The See Forever Foundation provides guidance, resources, and support to the network of Maya Angelou Schools.  It supports the Maya Angelou Public Charter High School, the Maya Angelou Academy, and the Young Adult Learning Center.  It provides the educational resources and tools to help young people change the trajectory of their lives and gives them the opportunity to explore their gifts, abilities and future dreams.  In addition, the See Forever Foundation focuses on data collection and analysis, financial, and human capital management for the organization.  The success of the schools is driven by the Foundation, which provides oversight and resources for education and wraparound services.    

Our Vision  

The Maya Angelou Schools prepare their students for life beyond the diploma, setting each scholar on a pathway to college or career through personalized learning, a standards-based curriculum, and social-emotional  support. 

Our Model  

The Maya Angelou Schools are a unique group of learning communities dedicated to positively impacting the lives of young people in the District of Columbia. Each day, we have the privilege of helping students, who may have otherwise given up on their futures, realize that it is never too late to pursue their goals and dreams.   While the path at students for Maya is often times not linear, we can guarantee that it is transformational and that we are with our students every step of their journey. 

In addition to providing a rigorous curriculum and safe school climate, our network and school-based staff work to provide a number of wraparound services, supporting the whole student, as pictured in the diagram below:  

  

Our Focus 

While each of the schools work to meet a specific set of academic, attendance, and other goals, collectively, our entire team of leaders, teachers, and support staff are focused on the critical priority of student engagement.      

This means that each day, we will make every effort to create a positive, coherent, and relevant experience for every student in our schools and individual classrooms.     

Our Network Leadership Team  

• Clarisse Mendoza Davis, Ed.D., Chief of Schools  
• Azalia Hunt Speight, Deputy Chief of Schools  
• Kamal Wright-Cunningham, Managing Director of Clinical Services & Research  
• Taihra Jones, Director of Curriculum, Instruction, & Professional Development  
• Russell Waller, Director of Special Education  
• Katia Jones, Director of Post-Secondary Transition  
• Akosia Yoba, Director of Career & Technical Education 
• Denean Stevens, Director of Student Recruitment & Retention  
• L’Tanya Holley, Director of Community & Family Engagement  
• Tuesday Hence, Director of Residential Services                     

 

Accreditation 

The MAPCS validation team after all of the interviews with the governing body, administrators, counselors, teachers, and students, along with the presentation at the reception on Monday, March 18, 2013, without any hesitation do whole-heartedly recommend to the Middle States Accreditation Commission, that the Maya Angelou Public Charter Schools has exceeded and met all of the twelve standards for accreditation; and therefore should receive full accreditation.”

In May 2006, the high school programs of the Maya Angelou Public Charter School were accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Secondary Schools. The MAPCS-Middle School Campus was accredited by the Middle States Commission on Secondary Schools (MSA) in May 2008. Our middle school campus was accredited through 2013, along with the other MAPCS campuses and was up for renewal. We are very happy to state that our middle school campus earned a full seven year re-accreditation. Our school’€™s accreditation is a reflection of the hard work and dedication of our teachers and staff and validates the importance of our program to the youth we serve. We will continue working to implement our goals during our seven year accreditation period.

Middle States Accreditation

We successfully pursued a major school-wide/cross-site project accreditation, as required of all District of Columbia charter schools. MAPCS was one of the first charter schools in the District accepted for candidacy by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, a non-profit organization, which oversees the implementation of improvement plans within its member schools.

Approval as a candidate for Accreditation means that MAPCS had already met MSA standards involving the major categories of a school’s operations. We then chose Accreditation for Growth (AFG) protocol as the process we would follow in order to become accredited. Under the AFG protocol, meeting the MSA’€™s standards simply qualified us for candidacy; the actual determinants of our accreditation and our performance in maintaining accreditation are our student performance and our intended strategy for ongoing improvement and growth.