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| 6/3/2009 11:13:00 AM Email this article • Print this article |
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New Roots Charter School Principal Tina Nilsen-Hodges, center, sits with members of the New Roots faculty in the mural lounge at the Clinton House. (Photo by Rachel Philipson) |
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Getting To Know
New Roots
Taryn Thompson
Reporter
On Sept. 9, New Roots Charter School with open in the historic Clinton House on Cayuga Street in downtown Ithaca. Recently, attention has revolved around the logistics and functionality of the school, but New Roots is not just about politics.
Principal Tina Nilsen-Hodges and Board Chairman Jason Hamilton have worked with dozens of people and entities from all over the region, including higher education institutions such as Cornell University, Ithaca College, and Tompkins County Community College, to develop a school that dedicated to equitable practices and research-based teaching methods.
State Requirements: How will New Roots meet New York standards?
The New Roots curriculum and program is designed to meet or exceed all New York state standards and graduate requirements for a Regents diploma, and support all students in being successful on New York State Regents exams. The administration has raised the bar on graduation requirements by establishing additional parameters: all seniors must complete a project that makes a tangible contribution to the Ithaca community and develop a digital graduation portfolio providing evidence of having met or exceeded all 28 state learning standards.
Like their counterparts in other New York state public high schools, New Roots students will take mandatory sequences of English, science, social studies, and mathematics curriculum, as well as health, physical education, Spanish or French, art, and music. However, expectations at the charter school are higher once again in requiring all students to follow and pass four years of study of each core subject.
New Roots students also will graduate with college credits from Tompkins County Community College. The administration is currently working with TC3 to design these courses for juniors and seniors in a way that meets college-level requirements.
While core subject curricula are designed to support success on state Regents examinations, they also are designed to integrate concepts and themes related to sustainability. Material in each course will compliment other subject matters that a student is taking through common themes and common essential questions.
Each grade level's essential question aims to engage students in real questions that concern them, provide inter-disciplinary connectedness among the classes they are taking, and to ensure continuity in their progression through the grades. The New Roots Charter School planning team has developed these themes and questions to assist students in localizing the challenges posed by climate change and global energy demands, and understanding the impact of these issues on the bioregion of New York state. The goal is to encourage students to take proactive measures in supporting the community's transition to more sustainable systems.
A Departure from Tradition: How is this different from Ithaca High School?
Hamilton said the concept of sustainability has become synonymous with words like environmentalism and carbon emissions.
"The word has come to represent a white, upper-middle class movement that takes advantage of white power," he said. "And in many communities of color, it's viewed as a negative movement."
The true essence of sustainability, however, requires "an integral melding of equity and social justice issues with environmental issues and political issues," Hamilton said.
"Our country has gone in the direction that sustainability is for a higher class; being environmentally conscious means buying a hybrid car, buying organic food, composting," he said. "But there are people who don't have the money to buy organic. There are people who feed their families with the cheapest commodity."
If this lifestyle - only accessible by the rich and privileged - continues to be promoted commercially, the U.S. is in danger of creating an "eco-apartheid," Hamilton said, quoting Van Jones, the special advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation for the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
"We end up solving issues for the wealthy and not larger issues like hunger and poverty," Hamilton said.
And so, New Roots will be based on an eclectic mix of teaching modalities to help students understand the importance of the bigger issues.
"One part of the curriculum will be problem-based, where kids will work together on a problem, and they will realize that they need each other: the rich, white kid will realize he needs the help of the poor, rural kid and of the black, urban kid," Hamilton said. "It will go beyond tolerance and coexistence to where you can't imagine doing things without the others."
Hamilton said it will help break down the barriers between the various groups in a society, the systematic separation between socioeconomic classes, racial backgrounds and cultural tendencies to where students will learn to value each other.
To this end, New Roots will strive to completely redesign the high school experience, from the way the school day is organized to the way children are integrated into the community.
"Young people know there are problems, whether its drug dealing in their neighborhood or water pollution, they know they're there and they're concerned," Hamilton said. "Why put them away for four years in a box at the edge of town when they'll walk out the door everyday and see the problem right there?"
Courses and Curriculum: How will this work?
A New Roots education is based in large part on expeditionary learning. EL schools educate students through interdisciplinary, project-based "expeditions" that culminate in exhibits, performances, publications, and public service to organizations in the community. Jeff Spence, an EL school designer, taught English and media production at Ithaca High School for 20 years and served as principal of Belle Sherman Elementary Schools for three years, before retiring last June. He will soon take the lead as New Roots's designer.
Part of expeditionary learning is an inquiry-oriented approach to teaching that encourages curiosity, discovery, problem solving, self-direction and individuality. It seeks to understand and preserve complexity through good questions rather than reducing to simple answers.
"Instead of filling the empty vessel with knowledge, expeditionary learning seeks to orchestrate the development of independent learners and thinkers," Spence said.
Another key element is standards-based curricula, which employs more of a backward path.
"The teachers start with district and state learning standards that identify the skills they want the students to acquire, and then carefully select materials, design investigations and require student projects that will demonstrate the students' achievement of those standards," Spence said.
