Debate and Diplomacy in the Upper School
Journal WINTER/SPRING 2017
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Seventh through twelfth grade students made up the cast of 29, crew of 11, and five musicians who presented Into the Woods at Brooklyn Friends School on Nov. 1 7, 18, and 19, 2016. With music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, the musical was originally directed on Broadway by James Lapine, with orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick. For the BFS production, faculty Lorna Jordan was the Director, Lisa Burns was the Musical Director, Andres Puigbo was Technical Director and Catherine Clark was the Costume Designer.
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20th Annual Quaker Youth Leadership Conference at Brooklyn Friends School and Mary McDowell Friends School Brooklyn, New York • February 2—4, 2017
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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Guided by the Quaker belief
Message from the Head of School
that there is a Divine Light in everyone, Brooklyn Friends School cultivates an intellectually ambitious and diverse community that celebrates each individual’s gifts. We challenge our students to value and embrace difference as they develop critical thinking skills and apply their knowledge and intelligence both in and out of the classroom. In this rich learning environment, we inspire all members of our community to voice their convictions, to discover and pursue their passions, and to seek truth. Our graduates are compassionate, curious, and confident global citizens who let their lives speak in the spirit of leadership and service.
At BFS, You Can Go Home Again Debate and Diplomacy in the Upper School Light the Way: A Spectacular Success for Friends Alumni Profile: Kyle Neptune ’03 Alumni Class Notes Lower School: Move Over, Dear Diary Life in the BFS Family Center Middle School: The World Is Their Oyster Cooking Up Projects in the Preschool Niamh Henchy ’18: Portrait of a Young Friend A Teacher’s Journey, Sustained by Friends
Please visit the BFS website, www.brooklynfriends.org/journal to read articles and view photos of our students’ academic, arts, athletics, equity and inclusion, and service learning programs in the fall and winter of the 2016-17 school year.
BROOKLYN FRIENDS SCHOOL JOURNAL is published by the Advancement Office of Brooklyn Friends School for alumni, parents, grandparents, faculty, and friends. 375 Pearl Street • Brooklyn, NY 11201 Tel: 718.852.1029 • brooklynfriends.org Joan Martin, Editor
Journal
Emmitt Sklar ’17, a leader of the Brooklyn Friends Model United Nations team, at the UN General Assembly during the UNIS-UN Conference.
WINTER/SPRING 2017
COV ER PHOTO:
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A MESSAGE FROM
Dr. Larry Weiss Head of School
The greater Brooklyn Friends School community is poised to embark on the celebration of our 150th year of fulfilling BFS' educational mission as a Quaker institution of learning, and planning for this momentous occasion is now under way.
The past provides crucial guidance for making the best choices in charting our futures as individuals, families, members of organizations, and global citizens.
The sesquicentennial 2017-18 school year, which begins next September, will be filled with celebrations and opportunities to look back at the extraordinary creativity, spirituality, resilience, and longevity reflected in our history. It will be a time to look forward to the promise and possibilities of our next 150 years. Having myself spent the last 50 years studying and teaching various sub-fields of history, I maintain a very strong belief that trying to understand the past is central to being able to grapple productively with the conflicting positive and negative forces that shape the present. The past also provides crucial guidance for making the best choices in charting our futures as individuals, families, members of organizations, and global citizens. Embracing the sesquicentennialâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s opportunities for a celebratory historical reflection is thus a personal priority for me as it is for the Brooklyn Friends School Board of Trustees. We want to provide every opportunity to engage the key constituencies that have made Brooklyn Friends a valuable, meaningful, growing and thriving educational enterprise including: our current students and alumni; our faculty and staff and their predecessors; parents and grandparents of students and graduates; contributors, supporters, and advisors of our past and present initiatives, particularly from Friends meetings and organizations; as well as the Trustees and former Trustees who have assumed the legal and fiscal responsibility for BFS' educational mission and its institutional viability and sustainability. The Sesquicentennial Steering Committeeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s operations are already underway. Its main goals are to oversee all of the initiatives that will take place throughout the year, and to re-engage members of our larger community in this momentous and joyous occasion. There will be many opportunities for individuals to be involved in the Steering Committeeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work and in the planning of so many activities throughout the year, and we welcome your input. Please don't hesitate to contact Karen Edelman, Director of Advancement or me, with your thoughts about how we can broaden and deepen participation in the celebration of our 150th year. In friendship,
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At Brooklyn Friends School,
YOU CAN GO HOME AGAIN by Lekeia Varlack Judge ’99
team. In a touching On Jan. 4, 2017, moment, David, our young Felix and Tiffany alumni came presented Thomas back to visit BFS with the 2014 and share their championship experiences banner, since they last commemorating walked the his contribution to halls of 116 BFS Athletics. Lawrence Street Head of School Dr. Larry Weiss thanking the Class of 2016 for their Legacy Gift. as seniors. They That evening, began the day by a select group imparting their wisdom and advice about college life in a group of young alums participated on a panel for incoming and session with our current seniors. Afterwards they mingled with prospective families and students, discussing their experience one another, visited teachers, toured the Upper School building attending Brooklyn Friends. Cassie Broadus Foote ’01 and enjoyed lunch in our café with students and staff. moderated the lively discussion. The former students wonderfully expressed the range of educational, social, and This year was a bit different from our previous young alumni service learning opportunities that were available to them and reunions. In addition to the regular activities, we hosted a class enlightened the audience about how truly special it is to receive photo dedication for the Class of 2016, highlighting their senior a BFS education. legacy gift. The group portrait was taken by alumna Elinor Hills ’14; the large framed photograph beautifully captures our Young Alumni Day most recent graduating class and is now prominently displayed is always a fun, in front of the Alumni Office at Lawrence Street. vibrant day that reminds the BFS Parents, young alums, and other members of our community faculty of how lucky attended the photo dedication. It was punctuated by brief we are to have had speeches by Head of School, Dr. Larry Weiss and Kathryn the opportunity to Collins, Associate Director of Advancement. Each described teach and mentor the significance of that moment and the impact of the senior these young adults. legacy gift, which in 2016 raised more than $40,000. We hope that they After the dedication, Athletic Director David Gardella and Thomas Chamberlain ’15 at right with Athletic visit us often, stay Director David Gardella and teammate Chris coaches Felix Alberto and Tiffany Huggins, along with connected, and Boyd ’15 looking on at left. former teammates, showed special recognition to alum Thomas give back to BFS Chamberlain ’15. Now at Stanford University, Thomas is regularly as they credited with forming the School’s first Boys Varsity Volleyball continue to make strides within the alumni community.
