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| Lunar New Year 4719 |
Words from Grace
Today is the beginning of Lunar New Year, celebrated for 15 days. New year begins on a new moon and ends when the moon is full. Sunday is Valentine's Day, and next week is vacation week! It is essential that you disconnect from technology and especially from Zoom meetings. There is a solid block of learning and teaching time between February and April break, and every minute will count - so rest up!
Speaking of celebrations, the new Carter School building project was approved by the Massachusetts School Building Authority yesterday, February 11, 2021. The meeting happened while Mayor Walsh was being confirmed, but he chose to attend the building meeting. Mayor Walsh has been supportive of this project from the beginning, and it's wonderful he could be present yesterday. Ground breaking is scheduled for fall of 2022 and opening the new building in the fall of 2024. Congratulations to the Carter community!
Important Dates
February 15 - President’s Day - No School
April 2 - Good Friday - No School
April 19 - Patriot’s Day - No School
April 20 - 23 - Spring Recess - No School
Division of Academics
See link below for further information
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-O_M6-rqNZfHxPzxkdR4UnC6Eb0u7SxQNHnCLa0njqI/edit
Facing History and Ourselves: Teaching for Civic Agency
What are the knowledge, skills and dispositions young people need to create a more just, inclusive and equitable world? Join us for an in-depth and interactive online professional development workshop exploring youth civic engagement. Participants will explore concepts and frameworks for teaching civic agency, including through student-led civic action projects, cultivated by student-centered classrooms that value student identities and model democratic principles of equity, justice, and the common good. This professional development is exclusively for BPS teachers. Register on Teachpoint.
Middle School Session- February 23, 3:30-5 pm
High School Session- February 25, 3:30-5 pm
Civics Curriculum Teacher Advisory Panel
In order to expand access to quality civics curricular materials for the new Grade 8 civics course, the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Rennie Center are convening a panel of Civics Curriculum Teacher Advisors. Teacher advisors will meet to review evidence of curricular materials’ alignment to Massachusetts content and practice standards, cultural responsiveness, and usability.
This is a great opportunity to make a positive impact across the Commonwealth while connecting with peers from other districts and to deepen your knowledge about quality curriculum. Panel meetings will take place from March - June 2021, and teacher advisors receive a $1000 stipend for the successful completion of the Advisory Panel.
Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis until February 24th. Apply now!
Generation Citizen
Are you interested in having civics education come alive and feel more meaningful for your students? Would you like to bridge the classroom to the community? Do you hope your students will be prepared to be lifelong participants in their democracy and community? Would you like to see your students help bring about systemic change in their community? Generation Citizen’s Action Civics program is a great way to develop students’ civic motivation, knowledge, and skills. Our project-based and student-centered learning approach is not just about civics. Students develop skills in collaboration, critical thinking, problem-solving; the program strengthens their literacy skills, builds student leadership skills, and increases students’ awareness, understanding, and tolerance for others. When you partner with Generation Citizen, teachers receive curriculum, training, online localized advocacy resources and, most of all, continual coaching and support from expert staff.
Please fill out the linked Google Form by February 26, 2021, if you are interested in working with Generation Citizen for Spring 2021 or for SY 21-22.
Mental Health Hotline
BPS will offer a mental health hotline during February vacation from 2/16/21 - 2/19/21. Please share this information with your students and families. MH Flyer
Folder with MH Flyer translated
Please Join! - Assessment Task Force
We are seeking teachers who represent all grade levels and school types to join the Assessment Task Force, as referenced in the 11/3 Superintendent’s Memo. Task Force members will include teachers, Central Office Staff, and School Leaders working together to design and recommend a comprehensive and balanced assessment system that will meet the needs of students, families, teachers and leaders across BPS.
The time commitment is 2 hours per month, with meetings on the third Thursday afternoon of each month through the end of June. The first meeting will be Thursday, February 25 from 3:30-5:00 pm, though subsequent meetings may be scheduled beginning at 4:30 depending on participant need. Please indicate interest by completing this form by 2/18/21. Participants will be selected to represent a range of experiences with BPS assessment tools, grade levels and content.
