacher's choice allotment in addition to your DOE teacher's choice.  So, this order should be discipline and unit specific.  Your materials need to be NYSTL approved.   (As an aside - schools are allocated funds through a variety of funding streams.  The most restrictive are the New York State Tax Levy (aka NYSTL) lines which can only be spent on vendors who have approved contracts with the state.  We need to spend these funds first.)  See that little green box underneath "Brief History of Time"?  You need to have that box appear in order to know if your item is "NYSTL approved".  Fair warning, the site is DOE designed, so it doesn't work super well and can be frustrating.  However, it's the only ordering platform we have, so I do appreciate your grit and patience.  Please complete orders no later than next Friday 24AUG18 and email them directly to me (kiris@uainstitute.org).  

<<Reminder>> New Head Shots and Bios.   Each year in place of a standard organizational chart, we create a staff directory that helps ourselves and everyone outside of our school get to know the folks who work at UAI.   To update our staff directory, I need your most updated head shots and bios.  Please Click on this LINK to upload your head shot and bio.  For your bio, please make sure to answer the following questions

• Who are you?  Where are you from? What personal details do you want to share?
• Where did you go to college? What degrees have you earned? 
• What brought you to your career (para, teacher, admin, support staff, dean, counselor) and why did you choose to work at UAI?

Summer PD Opportunities.  There are a LOT of summer PD opportunities coming up, and quickly.  Through our new and returning partnerships, we have a wide variety of PD opportunities!  (more on those partnerships later).  Here they are

When: Wednesday,  August 22 through Saturday, August 25, 2018 from 8:30 AM until 3:PM

Where: Richard R. Green High School, 7 Beaver Street, New York, NY 10004

Laying the Foundation (LTF) is presented by the National Math and Science Initiative (NMSI) and provides that provides educators with activities, teaching strategies, and content knowledge that increase rigor in the classroom, and prepares students to be successful in AP courses. LTF materials are content specific and aligned to the Common Core Math and Science Standards. During LTF, NMSI Content Experts provide teachers with activities that will allow them to introduce AP concepts at a level accessible to their students.  This PD is targeted at teachers who teach in grades BEFORE AP courses (so middle school through 10th/11th grade at UAI).  It is aimed at supporting earlier grade teachers in developing curriculum and tasks that maximize student readiness to achieve in AP and College Level courses. Training rate per session provided.  Click this link to register. 

New Visions PD.  Through our partnership with New Visions, teachers have the opportunity to connect with other same-discipline teachers and develop their facility in executing New Visions lessons and curricula.   This August, New Visions is offering PD for (@training rate per session):

• Algebra, Geometry, and Algebra II Teachers.  CLICK HERE to register
• Living Environment Teachers.  CLICK HERE to register

UAI PD.  All staff are invited to return to school on Tuesday, August 28th to begin setting up classrooms, planning for September, and getting ready to launch the school year.  During these three days, teachers are approved for training rate per session from 9AM-3PM, and are free to structure their time as needed.  We will be offering workshops (more on that next week) that teachers can choose to attend.  By the end of the three days, in order to be approved for per session

• Classroom set up is complete and ready to welcome students
• Desks and Chairs are set up
• Materials, Books, Etc. are ready for student use (tech will be distributed on Tue 04SEP)
• Visual Displays in Room are up and Room is Ready for Learning
• Your UAI Pacing Calendar is complete (you've made a copy of the template and updated it for the year (you've paced your courses for the year)) and you have linked at least your first weeks' lesson plans (3 lesson plans) to the pacing guide.  You've also shared the Pacing Guide to the correct folder HERE

Week of August 13th

UAI Staff News

Volume VI

Issue 1

August 13th, 2018

[Summer Edition]

[15 Weekdays until the start of School Year 2018-2019]

Announcements

Vision Alignment.  As one of the first major initiatives in his first full year as Chancellor, Richard Carranza is aiming directly at the issue of equity in New York City schools.  New York City is one of the most segregated school systems in the country, and Chancellor Carranza is committed correcting that by actively working to integrate NYC schools and bringing equity to all of NYC public school students.  

Similarly, the Urban Assembly has always been committed to supporting schools to provide students with the resources, education, and access needed to complete college and maximize students social and economic mobility.

For the first time since we opened our doors in 2006, the mission of the city, our lead partner, and our school is in perfect alignment.  Our mission at UAI is to empower young women to achieve in fields of Math & Science.  Through a commitment to providing students with a rigorous academic courses balanced with rich social emotional learning experiences, our young women will graduate ready to excel in college, and in so doing, they will be ready to compete in any career of their choosing, and have the power to determine their own social and economic status.

Just as our mission and work at UAI pushes the larger mission of the Urban Assembly and the New York City Department of Education, your work is critical for achieving our mission at UAI.  Together, we support and challenge one another to perform at our highest capacity because our students need that much more from us.   Each of our students has the capacity to thrive, and when we push ourselves to be better each and every day, we cannot help but do the same for them.

