No images? Click here From Teach Plus Illinois Dear Educators, My favorite teacher was Mr. Bryant. I met him when he played Friar Lawrence in my school’s faculty-student production of Romeo & Juliet. When he was offstage, Mr. Bryant hung out with the rest of the cast, treated us like regular people, and occasionally swore! Seeing him in a different capacity began to build our relationship, so when he pushed me to do better in my AP History class the following year, I worked harder instead of shutting down. He also put students in charge of our own learning, running the class almost entirely as a Socratic seminar. Because of Mr. Bryant, I developed a deep interest in history, social justice, and pedagogy that allows students to take charge of their own learning. During Teacher Appreciation week, sandwiched between donuts and discounts at stores you don’t have time to go to, the bigger gifts are the students who will remember you in 10 or 20 years, whose lives will be shaped by the impact you are having on them now. I am grateful to work with hundreds of transformative teachers every year, and you can see highlights of many of them below. One particularly transformative teacher is Briana Morales, who has been a policy fellow, a senior policy fellow, a research fellow, and now an Affinity Group Facilitator with Teach Plus. Last month, she was named the Illinois Teacher of the Year for 2023. She is one of the fiercest advocates I know, who will move heaven and earth when for her students. I’d like to share two appreciations of Briana written by her peers in the Teach Plus Policy and Affinity Group programs. Lisa Thyer, who was a fellow and senior fellow with Briana in our policy program, writes, “It may sound strange, but the first word that comes to mind when I think about Briana is love. Genuine, fierce love. Everything she does comes from the love she has for her students, from helping them discover their voices and heal through narrative poetry to providing them with the Christmas presents or dorm supplies they need for college and post-secondary life. She makes sure her students know that she's so much more than just their teacher--she's their champion, their mentor, their safe place, their family. She truly sees her students and works tirelessly to make sure others see them too in a system where they are all too easily overlooked and discounted. There is no one more deserving of this award than Briana.” Tanika Scott, who is an Affinity Group Facilitator with Briana in the East St. Louis area, writes, Thanks to all the teachers who, each day, are a beacon of light to your students, and to the lasting impressions that you leave with them many years into the future! Warm
regards, Fellow Highlights ISBE Names Briana Morales Of East St. Louis School District 189 The 2023 Illinois Teacher Of The Year "The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) named Briana Morales, an English teacher at Gordon Bush Alternative Center in East St. Louis School District 189, as the 2023 Illinois Teacher of the Year. State Superintendent of Education Dr. Tony Sanders, District 189 Superintendent Arthur R. Culver, and Gordon Bush Alternative Center Principal Darnell Spencer surprised Morales with the announcement at her school. View photos from the event. As the 2023 Illinois Teacher of the Year, Morales will share her knowledge and expertise with an even larger audience via an ambassadorship beginning in July. State funding will enable Morales to take a one-year sabbatical and will provide a novice teacher with the opportunity to teach in her place under her expert guidance. Morales will represent Illinois on the national stage in the National Teacher of the Year program sponsored by the Council of Chief State School Officers. 'Great teachers are the foundation of the kind of education system we aspire to in Illinois — one that uplifts every student and makes an impact beyond the classroom that helps shape the future leaders of our state," said Governor JB Pritzker. 'Congratulations to Briana Morales for her exemplary service to the students of East St. Louis and for working to make our state's goals a reality every day.'" (Illinois State Board of Education) Read the full press release here. See Governor J.B. Pritzker's official congratulatory message and Briana's acceptance speech. Check out this article by the Belleville News Democrat on Briana's win. IL Policy Fellow and 2022 Illinois Teacher of the Year Kim Radostits Met with President Biden, First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, and Education Secretary Miguel Cardonas IL Policy Fellow and Teacher of the Year Kim Radostits traveled to Washington, DC to meet President Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, and had a chance to meet and advocate directly with Education Secretary Miguel Cardonas. Racism-Free School Act passes Senate; Teachers Testify in House The Racism-Free Schools Act passed out of the Senate Education Committee unanimously earlier this month and, just today, passed on the Senate Floor with a 52-0 vote! In anticipation of the bill moving to the House chamber, Teach Plus Policy Fellows Briana Morales and Adriana Delgado Gonzalez, along with Teach Plus Policy Manager Bill Curtin, testified in support of the bill this week in a House committee hearing. At the hearing, all stakeholders indicated support for the new version of the bill. Pictures include a moment from the hearing itself, and a moment after the successful hearing outside the capitol, with Representative Maurice West, the House Chief Sponsor of the bill. Teach Plus Illinois Teacher Leaders have “Tea with the LG” Policy Fellows Treasa Howard-Collins and Marcanthony Martinez, and Affinity Group Facilitators Susanna Sendejas and Jacqueline Johnson, had tea with Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton during Teacher Appreciation Week to discuss how to strengthen the teacher pipeline and specifically how to better encourage students of Color to join the profession and teachers of Color to remain. Teach Plus Illinois Teacher Leaders Visit U.S. Department of Education During Teacher Appreciation Week Three Teach Plus IL Teacher Leaders - LaTia Taylor, Tyler Hunt, and Tesha Castillo - joined twelve other Black teachers at the US Department of Education to kick off Teacher Appreciation Week. Illinois teacher leader LaTia Taylor said to Secretary Cardona, “For me, my experience with connecting with other teachers across this country came from Teach Plus. We actually learn best practices when connecting with other Teachers - they elevated the voices and we need more space like this.” IL ECE Policy Fellow Erean Mei Featured in Chalkbeat Chicago "Without mandated full-day kindergarten, education advocates worry that parents will not enroll their children in kindergarten and might be forced to shuffle them around to different family members’ homes while they work. Erean Mei, a kindergarten teacher at KIPP Academy Chicago Primary, supports the full-day kindergarten bill because she sees it as a way to create equal opportunities for children regardless of their socioeconomic status. 