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Former Teachers: Where Are They Now?

December 2, 2016 by lpahomov Leave a Comment

Tamir Harper

Staff Writer

From SLA to another job — what does it take?

In the past three years, six teachers have left SLA. Some have moved out of the education field, but many have continued working to empower the innovative approach that Science Leadership Academy takes towards teaching and learning.

However, many students don’t know where their favorite teacher (or maybe not so favorite teacher) is doing now that they left SLA.

So where are they now?

This past week, many upperclassman found out the career change of one previous eight year Math Teacher Caitlin Thompson. Many students saw Ms.Thompson greeting students into the classroom of Spanish Teacher Melanie Manuel. Ms. Thompson came back to SLA as a substitute teacher while Ms. Manuel was out.

Ms.Thompson describes her day as “interesting” when teaching 9th graders that didn’t know her.

“Most of the students gave me a big smile when they saw me. Some didn’t even seem to notice that it was any different.”

That won’t be the last time you see Ms. Thompson. She’s “hoping to sub a few times a month plus sometimes I’ll be stopping by since I work with Mr. Lehmann and Inquiry Schools.” She was back on Friday, December 2nd to sub for Ms. Martin.

Does that name sound familiar? If so, here’s why. Inquiry Schools is the non profit that was founded by our founding Principal Christopher Lehmann. Mr. Lehmann serves as the Chairman of the Board and Superintendent. Ms. Thompson is not just a substitute for the School District of Philadelphia but she is also the Director of Operations for the group, which “works with educators, parents and students to create and support inquiry-driven, project-based schools with a focus on using modern tools.”

Ms. Thompson isn’t the only previous teacher that works for Inquiry Schools. A teacher that only Seniors know Ms. Diana Laufenberg serves as the Executive Director of Inquiry Schools. While at SLA she served as the Social Studies teacher and Coach of SLA famous Debate team, according to Ms. Laufenberg LinkedIn profile.

Mr. Lehmann explained how he continues to engage teachers that no longer teaches at SLA and previous students about how they feel about seeing Ms. Thompson, Ms. Laufenberg and at times Ms. Dunn who you will learn more about later on, inside our building.

“One of the really wonderful things about SLA is how alumni – students and teachers – stay involved. SLA teachers who have left generally leave either because of a change in their life or because they have a great opportunity to do something else. And generally, they have very strong positive feelings about what we’ve done together, so when there is a chance to work with folks on outside projects, former SLA teachers are a logical group of people to go to. It gives former teachers a chance to stay connected with us, and of course, it keeps us in contact with people we love.”

Junior Deja Harris that had Ms.Thompson for two consecutive years for Math. “It feels weird because the person left, they said they were leaving and then they came back so like it’s more confusing than weird.”

Not everybody shares this feeling of confusion. Senior Aaron Watson-Sharer has been at Science Leadership Academy for four years and had the opportunity to be taught by Ms. Dunn and Ms. Thompson.

“It’s something that at first was a tad awkward, but if I enjoyed my tenure at SLA as a teacher I would like to make regular returns. Now it’s just whatever for me, I say hello if I walk past them and that’s that.”

Does he personally think it’s important to keep teachers that left engaged in our school?

“I think it’s up to the teacher. If they feel they want to remain apart of the SLA community we’ll always welcome them back,” said Watson-Sharer. Ms. Dunn and Thompson try their best to remain engaged, so why not?”

In the past, the school has lost English Teachers Meenoo Rami and Alexa Dunn, Spanish Teacher Mark Bey, as well as Science Teachers Rosalind Echols-Kuykendall and Stephanie Owens. Some continue to teach outside of Philadelphia, but others have moved on to a different career. Ms. Rami currently works as a Manager for Minecraft, Mr. Bey works as a New York public school Spanish Teacher, while Ms. Dunn still works for the School District of Philadelphia as a Professional Learning Specialist.

Ms. Echols-Kuykendall continued her educational studies at University of Washington where she is pursuing her Doctorate in Oceanography and Ms. Owens currently lives and teaches in San Francisco, California.

Where will you be once you leave SLA? Maybe you will be back as a Teacher!

