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Partners and Funders Luncheon 2016

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In late April, the Maya Angelou Schools and See Forever Foundation hosted its annual Partners and Funders Luncheon. We hold this event annually to thank our supporters and partners, without whom we could not fulfill our mission.

The luncheon began with remarks and an overview of the organization from our CEO, Dr. Heather D. Wathington. Each school leaders then spoke on specific initiatives their schools have been working on this semester. Sarah Navarro, the director of the Young Adult Learning Center (YALC), highlighted the new Seeds for Success program which partners with the Department of Public Works and Department of Employment Services to create work opportunities and classroom incentives for students. At the High School, Principal Tameika Ashford Freeman presented updates about the High School’s after-school initiatives and the new Hospitality and Tourism program run by Director, Akoshia Yoba. This new program engages and exposes students to various career opportunities in the fields of hospitality and tourism and provides useful credentials and contacts for students.

The luncheon ended with a tour of the Maya campus and two hands-on activities led by Maya Angelou Schools’ students. At the YALC, students taught guests how to make their own picture frames from scratch. The students were fantastic teachers, both patient and engaging, as they demonstrated the machinery and frame-making process with ease. At the High School, student Ambassadors and Ms. Bell, our High School Art instructor, directed guests in making hand-made cards.

We hope all of our guests enjoyed getting to see the schools and students in action, and we look forward to another great Partners and Funders celebration next year!

–Yifan Zhang

Click through the gallery below!

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YALC Playtime Project 2

Playtime with the YALC

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Maya Angelou Students Present Puppet Theater to The Homeless Children’s Playtime Project

Aah, to be a kid again! This January, as a part of the Pre-Apprenticeship Certification Program (PACT) with the Home Builder’s Institute, Maya Angelou Young Adult Learning Center (YALC) students created a puppet theater for young children in need.

The model theater was presented to the Homeless Children’s Playtime Project at the DC General Shelter. YALC students treated children, ages 3-7, to a warm-hearted show, titled Positively a King: A Young Man’s Rise to King of the Community. Dressed like dragons, princesses, and firemen, the children were overjoyed with the show that sparked their already imaginative minds on how they can make an impact in the future.

The Puppet Theater was also submitted as a part of a national competition for the PACT Program, in which students had to use 80% recycled or donated material to create a useful project. Although the students placed 2nd in the competition, they definitely won the hearts of the children at the Playtime Project.

Engaging the community and helping those in need is just one of the many ways Maya Angelou Schools describe the Maya Way–a mantra that is ingrained in their academic program.

Click through the gallery below to check out the photos. To learn more about The Homeless Children’s Playtime Project, visit http://www.playtimeproject.org/ .

-Lisa S. Rajaram

 

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Jenny Nauss

YALC’s Jenny Nauss Named as Winner in JSTOR Lesson Plan Competition

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Frankenstein is one of those stories every young person knows, even before reading Mary Shelley’s famed novel. When students do approach the book, they often read with preconceived images in mind – cue lurid green monsters and frizzy-haired madmen.

Our very own Jenny Nauss, Maya Angelou Young Adult Learning Center Instructional Manager, recently won the first JSTOR Lesson Plan Competition—which is awarded for creative and reproducible lesson plans that incorporate content from the digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources into teaching at the secondary school level. In a lesson plan she created for an Ethics and Literature course at the Maret School, Jenny challenges her students to see beyond the surface of Shelley’s science-fiction tale.

The lesson is as follows: students read and summarize several peer-reviewed academic articles related to Frankenstein, then work on analyzing the author’s text through the lens of these articles. The articles are both intellectually stimulating and difficult—ranging in topic from cloning, to genetic engineering, to genetically modified foods. Frankenstein’s story thus becomes more than just a wacky science experiment; it becomes a lesson on moral decision-making, modern bio-ethics, and philosophical history.

One of the key skills students learn in this lesson plan is the ability to succinctly summarize, in their own words, a challenging text. As Jenny put it, “If the only way you can summarize a text is by using the words of the original, then you don’t truly understand the text.” This is a skill Jenny hopes to foster in students at the YALC, as it is crucial for success in the GED exam, as well as in the professional world. Explicit summarization forces students to think critically about what they are reading and extract the main ideas of the text.

Jenny has been the Instructional Manager at the YALC since June 2015 and came to the Maya Angelou Schools from a 23-year career in teaching. She was most recently an Upper School English teacher at the Maret School, where she developed the Frankenstein Lesson Plan. As her JSTOR award proves, her experience is a wonderful asset to the Maya family, and we look forward to hearing more about her innovative curriculum plans in the months to come!

To learn more about the JSTOR Competition, click here: http://teach.jstor.org/blog/announcing-lesson-plan-award-winners

-Yifan Zhang