'I think the bill addresses an equity question of children who grow up in a home where parents are able to pick them up from a half-day program versus those who are not able to access kindergarten,' Mei said." (Samantha Smylie, Chalkbeat Chicago) Read the full article here. IL Policy Alumna Elizabeth Ojeda-Jimenez Featured in National Education Association News "Before Ojeda-Jiménez earned her teaching credential in 2014 , she was a paraprofessional who assisted science teachers working with English language learners. 'I came to the U.S. from Mexico at the age of 10,' she says. 'I was that student who didn’t speak any English and was from a different culture and was not able to understand what was going on. It was difficult for me to assimilate. I wanted to be that person who helped these students navigate their new culture.' She wanted those students to have at least one teacher who looked like them—so she went back to school to earn her credential. During her campaigns and as a public official, those students and their families are her inspiration. Her 'why' is to be a voice for Latino residents, who make up a large portion of the community and had never had representation on the school board." (Amanda Litvinov, NEA News) Read the full article here. Opportunities National Webinar: The Importance of Belonging in Immigrant EducationHow can educators ensure immigrant-origin students feel safe, supported, and valued, with the chance to put down roots and build new futures—so they can become full participants in their new home? Join us on " 23rd, 2023 from 7:00pm - 8:00pm ET to learn with award-winning teacher and author Jessica Lander (2017-18 Teach Plus Fellow and 2018-19 Teach Plus Senior Fellow) about historic laws, cases, and movements that transformed immigrant education, explore innovative and creative approaches in classrooms and districts across the country today working with immigrant-origin students, and listen to the inspiring stories and voices of young immigrant students. Trace with Lander the threads that connect the past, the present, and the personal, and come away with ideas, tools, and inspiration that help support educators to collaborate and create welcoming classrooms and help nurture a sense of belonging for immigrant-origin students. Jessica Lander is an award-winning teacher, writer and author. She teaches history and civics to recent immigrant students in a Massachusetts public high school and has won numerous awards for her teaching, including being named a Top 50 Finalist for the Global Teacher Prize in 2021, presented by the Varkey Foundation and being named a Massachusetts Teacher of the Year Finalist in 2022, presented by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Jessica writes frequently about education policy and teaching. She is the author of Making Americans: Stories of Historic Struggles, New Ideas, and Inspiration in Immigrant Education, a coauthor of Powerful Partnerships: A Teacher’s Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success and the author of Driving Backwards. If you are a current Teach Plus Fellow and/or Teach Plus Alum and would like a free copy of Jessica’s book, please fill out this form. Books are available on a first come first serve basis. Looking for Chicago-based teacher leaders and school leaders to share their experiences! We need your help to improve teacher leadership in CPS! A group of Teach Plus Policy Fellows in Chicago Public Schools are looking for teacher leaders and administrators to share their insights on Distributed Leadership in CPS. Your input is important, highly valuable, and will contribute to the findings and recommendations they will share with district leaders. We are holding two additional focus groups for teacher leaders in the next two weeks, and we would greatly appreciate it if you would consider joining us. (We’re also giving out a small gift as a thank-you). If you are interested in sharing your views and experiences, please click on the links below to register. And please share with any other teacher leaders in your network! For Teacher Leaders: For Administrators: Teach Plus Network for School Improvement Principals who want to support the growth of continuous improvement, teacher leadership, and math instruction in their schools can apply for their school to be an NSI school for the next two school years. Teach Plus will support two math teacher leaders over the next two years with 1:1 coaching, leadership observations, and monthly professional development sessions, as well as supporting school leaders in their development of distributed leadership practices. We are currently recruiting 10-15 new NSI schools for the 23-24 & 24-25 school years. NSI teacher leaders receive a $6,000 stipend each per year and schools receive a $2,000 implementation stipend each year. If schools are interested, principals may fill out this initial screener form as the first step. Please reach out to kciciora@teachplus.org with any questions. Apply for the Bridge Project Fellowship IEA Educator Voice Academies The IEA Educator Voice Academies are designed to elevate the voices and highlight the successful practices of educators on important educational policy issues. For the 2023-24 school year, our unifying theme will be to Amplify Marginalized Voices. We are now accepting applications from IEA members to become Educator Voice Academy Fellows. We are working to support EVA Fellows in every IEA office across the