Being better and what that means in the context of teaching and learning will be the first thing we dig into as a staff together when we launch in September.  In preparation of that, there are a couple of things I need you to think about before that date.  These are simply thinkings right now.  Perfect for a conversation with a loved one, or a quiet individual reflection while on the beach/pool/other summery location.  Eventually, you'll be asked to share with your colleagues, but for now, just reflect.

• Your Personal Mission & Vision.   Each of you has a path and a reason that brought you to working in schools and to UAI in particular.  Too often, we get wrapped up in the day-to-day and forget about why we do this work.  You need your center and anchor to maintain your path in this work.  There are so many obstacles and detractors, it's easy to get blown off track.  Take the next few weeks to articulate your own personal mission and vision.  
• Why do you choose to work with kids (in your field as teacher, para, or administrative support) and why did you choose to pursue this work at UAI?
• What brought you to your work (what's your personal history)?  What do you hope to achieve with and for students at UAI?

To Do This Week

Summer Ordering.   If you have not already done so, please submit your order for at least your first unit via Shopdoe.  General Supplies have already been ordered for teachers and you will receive a UAI teacher's choice allotment in addition to your DOE teacher's choice.  So, this order should be discipline and unit specific.  Your materials need to be NYSTL approved.   (As an aside - schools are allocated funds through a variety of funding streams.  The most restrictive are the New York State Tax Levy (aka NYSTL) lines which can only be spent on vendors who have approved contracts with the state.  We need to spend these funds first.)  See that little green box underneath "Brief History of Time"?  You need to have that box appear in order to know if your item is "NYSTL approved".  Fair warning, the site is DOE designed, so it doesn't work super well and can be frustrating.  However, it's the only ordering platform we have, so I do appreciate your grit and patience.  Please complete orders no later than next Friday 24AUG18 and email them directly to me (kiris@uainstitute.org).  

New Head Shots and Bios.   Each year in place of a standard organizational chart, we create a staff directory that helps ourselves and everyone outside of our school get to know the folks who work at UAI.   To update our staff directory, I need your most updated head shots and bios.  Please Click on this LINK to upload your head shot and bio.  For your bio, please make sure to answer the following questions

• Who are you?  Where are you from? What personal details do you want to share?
• Where did you go to college? What degrees have you earned? 
• What brought you to your career (para, teacher, admin, support staff, dean, counselor) and why did you choose to work at UAI?

Summer PD Opportunities.  There are a LOT of summer PD opportunities coming up, and quickly.  Through our new and returning partnerships, we have a wide variety of PD opportunities!  (more on those partnerships later).  Here they are

When: Wednesday,  August 22 through Saturday, August 25, 2018 from 8:30 AM until 3:PM

Where: Richard R. Green High School, 7 Beaver Street, New York, NY 10004

Laying the Foundation (LTF) is presented by the National Math and Science Initiative (NMSI) and provides that provides educators with activities, teaching strategies, and content knowledge that increase rigor in the classroom, and prepares students to be successful in AP courses. LTF materials are content specific and aligned to the Common Core Math and Science Standards. During LTF, NMSI Content Experts provide teachers with activities that will allow them to introduce AP concepts at a level accessible to their students.  This PD is targeted at teachers who teach in grades BEFORE AP courses (so middle school through 10th/11th grade at UAI).  It is aimed at supporting earlier grade teachers in developing curriculum and tasks that maximize student readiness to achieve in AP and College Level courses. Training rate per session provided.  Click this link to register. 

New Visions PD.  Through our partnership with New Visions, teachers have the opportunity to connect with other same-discipline teachers and develop their facility in executing New Visions lessons and curricula.   This August, New Visions is offering PD for (@training rate per session):

• Algebra, Geometry, and Algebra II Teachers.  CLICK HERE to register
• Living Environment Teachers.  CLICK HERE to register

UAI PD.  All staff are invited to return to school on Tuesday, August 28th to begin setting up classrooms, planning for September, and getting ready to launch the school year.  During these three days, teachers are approved for training rate per session from 9AM-3PM, and are free to structure their time as needed.  We will be offering workshops (more on that next week) that teachers can choose to attend.  By the end of the three days, in order to be approved for per session

• Classroom set up is complete and ready to welcome students
• Desks and Chairs are set up
• Materials, Books, Etc. are ready for student use (tech will be distributed on Tue 04SEP)
• Visual Displays in Room are up and Room is Ready for Learning
• Your UAI Pacing Calendar is complete (you've made a copy of the template and updated it for the year (you've paced your courses for the year)) and you have linked at least your first weeks' lesson plans (3 lesson plans) to the pacing guide.  You've also shared the Pacing Guide to the correct folder HERE