Homework for tonight, readers: Google what Oceanography is! 🙂

Students Travel to Puerto Rico

November 28, 2016 by lpahomov Leave a Comment

It all started last year with an advisory memo about an opportunity for juniors to be a Drexel Student Fellow. After the application process, 5 students were chosen. Working with a Drexel professor and PhD candidate, we researched created research papers based around the UN Sustainability Goals. We then presented our findings for the International Conference on Urban Education (ICUE) in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

We first arrived in San Juan on November 4 and headed to the resort hosting the conference. The resort was right on the beach and there were different activities that we could participate in.

In the three-day conference, our first day was spent viewing other paper sessions. It gave us a chance to view other presenters at ICUE and see which presentation styles made sense. “I was nervous about the presentation until I actually saw other people presenting at the conference,” said senior Isabel Medlock. We were also able to meet the five undergraduate education majors who were in a similar program at UNC Charlotte and Queen’s’ University of Charlotte.

Attending the conference wasn’t the only thing we did while in San Juan. We were also able to visit elementary, middle, and high schools in San Juan. While at the elementary school, we read to students. We then donated the books to the school and stopped by the middle school next door. At the middle school we played with students and donated more books to the classrooms.

The last day at the conference was our chance to present. We each had different topics that we focused on. I presented on food deserts and related health risks. Isabel Medlock focused on mental health and how it affects undocumented immigrants. Eva Karlen spoke on how to eradicate our mindset of wastefulness. Xavier Carroll’s presentation was about urban community impact on water pollution. The last presentation on childhood marriage was by Tahmidul Bhuiyan.

This opportunity gave us a chance to present our research to a greater audience. We were able to discover not only things that we could be interested in later in life, but we were able to see our presentation and research styles. We were given the chance to conduct extensive research, allowing us to have experience before going to college. Xavier Carroll couldn’t have summed it better, “It was a big opportunity and I loved it all.”

Review: “Lemonade” by Beyonce

November 22, 2016 by lpahomov Leave a Comment

Deja Harrison

Staff Writer

According to everyone else, Beyonce’s latest album Lemonade is about Beyonce´s feelings towards her husband Jay-Z after finding out he cheated on her with multiple women.

How much of this is true? Beyonce won’t say. But After watching the visual album and listening to the music myself, I realized that there is a much deeper purpose to her work.

Lemonade is about Beyonce finding herself in her culture and in life again after all the pain she has been through over the past few years. In the visual album, the 12 songs are set up as the 12 stages of pain and healing: Intuition, Denial, Anger, Apathy, Emptiness, Accountability, Reformation, Forgiveness, Resurrection, Hope, and Redemption. Each of these moments had rich symbolism to explore that went way beyond the tabloid story of her and Jay-Z. Here are my thoughts on just a few of them.

Poetry

In the beginning of every song, Beyonce recites a poem that matches her stage.

¨So what are you gonna say at my funeral, now that you’ve killed me? Here lies the body of the love of my life, whose heart I broke without a gun to my head. Here lies the mother of my children, both living and dead. Rest in peace, my true love, who I took for granted. Most bomb p*ssy who, because of me, sleep evaded. Her god listening. Her heaven will be a love without betrayal. Ashes to ashes, dust to side chicks.¨

This poem comes from Apathy, which was her opening for the song Sorry. The poem refers to her stage of not caring anymore. in the end, we see that she is a new person, that she has been born again.

Changes & Celebration

This film also captures a lot of Beyonce in a more afro-centric type of way. She portrays and celebrates different types of black women while showing that they all come to form one. She stars alongside many famous and unknown black women and children of all different shades and body types.

Symbols

Beyonce goes back to her southern roots by going back to Texas and she also goes back to a signature hairstyle of hers blonde braids. They both represent her going back to the things she knows, to her beginings. Water is another huge symbol is Lemonade. It is apart of her rebirth, it is her being cleansed and then reborn. It represents her death and resurrection. She references many other forms of artwork such as African tribes and goddesses.

When she is seen strutting down the street in a bright yellow dress, she is embodying the African Goddess Oshun, who represents water, beauty, rage, and sexuality which are all very recurring in Lemonade. African tribes and customs are shown throughout the film through dance and face markings. The symbols in the album are what I believe make the album so amazing because you get to see her thought process and emotions about what she was going through expressed in a much stronger way than words.

Stop and Listen

This album to me is completely worth listening to because it is all about empowerment. Beyonce is embodying a black women who lost her ways and is taking steps to reinvent herself. That´s why I believe Lemonade to be about reinvention. Understanding that when life gives you lemons you can make lemonade. I feel like everyone can relate more to music that has a purpose. I personally loved this album and everything is stood for, and I recommend it to everyone who´s looking for something different in music. Lemonade tells a story that I think is worth listening to.