state. Fellows will pick a focus policy implementation issue to work towards improved implementation in their school or district. In addition, Fellows will collaborate with a statewide cohort to identify, elevate and implement educational policies that seek to Amplify Marginalized Voices. Fellows will receive regular training and support through the statewide EVA cohort, as well as personalized coaching from a member of the EVA statewide steering committee. Every EVA Fellow will receive an organizing stipend and a micro-credential that could qualify them for local salary advancement based on their local Collective Bargaining Agreement. If you are not selected as an EVA Fellow, members can also participate in the program as Educator Voice Coaches and will be positioned to be potentially selected as a Fellow in subsequent years. Please apply here. Applications will remain open through May 31, but apply as soon as possible as we will begin reaching out to applicants about next steps. Apply for the Learning While Leading Program The Learning While Leading Program is a two-year professional development program for educators who already have a principal endorsement and want to apply for an assistant principal or principal position. Priority for acceptance is with aspiring rural school leaders. The deadline to apply is June 16, 2023. Click here to learn more. North Central College Character Education Certificate North Central College’s Character Education Certificate is a 3 module online course that provides 45 ISBE approved PD units. “This course gave a good background on character education, helping me understand how I can include instruction around character education in our Tier 1 SEL lessons.” (Lucas Pepper, CCSD 93). The next cohort begins June 4. Click here to learn more. Raise your voice on behalf of aspiring teachers of color to ensure our state officials increase investment in MTI! We're in the final stretch of the second phase of our #IncreaseMTIFunding campaign. Please take a few minutes to send a letter to and tweet at your state legislators today! The Illinois General Assembly is scheduled to set the state’s FY24 budget in May. Raise your voice on behalf of aspiring teachers of color to ensure our state officials increase investment in MTI. Take 3-4 minutes to send a letter to your legislators to urge them to prioritize an investment of $7M for MTI in the FY24 state budget. You can also schedule a meeting using this fact sheet as a reference, give them a phone call, or send a tweet. Teacher Voices Ashley Kannan Ashley Kannan: Representation matters for my students and fellow teachers. Illinois can help. "Maya has one fear at school: the lunchroom. It didn’t take long for Maya, who is one of a handful of Indian students in our school, to notice strange looks from nearby students when she would open her lunch. These students would mock the orange color of her jalebis or the earthy smell of her saag paneer. When Maya approached adults for help, they, too, were outsiders to her culture, so Maya resorted to eating her lunch in the bathroom. A colleague alerted me to Maya’s predicament. I reached out to her, and now we eat our lunches together in my room — two Indians sharing food, culture and the experiences of being seen as different. By eating together, I helped ease the “othering” that Maya felt. Students who used to mock her are now asking to try these dishes, and, as a result, Maya no longer feels invisible. Being seen by someone who understands her has made all the difference. Maya is not the only student for whom representation matters. In Illinois, 82% of teachers are white, while the state’s student population is 53% nonwhite. Students like Maya are searching for adults who look like them and understand their experiences. Too often, those adults are not there. Without students seeing themselves in their teachers, we risk more children being disengaged from school and learning." (Ashley Kannan, Illinois Policy Fellow) Read the full article here. Nora Sullivan To stay in the classroom, teachers need support. "“I don’t want to come to school anymore.” As I looked into Simon’s wide eyes, my heart broke, and I thought to myself, I don’t want to come to school anymore either. In the corner of our classroom, a new student, Maurice, screamed while jumping on top of a table. Simon was covering his ears to block out the noise and chaos, and I desperately wanted to do the same.Becoming a teacher had always been my dream. I expected my first few years to be difficult. I just didn’t know how difficult they would be. I needed help, in the form of extra observations and feedback. I needed support from administrators and coaches. Instead, I was left to manage on my own.At a time when so many states around the country, including my own state of Illinois, are facing a critical shortage of teachers, it is imperative that we consider how we support new educators throughout their first five years in the classroom." (Nora Sullivan, Illinois ECE Policy Fellow)Read the full article here. Corey Winchester What I Learned From My Students Who Became Teachers "I rarely see authentic or endearing stories in the media that show the impact teachers and students have on each other. While shows like Abbott Elementary – which I especially love as a graduate of Philly Public Schools – try to show teachers as real, dynamic people with complexities and contradictions, few educators get to narrate the true power of the relationships we’ve been able to cultivate with our students.After 13 years of teaching, I’ve had just over 1,700 students walk in and out of my classroom. Even more astonishing, five of my former students decided to become high school history teachers, just like me. Inspired by the late Grace Lee Boggs, who used conversation as a way to deepen understanding, my partner Jon and I decided to invite each of these amazing human beings to our home to break bread, catch up and dialogue about our individual and collective work as teachers. After nearly two hours of laughter, tears and thoughtful discussion with students who have become teachers, I walked away with two important messages that affirm why teachers decide to stay and why our stories deserve to be heard." (Corey Winchester, Illinois Policy Fellow Alum) Read the full article here. |