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Debate & Diplomacy in the Upper School by Jeffrey Stanley The BFS Model United Nations (MUN) team has gone from strength to strength in the 2016-17 academic year. The fundamental purpose of this activity is to debate international issues in a model United Nations forum through discussion, the sharing of ideas, and working collaboratively with others. BFS student-delegates have done just that and more: they have garnered an impressive array of honors at each of the MUN conferences they have attended since October.
MUN CONFERENCE AT THE UN INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL
Outstanding Delegation
The group won the Best Small Delegation award at Columbia University’s MUN Conference and Exposition held on Jan. 12-15, 2017. Thousands of high school students from across the U.S. and internationally participate in the conference, which is known for its highly dynamic crisis-style committees. Delegates of all levels are challenged to think quickly and creatively in response to new scenarios and events. At Columbia, these ranged from Caesar’s Rome and the Fall of Constantinople to Nixon’s National Security Council and Putin’s Cabinet. In addition to the delegation prize, individual awards at the Columbia MUN Conference went to Isaac Handy ’17 as Best Delegate, Sophia Lipkin ’18 and Emmitt Sklar ’17 as Outstanding Delegates, and Claudius Agrippa ’17 and Miles Nabritt ’17, who received Honorable Mention certificates.
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MODEL UNITED NATIONS
Penn Conference Delegation
Just two weeks later, the BFS delegation traveled to Philadephia on Jan. 26 to participate in the Ivy League Model United Nations Conference, hosted by the University of Pennsylvania. At Penn, Emmitt won the Best Delegate award, representing German journalist and politician Hellmut von Gerlach in the Ad Hoc Committee. “This committee was the most elite in the conference,” said faculty advisor Vlad Malukoff. “It was by invitation only. The scenario was that Germany had won World War I, and they were meeting to decide the fate of a defeated Europe at a peace conference in 1919.” Three student-delegates won Honorable Mentions at the Penn Conference – Miles, representing the Vatican in the Historical General Assembly, 1946; Merry Parasol ’20 representing the Vatican in the Social, Cultural and Humanitarian Committee; and Sophia, who represented Elisa Bonaparte in the Crisis Committee “Bonaparte Family Dinner.” Other students participating at Penn were Isaac Handy ’17, Amanda Becker ’18, Aishat Adekunle ’18, Tae Kang ’18, Rachel Freedman ’19, Devon Schwitzman ’19, Maxine Simons ’19, Tenzin Chusar ’19, Charlie Dalton ’19, and Helen Lipsky ’19.
All in a Day's Work at Horace Mann Earlier in the school year, on Oct. 22, 2016, ten members of the team competed in a grueling daylong meet at Horace Mann School in Riverdale. Four students received awards. Emmitt, who represented the notorious and controversial FBI director J. Edgar Hoover on the United States National Security Council: 1948, an Historical Crisis Committee, was named Best Delegate. Honorable Mention certificates went to Nat Efrat-Henrici ’17, who sat on the Historical Crisis Committee representing the Chinese Communist Party of 1945; and continues on next page
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Debate & Diplomacy in the Upper School continued from previous page
Merry and Alyssa Williams ’19, who represented Turkey on the Historical Economic and Social Council Committee and the UN High Commission for Refugees, respectively. The BFS team as a whole also received Honorable Mention at the Horace Mann Conference, after going up against Model UN stalwarts Bergen County Academies and the Dalton School. “To put our performance in context,” said history teacher and faculty advisor Vlad, “Bergen County Academies is ranked in the top 25 Model UN teams in the United States and Dalton is a perennial Top Ten team nationally.”
Today's Students, Tomorrow's Leaders For those not familiar, “Model UN is an activity where young people from all over the world come to one place to simulate the United Nations,” explained Merry. “We’re given countries or people to represent. We do our research on the issue, and we then go into a committee where our goal is to push forward the ideas of that country or person. We put these ideas and proposals formally into a resolution that the majority of the other countries or people there would agree with.” New to BFS this year as a ninth grader, Merry has been involved with the junior Model UN program in middle school. “It’s an activity unlike any others that I know of,” she said. “It challenges you both intellectually and socially as you make solutions to problems that both promote your views but are diplomatic enough to have others accept them. The greatest personal reward of Model UN for me is improving my ability to speak publicly, use diplomacy, and have a chance to meet new people.” Merry sees herself pursuing a career in politics “and hopefully to have some sort of meaningful effect on the world,” she said. “The art of diplomacy is an important component of that,” she added. “What better way to learn than in a competitive, entertaining environment?” Senior Emmitt has been involved with Model UN since ninth grade and became team co-captain last year along with classmate Miles. “I enjoy the opportunity to meet people from around the world as well as the chance to explore different aspects of international affairs and history,” said Emmitt of his passion. “Model UN has inspired my interests in international affairs, economics, and political science and those are topics I plan to pursue in college.” FROM LEFT: Justin Williams, Merry Parasol, and Amanda Becker at the UN General Assembly during the UNIS-UN Conference.