Questions? Email sjay@bostonpublicschools.org
Panorama Weekly Update - Monitoring When Plans Are On-Track Up To Date
There are now over 10,000 BPS students with tier-2 or tier-3 plan entered in Panorama Student Success. Thank you for taking action to create and log these!
As individual staff and teams continue to create plans, you can use the platform to monitor their implementation and effectiveness.
The “Summary” side-tab, under the “Students” top tab, provides easy access to this information.
You can find more details here.
Division of Equity, Strategy, & Opportunity Gaps
School-based Equity Roundtables
The Office of Equity Strategy and Opportunity Gaps would like to thank School Leaders for engaging in School Based Equity Roundtables. To further support you in your efforts here is the School-based Equity Roundtable Handbook. Over the next two weeks ESOG will be looking for any feedback you have so that we can make any necessary edits in our efforts to produce a final draft. Please remember, if you need any additional support in engaging your community stakeholders in SERT, please reach out to Velecia Saunders @ VSaunders@bostonpublicschools.org. Velecia has set aside time every Wednesday between 1 and 3 to support schools in their efforts to consistently engage in School Based Equity Roundtables.
Office of Recruitment Cultivation and Diversity Programs
MTEL Support
For any teachers/paraprofessionals who are struggling to pass MTEL exams, please send the information below to those educators.
The BPS MTEL Prep and ESL Mentoring Program is a year-long program that provides MTEL preparation resources, courses, ESL MTEL mentorship, and licensure guidance to all BPS educators, including teachers on waivers and candidates within our Diversity Pipeline Programs. For more information regarding upcoming courses contact - Aketa Narang-Kapur, mtelprepsupport@bostonpublicschool.org
MTEL requests will only be processed if the form below if filled out. Spring registration closes today, February 12. Summer registration begins on February 13.
Seeking MTEL Prep Support? Please fill out our inquiry form!
Office of Recruitment, Cultivation and Diversity Programs (RCD)
Support BPS Recruitment: JOIN US FOR DEMO DAY!!! Demo Day (flyer) will be on Saturday, February 27 from 7:45-1pm for all grade levels (deadline to RSVP is TODAY 2/12). Please come and support aspiring educators by giving feedback to demo lessons they will present. Also, get a preview of candidates for next year. We encourage you to invite members of your hiring committees to join as well. School Leaders and designees may RSVP here. If you missed the orientation session for Demo Day yesterday on 2/11 and would like the slides, contact Kim Connolly at kngo@bostonpublicschools.org
Recruitment Events: Want a chance to meet with talented and diverse candidates? RSVP for one of our many Recruitment Events here
Affinity Recruitment Advisories: The RCD team is excited to launch the development of Affinity Recruitment Advisories to increase recruitment in diverse populations including from HBCU’s and Latinx, Asian and Deaf & Hard of Hearing teachers. If you would like to join an advisory to support this work, we will be meeting monthly...please see flyer for more info.
The Early Hiring Pool is now open (closes end of February) and we would love your help in encouraging highly qualified and diverse candidates to apply! For prospective teachers only. We are excited to share that so far, our pool is more diverse than ever before! Early Hiring Pool candidates will be screened by our Recruitment Fellows and we will develop a Priority Pool for you to search for recommended and highly recommended candidates.
Retention Services
Happy to share this month’s Educators of Color Monthly Newsletter for February
Join us for our February ALANA Black History Month Program sponsored by the BU African Studies Center on February 25th at 5pm. Register here.
Celebrating Diasporic African and African-American Blackness All Year 2021
The Division of Academics and the Division of Equity, Strategy, and Opportunity Gaps is proud to announce a year-long celebration of Blackness. We are creating a calendar of events occurring in February and beyond, celebrating the rich histories of people of the African diaspora. We invite you to submit any events taking place in your school, central office department, or the Boston community that celebrate and uplift Blackness. Please complete this form to submit an event.