Students don't take "field trips" as much as they participate in field work. Research shows that knowledge and skills acquired through concrete, memorable experiences affix more permanently in the brain, Spence said.
"Beyond that, when students are given some choices about how to demonstrate learning, given the responsibility of being more self-directed, given opportunities to work collaboratively on a team, given a real audience for their work products, and rewarded with celebrations of their learning on exhibition nights where their polished products are shared with their families and community, students invest much more of themselves in their work," he said, "and the return on that investment is always huge."
Day to Day: What's the schedule?
The school day will be longer and more flexible, with significant blocks of time - to the tune of two or more hours - during which students can focus on a specific activity or teachers can collaborate on projects.
The schedule is designed to optimize engagement and success, and to facilitate extended learning opportunities in the community and surrounding natural lands, according to the executive summary of New Roots's application. Students will attend class from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.
On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, students will attend core subject-area courses in hour-long blocks, in addition to a one-hour advising and school governance class called "mentoring community." On Tuesday and Thursday, students will spend time in 90-minute laboratories, art studios, internships, and field work related to core subject areas. Hamilton said this will help diffuse the current dynamic of moving kids around every 39 minutes across a large campus, which barely allows a student the chance to fully engage in the subject matter.
The main idea is a scaffolding formation of courses, where topics are woven together and remain so, as opposed to being austerely disconnected. All courses at New Roots will feature systems-thinking orientation and integration, a hallmark of sustainability education that teaches that social, economic, environmental, and personal health are all interrelated.
For example, the personal wellness core will teach physical education and health from a systems perspective, emphasizing the relationship between the environment, physical health, nutrition, and psychological wellbeing.
The Farm to Schools meals program will involve students in school meal preparation and will integrate the study of agricultural science at local farms. As a primary feature of the New Roots culture, the program will allow students to understand the relationship between human communities and economies, ecological systems, and personal wellness.
The science core will be a combination of biology, physics, geology, and chemistry in a comprehensive course called Earth Systems Science I and II in grades nine and ten respectively. It will revolve around understanding how the earth works and sustains human life, Hamilton said.
The structure of the school also will be different from traditional schooling in that students will not be separated based on ability or academic level; instead of having four different sections of math based on aptitude, or example, students at every stage will be in the same class, and will be able to expand on the varying strengths of their classmates.
Bringing it Home: Why Ithaca?
Any school and community can provide an environment through which an expeditionary style of learning is possible.
"Ithaca is especially fertile ground to feed these new roots, with its natural resources of the lake, streams, and gorges, its educational resources of local colleges, history and multicultural resource centers, downtown civic centers," Spence said, not to mention, "its vast human resources of experts in many fields, diverse neighborhood communities, cultures from all over the world, and supportive communities that care deeply about their children's education."
Teachers at New Roots will be working together to create cross-disciplinary connections and community-based projects that are related to what students are studying in all four core subjects. Not only will they be connected thematically and in coordination between teachers, but also through active hands-on learning the community in addition to the core curriculum.
"Teachers are seen as replaceable cogs that can be moved from one school to another and work in strict confines of what can be taught," he said.
At New Roots, teachers will work together as a team to achieve the foundational objectives, and each teacher will have a crucial say in what's taught and how they work together. Because of the small setting, teachers will have the opportunity to know their students as people, and can respond accordingly through teaching techniques and group efforts.
The curriculum will be complimented by service learning, through which students will be able to take part in local volunteer activities, the goal being to instill a sense of worth and importance, and the ability to be a critical component in struggles against problems of poverty and social injustice.
The curriculum provides opportunities for community-based projects that reflect student learning across the disciplines. It was therefore important for the charter school to be located in a central, localized, downtown headquarters from which access to area organizations and affiliations is easy and affordable. New Roots administration recently finalized arrangements with the Women's Community Building for use of their kitchen and auditorium, as well.
"This downtown campus model is optimal for our school concept," Nilsen-Hodges said in a report to the Board of Trustees. "We're close to the heart of downtown, using our resources in ways that benefit the wider community by supporting organizations that provide affordable downtown office space and venues to nonprofits and small businesses."
The principal stated she has initiated conversations with city engineers and the police department to ensure a smooth transition with as minimal an impact as possible on downtown traffic patterns.
"This engagement makes kids learn better and connect subjects better as they draw on all disciplines to help," Hamilton said.
Student Needs: What do they think?
Zawan Ushari is finishing her eighth grade year at Dewitt Middle School and will attend New Roots in the fall as a freshman. She spent her elementary school years in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, before her family moved to Sudan. There, she skipped grades six and eight.
"Schools there weren't challenging," she said. "So I went to ninth grade, which was boring too. In Sudan, the education we received was very poor and the teachers weren't very good either."
Ushari said that New Roots will allow her to study subjects about which she is more passionate, like literature.
"I would like to be a literary critic," she said. "I think I will have more freedom to work on what I like [and] enjoy the experience of having better teachers. New Roots gives each student a chance to work with his or her teachers individually."
That tighter bond with teachers is also important for Zoe Fassett-Manuszewski, a current eighth-grader at West Middle School in Binghamton.