The duo of Emmitt and Miles are filling huge shoes left by alums Abraham Axler ’13, Ben Waldman ’14, and Otis Hatfield ’15. Abraham, now a Presidential Scholar at the University of Virginia, made a generous designated gift to BFS to honor those students
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PAYING IT FORWARD who excel at Model UN annually. Upon his graduation from BFS, he created and named the Samuel Pemberton Award for Diplomatic Excellence, which carries a monetary prize for every student who wins Best Delegate, Outstanding Delegate and Honorable Mention at a collegiate Model United Nations Conference.
Model UN is considered an SLA, or Student Led Activity, at the school. These activities meet a minimum of once a week during
“International Night”
the school day, and membership
Model UN has been steadily gaining in popularity in the Upper School for the past several years. On a special evening last May, some 40 BFS students, parents and faculty gathered in the Upper School Café for the first Brooklyn Friends Model UN fundraising dinner. The appropriately named International Night featured a potluck dinner prepared by 15 Model UN students and their families. Team member Amanda Becker ’18 and her family organized the evening.
of the grades, 9 through 12. The
is a mix of students from each
Vlad was effusive in his praise for the financial and social success of the event. “We had food from Poland, Italy, China, Spain, Korea, Nigeria, Vietnam, Guyana, Tibet, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Germany, Jewish Eastern Europe and Haiti,” he said, rolling off the countries and cultures. Amanda’s family also arranged for a stellar GUEST guest speaker, former US State Department SPEAKER official Jonathan Brecht. Born and raised in Jonathan New York City, the veteran diplomat spent his career in the US Foreign Service. He studied Brecht Arabic and Middle East affairs, and worked for the State Department’s Near East Asian Bureau in Saudi Arabia and Washington. Jonathan was involved in high level decision-making as it related to Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, oil policies and pricing, terrorism, the influence of religion on regional politics and Palestinian-Israeli relations among other, often contradictory, areas of US foreign policy. Guest speaker Jonathan Brecht “It was a great way to bring the community together and learn about the world in a real way,“ said Vlad of Jonathan’s presentation. “Our media is dominated by either the liberal-interventionist worldview or the neo-con worldview. Jonathan stressed that we need more of a realist perspective, which is not even represented in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, or New York Times.”
parents of this year’s senior class recently announced that their 2017 Senior Legacy Gift would be funding to continue and expand SLAs at the school. Their gifts, which will be pooled into an endowment fund, are intended to be a meaningful way for parents to recognize their child’s achievements and to honor their place in BFS history. At the same time, the gifts acknowledge the exceptional opportunities students have enjoyed here and helps make certain that such opportunities are available to future students. This year’s 15 SLAs include Debate, Environmental/Earth Day, Exercise & Fitness, Film, Gay-Straight Alliance, P.E.A.C.E., WordFlirt, Youth Action Project, El Club Latino and, of course, Model UN among many others.
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1.
Light the Way: A Spectacular Success for Friends by Karen Edelman On Oct. 27, 2016 – the night of one of the first major storms of the fall season – another chapter was added to the history of Brooklyn Friends School. At our newly completed facility at 116 Lawrence Street, the community gathered together to celebrate the completion of our most successful philanthropic initiative to date – the Light the Way capital campaign. The campaign was a three-year initiative that raised $7.5 million to support the school’s educational programming, our faculty, and our commitment to financial aid. Moreover, the campaign was vital to the support of the construction of the new Upper School facility. The $7.5 million figure represents
comprehensive giving to the Brooklyn Friends Fund, annual gala benefits, and capital gifts to support the upper school facility and the School’s endowment.
commitment and the dedication that our families, grandparents, alumni and friends have in the unique kind of individual we are shaping at Brooklyn Friends.”
While the rain poured down and the wind blew outside, the atmosphere inside Lawrence Street was warm and celebratory. Friends representing all the school’s stakeholders gathered together to congratulate one another on the campaign’s success. Karen Edelman, Director of Advancement, thanked the capital campaign cabinet and parent chairs, Mark and Allison Dunn, for their exemplary leadership. She stated that the gifts that were made to help build this beautiful building that we are currently standing in were a reflection of “the
Allison spoke of the passion that she and Mark have for the values that Brooklyn Friends instills in our students and how their sons, now in first and fourth grades, have thrived at BFS since their early childhood years. She said that it had been a privilege to lead this philanthropic effort. A special treat of the night was the surprise appearance of two members of our community. Michael Phillips is an alumni parent, a current grandparent, and was the Clerk of the School Committee (Board of Trustees)
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2. 3.
5.
when the school’s last major real estate decision was made – to purchase the 375 Pearl Street building. In addition, Kenneth Lightell, former head of the Middle School, was visiting from North Carolina. Ken was instrumental in creating a strong middle school program that is thriving today. Dr. Larry Weiss had the honor of welcoming them both and highlighting their role in the past that has made BFS a success today.
