Caring for our community
Part of the mission of the Jersey City Public Schools is to help our students become engaged, impactful and caring citizens of their communities and the world. This past month, many of our schools enacted that mission through fundraisers, food drives and other other community service projects aimed at supporting people in our community. Pictured above, students at Infinity Institute collected 12 barrels of canned and dry food goods, 15 turkeys, 12 pies and 40 bottles of juice for St. Paul's Food Pantry. The Pantry distributed food to help residents in Greenville enjoy holiday feasts.
Students at PS #22, pictured below left and center, held their annual Potato March bringing in food donations as part of their Food Drive. Students brought in canned and dry goods to place in baskets. With the help of Goldman Sachs and Team Walker, the students collected enough food to provide 35 food baskets, including turkeys. In addition to the many food drives held at schools across the district, students also participated in fund-raisers. The Student Council at PS 28 organized a "Wear Pink" day to raise money for Breast Cancer Research. They donated the $1,480 they raised to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation to honor the memory of Lori Sorrentino Hennessey—a wonderful teacher who lost her battle with breast cancer last year (picture below right).
Concerned that low-income and minority students are substantially underrepresented in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) fields, the JCPS have developed programs to disrupt those trends. This fall, we partnered with Students 2 Science (S2S) to inspire, motivate and educate elementary, middle and high school students to pursue STEM careers. The partnership brings rigorous STEM education and workforce readiness skills to students by providing rich learning experiences. One component of the program brings middle school students into professional science labs to conduct experiments. Pictured above, students from MS #4 visit a state- of -the- art laboratory in East Hanover, NJ and participate in an authentic, hands-on learning experiences. Through the S2S program students get to use sophisticated laboratory instruments that are too expensive and specialized for schools to purchase. At the lab students worked side by side with practicing STEM professionals on real world problems. Some of the projects students have worked on with their mentors include assessing the quality of a cholesterol-lowering drug and studying sand particles from the Gulf of Mexico to determine the impact of the 2010 oil spill.
Its never too early to get ready for the future! Students in PS 30's chapter of the Society for Hispanic Professional Engineers attended Science Day at NJIT. Students sharpened their science, math and reasoning skills by tackling engineering challenges. Pictured below, students design balloon powered cars.
Building a sense of community within schools and with families is an important part of our work. In addition to developing students academic and cognitive skills, our schools also support student growth through deepening connections within our school communities and with our familes.
Making Peer Group Connections at Dickinson
Transitioning to high school can be very stressful for new students and success in the first year of high school is a key to success in the years that follow. To help 9th grade students make a smooth transition and make connections to their new school, Dickinson HS partnered with the Center for Supportive Schools to create the Peer Group Connection program. The program is evidence-based and supports students’ successful transition from middle to high school by leveraging the power of high school juniors as mentors for incoming freshman. Peer mentors lead sessions with their mentees that help build relationships among students within and across grades. They also work on developing essential academic, social and emotional skills including critical thinking, goal setting, decision-making, time management, teamwork and communication. through hands-on activities and simulations. "Through mentoring we continue to see an increase in positive behavior as well as attitudes among both leaders and freshmen," noted Stakeholder Coordinator and Guidance Counselor, Marissa Savino-Gonzalez. " We hope to continue in successfully developing as well as improving our goal to not only build on peer-to-peer communication, but also community involvement," she added.
PS #28 brings Literature into the Maker Space experience
Christa McAuliffe, PS #28, has been innovating with the Maker Space concept for a few years now creating unique opportunities for students to engage in art, design and engineering projects. At different times during the school year, students are given the opportunity to pick an activity from a list of options offered by teachers and to spend some of their time working on those projects. This year, the school decided to create a Literacy Maker Space. Teachers identified eight different books they wanted to offer to students and 7th and 8th grade students picked the one they wanted to read. They joined cross-grade book groups based on those choices and met with those groups during the school day. To help students decide which book to choose, the school hosted a First Impressions event so that students could listen to excerpts from the different novels. Each reading group will create a 30 second commercials for their books to share with students in grades 6-8. To help support this innovative approach, Dr. Lyles came as a guest reader. Watch this short video about the First Impressions Assembly In addition to getting the opportunity to read a book of their choice, students also get to work with students across two grades making connections to kids they would not ordinarily get to know.
On November 19, 2018, Dr. Maya Angelou, PS #20, had a father and child event by inviting dads, granddads, uncles, brothers & step-dads of students, to come out and have Pizza with Dad. Dads and their children spent quality time together enjoying activities such as soccer and double dutch, took photos together and then ate pizza. Besides having so many fathers and father figures in attendance, Mayor Steven Fulop stopped by to join the celebration to make it more special (below).
Jersey City provides a wide range of options and programs for high school students. All students can apply to Small Learning Communities and district wide programs in the Arts, Sciences and STEAM, as well as Career and Technical paths an academically accelerated programs. There are a number of upcoming events to help middle school students and their families figure out the best high school options for them. The best place to start is the Higher Initiative Project Fair (HIP Fair) at MS #7 on December 8. Our high schools also host open houses during Hello/Hola High School Week so that students and parents can see what the schools and programs are really like. See the information below for more information.
Upcoming Events
December 8, 2018--JCPS HIP Fair, 11 AM to 3 PM @ MS #7, 222 Laidlaw Ave.
December 18, 2018--Board Caucus, 6 PM @ District Office, 346 Claremont Ave
December 20, 2018--Board of Education Monthly Meeting, 6 PM @ Snyder HS, 239 Bergen Ave
December 21, 2018--Half-day session for schools, dismissal at 12:45
December 23-Jan 1--Winter break, schools closed, Central Office is open Dec. 26-28.
To submit items to Liberty Lines, email them to communications@jcboe.org. To learn more about our district, go to our website, www.jcboe.org
Credits:
Created with images by Ronile - "statue of liberty new york ny nyc"