Calendar submissions must meet the following criteria:
1. Promotes/encourages culturally and linguistically sustaining practices
2. Aligns with BPS Strategic Vision
3. Sponsored by a BPS school or central office department (BPS community partners are encouraged to connect with a school or BPS central office department)
Feel free to share this information with your networks. Questions contact: diversityprograms@bostonpublicschools.org
We would like to thank everyone who attended our Kick-Off event to celebrate Diasporic African and African-American Blackness. A huge shout out to all who helped support the effort, our speakers, musician, the Superintendent and all those who participated in the discussion. Here’s to celebrating our blackness all year long.
RCD Pipeline Programs
“Bounce the Ball: A Conversation with Maisha Moses, Executive Director of the Young People’s Project, moderated by Dr. Abdi Ali, Manager of Pipeline Programs. Wednesday, February 17, 2021, 6:00PM - 7:00PM. Registration required. Maisha will share her reflections on the legacy of the Algebra Project, Civil Rights and mathematics, and Math Literacy Workers in public schools.Division of Finance
2021-22 Configuration Map Launch for Schools serving K-8
The Planning & Analysis team has issued configuration maps for SY21-22. We’re asking school leaders from schools serving grades K-8 to check their configuration maps, located in the School Year 2021-22 Reports folder in your Planning & Analysis directory.
We are asking that you review your configuration map, since we assign students based on the capacities listed in this report. If you find any issues, please email Dane Holding at dholding@bostonpublicschools.org and cc: your Planning & Analysis liaison.
We understand that some school leaders may have unresolved issues with regard to their 2021-22 configuration. If you’re in this situation, please reach out to dholding@bostonpublicschools.org once you’ve resolved the issue and know what your configuration will look like.
If you need any help accessing your Planning & Analysis directory, please contact dholding@bostonpublicschools.org
Division of Human Capital
Excess Letters for Permanent Teachers Without a Position
Permanent Teachers without a Position from Autonomous Schools were issued letters via email on 2/1.
Permanent Teachers without a Position from Traditional Schools will be issued letters via email by 2/19. Please make sure to have conversations with these staff.
Hiring Reminders
Now that Probable Org meetings are over, the OHC Staffing Teams are working on getting vacancies posted accurately. Please help us by sharing any of the following with your Staffing Manager:
Leaves of Absence
Do you know about any Leaves of Absences that will be active at the start of the next school year that should be posted? Reach out to your Staffing Team to make sure we have noted these vacancies and have a plan for posting.
Managerial Positions
If you have managerial positions that will be posted, send the job description to your OHC Staffing Manager for approval.
Paired Part-Time Positions
We will be sharing a spreadsheet for pairings that are less than .5. If you already have an arrangement with another principal, let us know!
School Level Text for Vacancies (Reminder)
We encourage you to submit your school-level text as soon as possible; it's a GREAT OPTION for consistently marketing and sharing your specific school values to prospective candidates (school-level custom text will appear as the first paragraph of all of your job descriptions). Please use this link to do so.
Once we have a list of vacancies, we’ll reach out regarding position-level custom text, which will be unique to each specific position. All custom text and job postings must be reviewed by the BTU prior to posting and that review will take place over school vacation week to ensure postings are up by March 1st, so expect a deadline around 2/19.
Division of Operations
ID Card Access Policy
Please read the updated ID Card Access Policy which outlines the process for securing new and replacement cards.
Division of Student, Family, and Community Advancement
Partnership Preference Form
The Partnership Preference Form, indicating your preferred partners for SY21-22 is due in your profile on www.PartnerBPS.org by March 1, 2021. Partnership Fund Liaisons can assist you in creating a partnership strategy. They received training this week. They will be reaching out to their assigned School Leaders in the next two weeks to meet with you.
To prepare for this meeting, we encourage you to have a conversation with the school site council. In particular please consider how the needs of your community have changed this year, and if there is a way to leverage partners to address these ongoing concerns next year.
The Partnerships Office is here to assist you, please feel free to reach out at any time, mfarmer2@bostonpublicschools.org
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