6.
4.
7.
1. Gustav Peebles, Brad Mulder ’83 (board co-chairs), Allison Dunn, Mark Dunn (campaign co-chairs). 2. Parents Ambereen Sleemi, Monifa Bandele. 3. Parents James Logatto and David Kim. 4. Michael Phillips, Kenneth Lightell and Charlotte Lightell, Larry Weiss. 5. Parents Sabrina LeBlanc, Vanessa McGuire. 6. Head of Upper School Sidney Bridges, alumni parents Hildemarie and Alex Ladouceur. 7. Alumni parents Ricardo Granderson and Alisa Martin with parent Amy Lazarides.
Looking Forward, Giving Back – A Brooklyn Friends Tradition The presence of alumni, alumni parents and alumni faculty at the Oct. 27 celebration of the capital campaign underscores the important role of previous generations in the history of the School. “Looking forward, giving back” – the theme of the 2016-17 Brooklyn Friends Fund –embodies both the history of the school and the Quaker principle of stewardship. Our school’s longevity and strength is based on the generosity and commitment of generations of trustees, parents, grandparents, faculty, students, alumni and Quakers going back almost 150 years. Today’s families stand on the shoulders of previous generations who gave generously to sustain and enhance the Brooklyn Friends School program. Just as in the past, Brooklyn Friends School continues to rely on the extended community to support and build upon all areas of school life and operations as well as financial aid. Please give online at: www.brooklynfriends.org/donate.
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ALUMNI PROFILE:
Kyle Neptune ’03 by Jeffrey Stanley
While countless basketball fans were wowed by the Villanova Wildcats’ explosive NCAA tournament victory last April, the BFS community was particularly thrilled because alum Kyle Neptune ’03 is an Assistant Coach with the team. A star on the legendary BFS State Championship team of 2003, Kyle attended Lehigh University where he played for the Mountain Hawks for four years. As a junior he went up against Villanova and logged 33 minutes as the starting forward. He was named Lehigh’s team captain during senior year but more surprises were in store for him. Kyle entered BFS in sixth grade. “I was born in Fort Greene and we moved a couple blocks to Clinton Hill when I was young,” he recalled. “A couple of friends of mine went to BFS and we were close with the families. I had gone to school with them for years at PS 261 so it was an easy transition.” Science teacher Hyacinth Foster (now a faculty alumna) helped ensure Kyle’s academic success at the school. “Hyacinth is from Jamaica, my parents are Caribbean, so we had a connection that way,” he said. “I looked at her like a mother away from home because she was so similar to my mom.” He credits the development of his basketball prowess to Athletic Director David Gardella and History teacher Vlad Malukoff, who was also Head Basketball Coach at the time. “I actually became pretty fond of history because his classes were so interesting,” Kyle recalled.
Kyle on the sidelines with Villanova
“The biggest thing about Quaker values that helps me now is that you deal with all different types of people...”
Former English teacher Day Rosenberg, no longer at BFS, was also an influence. “He was a great guy. I was a little bit of a knucklehead back then,” Kyle confessed, “and I remember not wanting to disappoint him. He talked to you. He was fair. I really liked him.” After graduating from Lehigh as team captain, Kyle spent a year pursuing an overseas basketball career. “I was in Lithuania, Latvia, Puerto Rico,” he said. Toward the end of that year one of Kyle’s friends, a scout with the New Jersey Nets, asked him to tag along to some NBA camps. “So I caught the bug there,” he said in reference to his future coaching career. “These were high school camps that my friend used to coach at while he was a scout, part-time, and I became a counselor at a couple of them. I learned this is pretty cool. It was enjoyable.”
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At the end of that summer, Kyle found himself at a professional crossroads. “I was bouncing around and trying to play professional, and making the choice to embark on this new step into coaching. For a basketball player, you plan to do this your whole life. You’re always thinking, I can do this forever. Ninety percent of the players feel that way. To say, I’m done with this, I’m moving on, is one of the hardest things you’ll do as a basketball player.” He sought advice from his former coaches and mentors at AAU Boys Basketball, a national sports education nonprofit. “To high school basketball, AAU in New York is huge,” Kyle explained. “There are a bunch of events during which all-star high school teams come together and compete. We had a reputation of having the best teams. The coaches were legends almost. Bigtime guys in the basketball world.” Soon after reaching out to them, he got an offer from Villanova for a video coordinator position. “Long story short, three weeks later I had the job at 23 years old.” In this unique job, Kyle specialized in on-court teaching, player development, and recruiting.
good at this job are maniacal, so to compete against these people you have to be the same way.” This busy young teacher, mentor, coach and player has seen the world but he still looks back fondly on his days at BFS and the culture he experienced here during his most formative years. “The biggest thing about Quaker values that helps me now is that you deal with all different types of people: Black, white, gay, straight, whatever,” he said. “You build bonds with all different types of people no matter what you are, and in a way that you’re getting to know them and respect them no matter what their beliefs.” “That helps in the real world,” he added, “especially in this business, because you’re dealing with so many different types of families, fans, media people, administrators...a lot of people with a lot of different intentions. At BFS you were exposed to that, and everyone was allowed to be themselves and not being judged, which is a rare experience for most students. It’s been pretty valuable to me.”