Column: Growing Up Dark-Skinned

November 22, 2016 by lpahomov Leave a Comment

Deja Harrison

Staff Writer

¨You’re pretty… for a dark-skinned girl.¨

Are dark skinned-women not beautiful?

¨Black girls are always so angry.¨

You would be too if you were objectified and called ugly your whole life.

¨I like your type of hair, I wish I had hair like yours.¨

My type of hair? What does that even mean.

¨Black girls are so ghetto and rude.¨

Where do people get these ideas from?

I am dark-skinned — the “worst type of black” girl. I wear name-brand sneakers, weave, tights, and fake nails. I do not speak in “proper tone” all the time because I do not feel the need to. In those 3 sentences most would think they have me all figured out because of the stereotypes associated with me. I always wondered where people got and came up with these ridiculous stereotypes.

I get stereotyped as the typical mean loud ghetto black girl all the time, but that’s just not who I am.

Here’s who I really am:

I am a goofy person — like serious goofy. I laugh at any and everything all the time. I remember talking to people who are even now my friends and them saying that when they first saw me they thought I was going to be such a bitch because of the way I look. As soon as someone talks to me I start smiling because I want people to know I’m friendly. I am happy 90% of the time, and in that other 10% I’m most likely upset because I´m hungry. My facial expressions categorize me as a Squidward even though my personality is much more of a Spongebob. We get wrapped up so much in people’s appearances and rumors we hear that we lose focus on actually getting to know someone who could actually be an amazing person.

Most people don’t see any of that, though. They just see my dark skin.

As a young black woman in America, I feel like I have a natural target on my back. I´m supposed to speak and act a certain way because those are the things associated with my culture and gender. I feel like no matter what I do, I just can’t shake the thoughts of those who assume based on my ethnicity and gender that I am angry, loud, and have no future.

It is hard to find my place and my happiness in this world when there are so many people out there trying to deprive me of it. Why can’t I be happy?

Column: Speaking of Love

November 18, 2016 by lpahomov Leave a Comment

Larissa Pahomov

Faculty Advisor

In my first year of teaching at SLA — which was my first year of teaching in my own classroom — a student asked me, “do you love us?”

The question gave me pause. This was a student in the crankiest class I taught that year (hello, Fire Stream, Class of 2010) and it seemed, for a moment, that the query might be a trick. But I still knew the answer in my heart.

“Yes, of course I love you.”

The student wasn’t buying it. “What? You lyin’. We really annoy you in our class.”

Zac Chase, who was listening in, came to the rescue here: “You mean you’ve never been driven crazy by somebody you love?”

It was only a couple of years in that I came to realize how truly rare this conversation was at the high school level. Love exists between young children and their parents, with teachers serving as proxy; as those children become adolescents, the definition of love shifts towards romance. Our popular portrayals of “I love you” further narrow our understanding of the experience — with our heads full of images of (straight, white) couples in joy or anguish, we lose contact with the universal experience that love can be.

And yet. I am lucky — beyond lucky — to work at SLA. What I have witnessed here has helped expand my understanding of what love is and how it can save us.

When a student carries a friend in a cast down the stairs during a fire drill, that’s love.

When an entire advisory turns out for the funeral of a parent, that’s love.

When a teacher takes a student into their own home so they will make it to graduation, that’s love.

And when we feel concern, fear, even terror about the changing political landscape, our love for each other is not just comfort or safety, but an act of resistance against the forces that would prefer to see us tear each other down in hate rather than lift each other up.

Late in the evening of election night — but long before the results were made official — a question formed in my head: What are we going to say to the kids tomorrow?

That question lead to a few lines of text, which then became a collective letter that SLA teachers composed between midnight and 7AM the next morning. We got to school early, wrote it out on poster paper, and made photocopies for every teacher to read out loud at the start of first period.

These actions saved me that day, and it brought strength to many teachers (perhaps even more than the students).

At the end of the next day, I had a chance to debrief a bit with my advisory. I had to tell them: It’s not every teaching staff that would start a letter with “to our school family” and sign off with “love.”

And yet, I’ve been hearing and seeing expressions of love more than ever since last week. Not just in my building, or in my house, but all over this fine city.

There are some dark times ahead. But it is the dark moments that make love the most precious, the most essential. Let’s not lose that.