"I think they're going to care a lot more about the students and parents and teachers, and I think there will be more freedom because there [will be] less students and we might do a lot of hands-on things," she said. "I also think that teachers will be able to give students more attention because they will know them better."
The school is also forward thinking, in Ushari's opinion.
"New Roots prepares students for the future," she said. "[It] is different from other public high schools because it's a bright and new idea, and the curriculum is more relevant for today. I think that New Roots won't have the strict and unnecessary rules that normal schools enforce, which gives a student less freedom"
New Roots would be a relief from the academically uninvolved and socially dysfunctional atmosphere at her school.
"It doesn't seem like anybody really cares about learning," Fassett-Manuszewski said about West Middle. "Everyone is disrespectful and they don't have any role models to look at that do care. I feel like we waste so much time in school just trying to get kids to pay attention."
That's why Fassett-Manuszewski is moving to New Roots. She will be commuting from Binghamton every day with her father, Paul Manuszewski, who will be an English teacher at New Roots.
"I'm looking forward to having so many possibilities," she said. "I feel like there's only one way to go now, but at New Roots, whatever you want to do there's a way to do it."
It's the attitudes of her current classmates from which Ushari is hoping to find solace at New Roots.
"I didn't like the fact that my classmates formed cliques in Sudan and Ithaca where I wasn't accepted," she said. "I like the opportunity of having an international education. What I don't like about all the schools I've been to is that it seems to me that students don't like to accept a student who has different interests than them. I think that learning internationally gave me a lot of experience regarding different peoples' habits and ways."
Teamwork: Where do parents and teachers stand?
Elizabeth Clark and her husband met at Cornell University and stayed in Ithaca to raise their family. Their son with autism attended public schools in the Ithaca City School District for several years, but because of bullying and medical needs, the family moved to Fredonia where they found a smaller school that could serve their son.
"One of things with high-functioning autism is that they have to learn how to script behaviors," Clark said, "and what happened is that our son has a literal interpretation of everything. If he's around a group of kids who really care about the environment and the future of America and social justice, I think he's going to learn from those children who are going to be a source of the things he needs. Otherwise, he's constantly unable to fit in a school where Miss Personality or The Jock always wins out."
Clark said the values are quite different in regular schools.
"A lot of schools have a huge disparity in outcome between groups of students," Clark added. "The big difference for us is that most public schools say, 'This is how we will teach your child' and what we're hearing from New Roots is 'How best does your child learn?' We love the whole philosophy."
Brian Scime's son is currently in eighth grade at Boynton and will attend New Roots in the fall. He said his son dislikes the social divisions that segregate students into categories of status.
"The thing about New Roots that really speaks to me is that they'll have different levels of learners all in the same class room all moving together, but at different speeds," he said. "Classes will not be set up in the same way.
Scime was part of the interviewing and hiring team for several of the incoming faculty, and said one of the traits sought in a teacher was the ability to see students in a strength-based way.
"Traditional schooling is more weakness-based, so kids end up feeling crappy about themselves," he said. "New Roots will focus more on where a child can shine and how to make that part grow."
One incoming faculty member said he was turned off by the public school system, which he found to be characterized by a robotic rigor.
"If you've ever spent any time with children, you know each one thinks differently, acts differently, and has a different personality," said Louis MacDonald, who will be teaching personal wellness.
MacDonald was a public school teacher for 10 years at schools in New York City, in a prison, and in a middle school in Florida.
"You have to be in an environment that can foster that kind of diversity, and from my experience, it's just not happening in the public school setting," he said. "It's a one-hat-fits-all ideology."
MacDonald said he was very impressed with New Roots' interview process.
"One of the things I loved was that they had students present to ask questions. I loved it; it was phenomenal," he said. "I've always advocated for students to be involved in choosing teachers. If you're not taking students' feelings and learning rate into consideration, I don't want to be a part of it."
Moving Forward: Will New Roots be ready?
New Roots recently hired six new faculty members to climb aboard, and, on June 9, New Roots will announce the names of the rest of the team. The summer will be dedicated to staff development, sustainability education training, and curricula development.
New Roots's curriculum is not specifically set in stone in the fashion of New York state's concrete formulas for teaching based on academic standards. This summer will see more configuration of the curriculum through collaboration with teachers, and the actual teaching template of core subject material is still in the process of being organized and defined. Nilsen-Hodges said faculty training and professional development scheduled during summer recess will engage teachers in working out the month to month, week to week details.
The school will draw on the expertise of two national partners to guide faculty in developing and implementing this curriculum: the State Education and Environment Roundtable, and Expeditionary Learning. Each of these organizations support the work of over 150 schools nationwide, and has extensive documentation of the efficacy of their approaches in increasing student achievement and engagement. School designers from both organizations will be working with New Roots faculty this summer to plan curriculum and projects, and to train them in active, engaging teaching methods.
Faculty will also be attending an Advanced Curriculum Design Studio with the Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education in New York City before the school opens. The Cloud Institute provides schools with rigorous, standards-based curriculum and assessment tools that support an education for sustainability: ecological literacy, systems thinking, multicultural perspectives, sustainable economics, citizenship, creativity, and the interaction between geography, ecology, and people.
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