His career didn’t stop there. “Then I was lucky enough to get a job as assistant coach at Niagara University. I was there for three years. My last year we won our league championship,” he said. “My boss ended up getting a job coaching at Hofstra because of the year we’d had. He asked if I would come with him. I was so happy to come back to New York.” It was good to be back home near family and friends but he was only at Hofstra for six months when Villanova came calling a second time. “A Villanova coach took a job with the Philadelphia 76ers. I got a call from Coach Wright and he asked if I’d be interested in coming back.” Oh yes he certainly was, and that’s where he remains. For now. Does he have any hobbies or passions outside of basketball? Not on your life. “The basketball business is in a lot of ways a full-time thing,” he said. “If you work in sports at a high level this is a 365 thing. If you don’t love this thing, you won’t last. The people who are really
Kyle in action as a player at Lehigh University.
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Alumni Class Notes by Lekeia Varlack Judge ’99
1940s
Malcom Bell ’49 wrote the non-fiction book, The Attica Turkey Shoot, which is a riveting story that details the infamous 1971 uprising at Attica Correctional Facility and Malcolm’s role as the prosecutor in the subsequent trial. This story is a firsthand account of crime, punishment and the hypocrisy of the criminal justice system from Malcolm’s experience in this historic event. Sounds like a great, informative read.
1970s
Burke Fitzpatrick ’72 retired in July after 35 years of service with the State of South Carolina and now he spends his free time in self-described “Bucket List” territory. The last 23 years of his professional life were with the South Carolina Department of Public Safety, where he administered law enforcement grants focusing on juvenile justice and compensation to crime victims. Now he is the captain of his parachute exhibition team and plans on adding to 5,356 jumps with more skydiving and BASE-jumping. Wow! When speaking of Brooklyn Friends, Burke adds, “Those 13 years at BFS seem only a moment ago.” Marcus Levitt ’72 and his wife Alice are spending this academic year in St. Petersburg, Russia, where he is on sabbatical/research leave from the University of Southern California. Together with Russian colleagues, Marcus has
been working on the publication of a critical edition of the works of a major but mostly forgotten 18th century Russian writer, Alexander Sumarokov. Upon their return to the US in the spring, the couple will be moving from L.A. to Medford, Oregon. Widely published with an undergraduate degree from Haverford College with a Ph.D. from Columbia University, Marcus plans to begin an early retirement, although he intends to continue research and writing.
1980s
When you can, take some time to check out National Geographic’s documentary Before The Flood, directed by actor and director Fisher Stevens ’81. This documentary follows Leonardo DiCaprio as he conducts interviews with world leaders discussing the climate change crisis and potential solutions. Fisher, who was our George Fox Award recipient in 2014, won an Academy Award for his last documentary, The Cove. We appreciate his efforts is raising awareness about this important issue. While flipping through the channels, you might have caught Josh Cox ’82 on Criminal Minds season 11, episode 1. As an actor, Josh has appeared on several popular series, including Friends, CSI, and Nashville. Look out for him on your favorite show. Since graduation, Kate Tanenbaum ’86 has continued her education at various colleges. In 1994 she obtained a B.A. in Liberal Arts from Evergreen State College, located in Olympia, WA. After coming to terms with a major
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health condition, Kate became a Hospital Volunteer and is now in her fifth year of volunteer service. In her spare time she writes poetry and enjoys reading with the New York Public Library. Kate is forever thankful to all her BFS teachers and to her family for their simple encouragement. Lisa Varlack Betts ’87 has kicked off the new year by starting her own real estate company, Brooklyn Quarters. This boutique firm specializes in the brokerage of commercial and residential properties throughout the New York City area. Best of luck with your new endeavors, Lisa.
1990s Everyone is rooting for Jazelyn Montanez ’98, who is an avid runner and marathoner. Jazz bounced back from a hip fracture in time to compete in the NYC Marathon in November 2016, finishing in 4 hours and 3 minutes. She is currently training for the next NYC marathon and just got selected for the Chicago marathon in October 2017. We look forward to seeing your progress, Jazelyn, and will be cheering you on from the sidelines.
2010s
Congratulations are in order for Sophia Ladouceur ’10, who recently was married to a fellow alum from College of the Holy Cross. We wish you the best of luck on your nuptials! After recently graduating from Wesleyan University, Jessica Carlson ’12 has started work as a promotional review associate for Hill Holliday in the field of pharmacology advertising.
Congratulations to Abraham Axler ’13 on being awarded the prestigious Marshall Scholarship while attending the University of Virginia as a Jefferson Scholar. This highly selective scholarship finances the living and educational expenses of “intellectually distinguished” American students for study in the United Kingdom. The Marshall Scholarship was created in 1953 by the British Parliament in recognition of the tremendous support Americans gave the UK through the Marshall Plan. Abraham applied for the scholarship through the New York region, the most competitive of all with a 3% award rate. A Politics Honors major, Abraham will be attending graduate school at the London School of Economics, where he will be working towards a Master of Science degree in Social Policy and an M.S.C. in Political Communication. We are truly proud of your accomplishments, Abraham.
Alumnae (from left) Crystal Backus ’96, Lekeia Varlack Judge ’99, Susan Price ’86, and Cassie Broadus Foote ’01 are among the alum members of our 150th anniversary celebration steering committee.
To share your news, please send an email message to alum@brooklynfriends.org, telephone 718-852-1029, ext. 208, or write on the reply envelope when you send your gift to the Brooklyn Friends Fund. In addition to sharing your accomplishments and milestones, we very much enjoy printing photos of your families and happy occasions!
