During the first week of August, twelve CEA members attended the MTA Summer Conference at UMass Amherst. There was a tremendous range of experiences, almost universally significantly positive!
Mary Elizabeth Cranton, a 6th grade Math teacher at Cambridge Street Upper School, took a few workshops about student centered instruction and will put them to use in her classroom this year.
Lisa Ebel, a building substitute at the Morse School attended four workshops and participated in networking events. She found all of the workshops to be very well run, informative, and helpful to her teaching practice. The two that really stood out were “Parent and Family Engagement” and “Using Culturally Responsive Teaching Practices to Close Achievement and Opportunity Gaps”.
Terry Gist, a clerk in Food Services attended 3 workshops. The first was: Racism: What Is It and How to End It, presented by Beau Stubblefireld-Tave from the Center for Culturally Fluent Leadership in
Newton. The second was How to Connect Farm to School Projects and Wellness Initiatives for Students in Your District. She also attended the Salsa Workshop which she thoroughly enjoyed! She says “Anyone that has not attended the summer conference should try it. It is great to meet colleagues from across the state.
Kelly Graeber, a music teacher at the Morse School, took just one class: “Supporting ELLs in You Classroom.” It will fulfill her 15 PDP requirement in SEI. That said, the class was great. Teachers make great teachers! (Shocking, I know!) Her teacher modeled all of the concepts for teaching ELLs through her own teaching. She was respectful of our time and trusted us as fellow teachers. It was quite refreshing!
Rose Levine, a 5th grade teacher at Graham and Parks took a series of workshops on pedagogy and classroom culture. They were largely high quality, practical, and helpful! She took one two-day session on teaching math in small groups that will change her math instruction forever. She found it exciting to work with educators from all over the state and to be in teacher-led workshops.
Dan Monahan, the CEA President, attended the New President’s Academy and connected with MTA staff as well as current, former and new local presidents. Great workshops on a huge range of relevant topics.
Susan Moynihan, a Library Media Specialist at Kennedy Longfellow, took a workshop on creating web pages, and has applied what she learned to make this CEA website even better!
Liz Phipps-Soeiro, a library media specialist at Cambridgeport did an awesome Ed Talk on her work called “Community Connections” about her work with finding real world connections and authentic audiences for collaborative projects in school.
Betsy Preval, a 7th grade ELA teacher at Cambridge Street Upper School, attended Union School and enhanced her knowledge and skill at organizing. Looking forward to her putting these to work.
Lisa Rosenberg, a special educator at Kennedy Longfellow presented a workshop on Phonics and Encoding.
Robyn Towner, a special educator at the King School also attended the conference.