SESSION TYPE: Featured Speaker (Panel) SESSION TITLE: Middle Grades: Reading the Signs, Supporting the Transitions STRAND: Whole School Issues DAY: Friday TIME: 2:30 - 3:45pm LOCATION: Sutton Parlor Central, 2nd floor

The middle grades are a challenging time as early adolescents go through seismic development, all at different and unpredictable times. Research on this age group is revealing more information that can help teachers and schools meet these challenges. This session will look at connections between key middle grades indicators and future risk of dropping out of school, the need for adult engagement with students, special issues related to male students, the importance of literacy, and adjustments schools may have to make to engineer learning environments that will support the common core of standards. Panelist will discuss research and promising practice.

BIOGRAPHY

Kathleen M. Donahue is Vice President of the New York State United Teachers, coordinating the Program Services department. She spent more than 30 years in the elementary and middle school classroom, and is the former president of the Hilton Teachers Association and also the Monroe County Federation.

Betty Edwards is a consultant in the area of middle level education, school improvement, classroom assessment, and the connection between dropout prevention and middle grades education. Dr. Edwards recently served as Executive Director of the National Middle School Association (NMSA), the nation’s largest professional association focusing specifically on the education of young adolescents (10-15-year-olds). She led the association in the revision of This We Believe (a foundational document on middle grades education), the development of Middle Grades Assessment, and work in the area of dropout prevention, service-learning, and technology in the middle grades.

Previous to this position, Dr. Edwards served as the assistant vice president for testing and professional development for Measured Progress, a non-profit provider of customized assessment and professional development on various areas of assessment. Prior experience also included service as a middle grades teacher, assistant principal, district curriculum director, Kentucky’s state department director of curriculum and assessment development, and associate director of the National Study of School Evaluation (NSSE). In that position, she worked nationally on issues surrounding school improvement and directed development of program improvement guides on early childhood and English as a Second Language.

Betty is past president of both the National Middle School Association and the Kentucky Middle School Association and served twice as the director of the Alliance for Curriculum Reform. Dr. Edwards has served on numerous advisory boards and currently serves on the Educational Leadership Board for Special Olympics.

Andrés Henríquez is a program officer in the National Program of Carnegie Corporation of New York, where he leads the Corporation’s work on standards and assessments as well as the work in adolescent literacy. Prior to joining the Corporation, Andrés served as the Assistant Director for Strategic Planning, Center for Children and Technology (CCT) at the New York offices of the Education Development Center, Inc. He has also worked as a program officer at the National Science Foundation (NSF) in Washington, as a senior research analyst at MTV Networks, a researcher at Sesame Workshop and taught for five years at a public elementary school in East Harlem. Andrés received his undergraduate degree in psychology from Hamilton College and a M.Ed. from Teachers College, Columbia University. He is currently a Ph. D. candidate at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center.

Ernest A. Logan worked for nearly 25 years in the NYC public schools – many of those years as an Assistant Principal and Principal – before joining CSA’s staff in 1997.

That year, he became CSA’s Director of Community School Districts and worked in the field enforcing the contract and protecting his colleagues’ legal rights. In March 2000, the Executive Board chose Mr. Logan as First Vice President. A few months later, he was elected Executive Vice President. In 2006, he won the presidency in an unopposed election. Again in 2009, he won the presidency, unopposed, for a second term.

As CSA President, Mr. Logan secured a contract for his Department of Education members that provided substantial salary increases and numerous reforms including a rating system for Principals that is tied into school performance and specific leadership competencies. Mr. Logan has repeatedly called for high standards and accountability from his members, and does not accept complaints that “the job is too tough.” Mr. Logan has forged relationships with city and state officials, understanding the importance of “bridge building” as he calls it, to secure legislation, resources and policies that enable CSA members to perform their jobs to the best of their abilities.

Born in Brooklyn, one of 13 children, Mr. Logan graduated from Franklin K. Lane High School. He received his BA from SUNY Cortland and his MA in Education from Baruch College/SUNY.

City Council Speaker, Christine C. Quinn, has long advocated investment in Early Childhood Education and the Middle Grades. She organized a Middle School Task Force, which created proposals to improve middle school success in New York City. Quinn worked with the administration to provide grants to the highest need middle schools, which have since already demonstrated greater increases in test scores than the citywide average, and the Council and DOE have expanded funding to other city middle schools.