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Move Over, Dear Diary Lifebooks Come Alive as Part of the Third Grade Writing Curriculum
by Jeffrey Stanley The third grade lifebooks start as simple black marbled notebooks, and the students’ first goal is to personalize them. They begin by collecting clippings to decorate the book’s covers in ways that reflect their personal interests; photos of New York, family members, and animals abound. The blank pages inside are also gradually personalized, one thought at a time. “The book becomes a place to collect ideas,” explained Lower School Teacher Julia Smith. “The children are planting seeds to see which things they want to grow.”
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“The sense of ownership is something that really resonates with 3rd graders, and they treat their lifebooks as treasured objects from the moment they receive them.” — Sarah Gordon
Take this (shortened) entry by one of the students on the topic of “Memories,” written in the form of a list: First time my brother is at camp; Acadia; Grampa dies; Learning about seals; Women’s world cup; Christmas in Charlottesville; My first bike. Everyone’s memories are unique, and each of them could readily form the basis of a longer, more descriptive, yet deeply personal story. By the end of the first writing unit, Personal Narratives, the students have written and polished a piece of work based on an entry in their lifebook. They bind each of their finished narratives and share their works with their classmates and parents at a morning “publishing party.”
Refine and Enhance The lifebook has been a fixture of the BFS third grade curriculum for some time now; based on their own teaching experiences over the past several years, in which they refine and enhance their practices, Julia and her head teacher colleagues Sarah Gordon and David Bournas-Ney have made it a signature third grade program. One of the teachers’ inspirations is Ralph Fletcher’s A Writer’s Notebook, in which the author makes clear that such a book is not a diary or a class journal in which students are given precise assignments. Fletcher instead compares the notebook to a woodland ditch filled with fresh rainwater and colonies of growing creatures. “A writer’s notebook is like that ditch – an empty space you dig in your busy life, a space that will fill up with all sorts of fascinating little creatures. If you dig it they will come. You’ll be amazed by what you catch there.”
One of the benefits of the lifebooks curriculum is that it appeals to a range of writers at various levels in their skills development. “Lifebook writing allows reluctant writers the freedom to explore and be inspired by topics that truly interest them,” said 3B Head Teacher David. “It also creates differentiation in that each writer can experiment with the new techniques, language and ideas for which they feel ready.” Now in her 12th year at Brooklyn Friends School , 3A Head Teacher Sarah takes a long view of the value of lifebooks. “When we hand children their lifebooks at the beginning of the year, I always tell my class that years from now they are going to be able to look back at their lifebooks and know all about who they were as eight and nine year olds,” she said. “They will see what memories were important to them, what they were learning about, what they were worried about, what they loved, what they imagined and what they thought about.”
A Source of Inspiration Children’s book author Julie Sternberg, whose daughters are now in high school, was so pleased by the lifebooks that her children kept in third grade that she was inspired to write a series of books based on the concept. The Top Secret Diary of Celie Valentine chapter books. Friendship Over and Secrets Out! were the first two in the The Top Secret Diary of Celie Valentine chapter books series. “I was the kind of kid who loved the idea of writing every day but was too lazy to put pen to paper,” she said. “I so wish now I had filled the pages of those lock-and-key diaries I begged my parents to buy instead of only the first few.”” Her regret-tinged nostalgia explains in part her appreciation for the lifebook project. “I thought it would result in a collection of writings that my daughters would end up treasuring,” she said. “And, in fact, it did. We all love everything about the lifebooks now.” continues on next page
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Julie initially envisioned the Celie Valentine series of books as a collection of lifebook-like journals in her protagonist’s life. She described her vision of “a collection of writings in a variety of formats – some journal entries, some responses to writing prompts – by a girl in a lower school.” In the end, in order to smooth out the narrative, Julie converted the books into a more straightforward diary format, with other kinds of writings taped inside the diary. “Regardless, she continued, “the BFS third grade lifebook project was absolutely a primary inspiration for the series.”
How It Works Lifebook homework involves daily writing exercises “to build up their muscles,” said teacher Julia, “both the graphomotor ones and their endurance for the writing process.” Students also read personal narratives written from young peoples’ perspectives, like How to Get Famous in Brooklyn by Amy Hest, in which an 8-year-old’s writer’s notebook is lost and scattered to the wind, making her a celebrity. “The book is very sensory in terms of the writer’s explorations of her neighborhood,” said Julia. “We then ask the kids to go off and write about a place they know well.” As for their own personal narratives, the second stage is reflecting back over the contents of their lifebooks and finding an idea about which they wish to write in more depth. Students put careful thought into selecting which piece they will write about, spending a full month crafting and honing their narrative to share with an audience. After planning, drafting, revising, and editing, students copy their finished personal narratives by hand into handcrafted books that are displayed in the classroom. Students read and comment on each other’s work, and parents are also invited in to view them. The lifebooks and their seed ideas will continue to accompany the students throughout the year’s writing units including fiction, poetry, and sometimes an intersection with the social studies curriculum.
