Week of January 13th

UAI Staff News

Volume VII

Issue 21

January 13th,  2020

Announcements

Staff Birthdays This Week.  

Happy Birthday to Nancy on Sunday (12JAN).  Enjoy your day!!

Announcing a New Partnership with Broadway Junior.  Thanks to the hard work of Damon, Alison, and Phillan, we were successfully selected to partner with Broadway Junior.  Through this partnership, Damon, Alison, and Phillan will receive the training required to produce UAI's first musical theater production with our middle school students.  In addition, we also receive some funds to build up the materials and resources required for launching a musical theater program for our middle school!  This year, we are producing Annie, Jr.  Info sessions for Middle School students will be held this Thursday 16JAN20 in the dance room (room 503).   Please spread the word to all of our 6th-8th graders to get information and try out for this amazing opportunity!!

First Facebook Design Derby.  The past fall the 9th graders have been working hard with Ms. Nadine to learn about the Design Process, the process that Facebook professionals use to create, design, and implement new features and programs.  Throughout the fall, students participated in live streaming to learn from Menakshi Menon, a Quantitative User Researcher at Facebook.  Menakshi shared her expertise and perspective from behind the scenes at Facebook to help inspire and support our young women to realizing their design ideas.  This Friday, the Class of 2023 Design Derby finalists will present their ideas to a panel of experts at Facebook NYC.  The winning group wins a free trip to California to tour Facebook's home quarters and join a virtual congress of young people dedicated to define digital citizenship for the future!

To-Do This Week

Monday Professional Development.  This Monday, we're going to wrap up the 3-part series aimed at supporting teachers in planning and executing high quality turn and talks in their classes.   Like last week, we'll meet in 409 and do announcements and then divide into our planning groups.

Teacher Core Subject Teams -Note:  For this round of subject teams, we're going to focus on core subject turn and talks and integrate breadth & elective subjects into the core teams.  This is strictly for planning and preparation logistics in running these consultancies

• (8) MS ELA - Sarah M (Presenting), Marsha (Facilitating), 
• Phillan, Kristina, Christina, Cassandra, Laura, Pauline
• (8) HS ELA - Joey (Presenting) Rebecca C (Facilitating) 
• Tiffany, Rebecca F, Damon, Elana, Jessica, Juelle
• (9) MATH - Jamie (Presenting), Kiri (Facilitating) 
• Alison, Cherry, Matthew, Danielle Ro, Joanna, Nina, Judy
• (9) SCIENCE - Amanda (Presenting), Rachel (Facilitating)  
• Sarah R, Amy, Emma, Nick, Tom, Elena, Jelissa
• (9) SOCIAL STUDIES - Brodie (Presenting); Annie (Facilitating)
• Jake, Natalie, Kelly, Suzannah, Nadine, Giselle, Brenda

Monday Agenda

• 3:00-3:05 - Blog Announcements
• 3:05-3:10 - Setting Our Intention - What is the focus of the Rehearsal? What feedback is needed?
• 3:10-4:05 - Lesson Rehearsal
• 4:05-4:10 - Staff Journal & Reflection - What about today's PD will I use in my own practice? 

Tuesday Family Outreach.  High school advisors must begin reaching out to advisees to advise families of Regents Week programming.  Joanna will share schedule and lists this week.  All advisors, should share that the end of the MP3 ends on Friday, 17JAN20.  The Spring Term and MP4 begins the next class day (21JAN for middle school; 28JAN20 for the high school).  There is no school on Monday, 20JAN20 (MLK, Jr. Day) and no school for students on Monday 27JAN20 (Chancellor's PD Day).


Are you tired of your phone ringing during class?  Me too.  I have tried to ask, remind, cajole, demand, stridently remind ALL out of classroom staff to NOT call classrooms.  I have failed.  So, like every problem that I fail at, I step back and try to find another approach.

Phones are primarily in classrooms for the safety of the teacher and students.  No one needs to call into a classroom in an emergency.  We have enough staff with radios.  We can come to your classroom.  Therefore, I am recommending that you all take your phones off the hook.  If we really need something, we'll come to your classroom.

All deans, counselors, interns, office staff, and admin will no longer be calling classrooms for students or other reasons.  If a student needs to be pulled from class, we will find another method to do so.  If you need to use the phone, you need only to hang up and then call out.  For classroom staff, phones will continue to serve their intended, emergency purpose.

Social-Emotional Learning Updates

Per Session Opportunities

No new postings this week.