Incubating Ideas Lower School Curriculum Coordinator Diane Mackie is an ardent lifebook fan and advocate. “I like that it engages kids to write in a way that is individual and personal, that it’s a readily available avenue for kids to share thoughts, feelings, ideas, wonderings. Kids can run with it, walk with it, meander and ponder, as they choose.” Like author Julie Sternberg, Diane’s own two children went through the program. “Some children fill two or more composition notebooks a year loving the opportunity to collect ‘seeds’ for possible longer pieces or for future more developed stories or to document their lives,” she explained. “Others are not nearly as prolific and may just meet the requirement of four small pieces of writing a week. I had one of each child as a parent.” As with Julie’s daughters, and doubtless many others, Diane’s now-young adult children look back on their lifebooks with pride, she says. “They delight in the written record of their third grade year and reconnect to the spirit and soul of who they were or continue to be. It’s a lens into their 8-9 year old selves.” Diane recalled a quote from the influential Fletcher: “A writer’s notebook is like an incubator: a protective place to keep your infant idea safe and warm, a place for it to grow while it is too young, too new, to survive on its own. In time you may decide to go back to that idea, add to it, change it, or combine it with another idea. In time the idea may grow stronger, strong enough to have other people look at it, strong enough to go out on its own.”
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Life in the Family Center Making the Case for Books and Reading – Right from the Start by Sara Soll
All areas of early childhood development, including literacy, reading and writing, thrive on hands-on, open ended, exploratory and repeated play, observation and experiences. As the interactive zerotothree.org website puts it: “Early language and literacy (reading and writing) development begins in the first three years of life and is closely linked to a child’s earliest experiences with books and stories. The interactions that young children have with such literacy materials as books, paper, and crayons and with the adults in their lives are the building blocks for language, reading and writing development.” We don’t formally teach reading and/or writing in the Family Center. Literacy development is a continuous process that is seamlessly integrated into all areas of learning and development. Children build knowledge and understanding through interaction, observation and imitation of all that they see and hear. Almost everything a child does in the classroom is supporting the development of reading, writing and literacy: • Reading to children is the early experience that has been clearly identified to make a difference in learning to read. • Listening to and looking at books is enjoyable. • Reading books introduces children to the form and structure of written language. It acquaints them with important literary conventions such as how to hold a book, turn the pages, and follow from left to right. • Observing reading, writing, and talking throughout the day in both intentional and spontaneous moments. • Familiarity with print and some of its uses happens through “reading” the daily classroom schedule, following a recipe, listening to a story, and looking at books.
• Open-ended materials and activities help fine motor coordination and visual discrimination through sorting, matching and sequencing. • Language development and self expression develop as children learn to listen; understand; express themselves verbally; build vocabularies through play, stories, books, dramatic play, circle time, drawing and painting. • Playing “pretend,” which is a symbolic activity, allows the children to develop an understanding of abstract symbols and how they represent the concrete.
Reading and writing in the Family Center are supported continually in ways that are developmentally appropriate for two and three year olds. These activities are a part of everyday classroom life and give the children many opportunities to build a solid foundation of skills necessary for later, more abstract reading and writing. In many ways, they are the building blocks for lifelong learning – something that we advocate right from the start.
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The World Is Their yster Middle Schoolers Take to the Streets and Embrace the Cultural Treasures of New York by Jeffrey Stanley Brooklyn Friends School may be in an urban setting, but in this city we have tremendous resources that enhance learning, not to mention an excellent mass transit system. Middle School faculty members are known for taking particular advantage of these resources, and have done so for many years. The trips are deeply embedded into the curriculum and have become a vital part of life in grades 5 through 8.
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THE CLOISTERS MUSEUM On Nov. 29 and Dec. 2, History Teachers Ticia Vreeland and Amanda Goodwin trekked with their 6th grade students – in two groups on different days, no less – to visit The Cloisters Museum in Upper Manhattan. Fortunately they had chaperoning help from Science Teacher Janet Villas, Middle School Dean Laurice Hwang, Learning Specialist M’Balia Rubie-Miller and Latin Teacher Katy Koken. “Two trips was difficult for us,” said Ticia, “but it was the best thing for the children.” The extra trip was needed this year due to the growth in 6th grade enrollment, which now stands at 69. For those not familiar, The Cloisters Museum is located in Fort Tryon Park and is part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The collection, specializing in medieval European art and architecture, consists of four real cloisters from French monasteries and an abbey that were transported here and reconstructed in the 1930s, along with real indoor chapels from the era. A set of authentically reconstructed medieval gardens surrounds it. “The tour we took was named Medieval Life,” explained Ticia, “but we specifically asked to see the
Unicorn Tapestries, the Annunciation Triptych, the Three Kings statues, and some reliquaries, [which are containers for holy relics.]” “Amanda and I each teach two sections of History,” she continued. “The curriculum starts with the Bible and then moves to medieval Europe, the medieval Middle East and the development of Islam, and ending with medieval West Africa. This trip and the Feb. 7 visit to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine are part of the Medieval Europe study.” At the Cathedral, the students had a guided tour and learned about the building's similarities and differences with an authentic medieval cathedral. “It’s a great way for sixth graders to see Cathedral design and architecture in person,” explained Ticia. “We saw firsthand what we’ve been reading about come alive.”
THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM Fifth Grade Teacher Samantha Laserson, in her first year at BFS, hopped on the field trip bandwagon, joining with fellow Fifth Grade Teachers Alison Mirylees and Margaret Trissel to plan cultural activities for the students. On Dec. 9, the entire fifth grade class visited the Brooklyn Museum for a guided tour focusing on ancient civilizations. “Sumer, Mesopotamia, and Ancient Egypt,” Samantha explained. “We examined some stone carvings with cuneiform writing, as well as a mummy and some other Ancient Egyptian art.” The students had just completed a curricular unit on these regions, so being in such close proximity to these artifacts right here in Brooklyn made a field trip a no-brainer. Every December
the fifth grade also recreates an ancient Egyptian funeral procession in the hallways at Pearl Street, a time-honored event at the school, so the museum visit only enhanced the experience. “I know that visiting the museum and the culminating fifth grade funeral are both beloved traditions here,” said Samantha. What did the students think? “It was pretty cool,” said effusive fifth grader Isa, now in her first year at BFS. “I learned a lot – it was really interesting. I like that in the museum there were lots of examples, that I got to actually see in person...I recommend this, it was really cool.” Her classmate Julian, now in his sixth year at the school, also gave the trip a thumbs up. “I really liked getting to learn about the Greek mummy,” he said. “It was mainly that we saw Egypt but there was this one mummy done in a style that the Greeks borrowed from Egypt. We got to see some cool stuff. We also had a tour guide so we got to learn more than if we hadn't.” continues on next page
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The World Is Their Oyster HUDSON RIVER WATERSHED Middle School trips aren’t restricted to history and the humanities. On Oct. 17, Janet Villas led the entire 8th grade on a trip for a deep dive into A Day in the Life of the Hudson River Watershed. Fellow science teacher Kevin Cooney joined her and led students in the project, along with a scientist guide. “This program is part of the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and Columbia University's Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory annual snapshot day,” explained Janet. “On that day thousands of kids in New York State go down to the river and take water and core samples, do chemical and biological testing, and report their results back to the DEC. They even send a runner to get our samples at the river to keep them fresh.” Janet already has an advantage in this arena thanks to her environmental activism in and out of BFS, and her ongoing classroom work with the Billion Oyster Project with students, an ongoing environmental restoration program done in affiliation with the New York Harbor Foundation. “We did the same type of observations that we usually do for the Billion Oyster project,” she said, “but added a layer of additional tests and demonstrations.”
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a great success,” she said. “The most exciting part was the core sampling of the beach. We had to drive a tube into the sand and get a sample to be analyzed for all sorts of living and non-living things. We also learned how much shoreline will be under water in the event of continued climate change and we walked along the beautiful Brooklyn Bridge Park.” Such projects don’t just serve an academic purpose for our students. It becomes a form of activism and service learning. “We’re coordinating our work with Brooklyn Bridge Park educators, the Billion Oyster Project crew, and the DEC,” said Janet. “Everyone benefits.”
THE TENEMENT MUSEUM Not to be outdone for what will be the sixth year, Teachers Sarah Schlein and Ed Herzman’s 8th graders will
The Hudson watershed field trip used to be an Upper School science project, Janet recalled, but last year she began doing it with eighth graders. “It was
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pay a visit this spring to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, a restored 19th century tenement house in the iconic immigrant neighborhood. “Our American history curriculum focuses on the time period from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement,” said Sarah. “We devote an entire unit to immigration at the turn of the 20th century.” What better place to bring immigration to life than at the Tenement Museum, a National Historic Site just three subway stops from Pearl Street? As the museum’s website puts it, the original tenement home at 97 Orchard Street “enhances appreciation for the profound role immigration has played and continues to play in shaping America’s evolving national identity.” Last May students divided up into groups to take either the Hard Times or the Victoria Confino guided tour. The first examines how immigrants survived economic depressions in the 19th and 20th centuries, including visits to the restored homes of the German-Jewish Gumpertz family and the Italian-Catholic Baldizzi family. The latter tour introduces visitors to 14-year-old Victoria Confino, who lived in the tenement in 1916. This year’s 8th graders will enjoy similar opportunities.
BROOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN Beating all of their teaching colleagues to the subways in late September of the 2016-17 school year, 7th grade English Teacher Jeremy Hawkins and Math Teacher Lyman took their students to visit
EL BARRIO
the Shakespeare Garden within the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Structured in the style of an authentic English cottage-garden, the living exhibit features plants mentioned in Shakespeare’s plays and poems. The concept of a Shakespeare garden has been in vogue for many years throughout the world. The original and surely most famous is that planted at Stratford-on-Avon in the 1920s and based on a 1586 woodcut from Shakespeare’s lifetime. The Bard himself was known to be an avid gardener who knew his rosemary from his rue.
Perhaps the most profound field trip of the recent past, and one that brings us back full circle to those iconic Three Kings at the Cloisters, was the Middle School Spanish classes’ trip to Harlem on Jan. 6 to celebrate and participate in El Dia de Reyes, or Three Kings Day, as never before. The idea came from Spanish teacher Kim Allen, who is new to BFS this year. Colleagues Laura MurtulaMontanya, a native of Spain now in her second year at BFS, along with Spanish and French teacher Paul Romano and Math Teacher Marna Herrity chaperoned and participated in the event. “For me it’s natural to want to take kids out into the community and get them out of their bubbles,” said Kim, a birthright Quaker from Medicine Lodge, Kansas. “The holiday aside, the most significant part of the day was getting on a train and going to Harlem. And the students said, We’re in Harlem? This is Harlem? Oh! That was the most important part of the day. They saw it as a community not unlike their own and in some ways continues on next page
“The idea for the trip came a few years ago to me and theater teacher Lorna Jordan.” Jeremy said. “One of the things we do is videotape the kids reading lines from Shakespeare that address flowers and flora.” Students also tackle Shakespeare in Jeremy’s English classes. These seeds continue to flourish in the Upper School under the guidance of Upper School Head Sidney Bridges, BFS’ resident Shakespeare scholar.
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The World Is Their Oyster different, but it was a positive perception. They saw families, schools, how much Spanish was used in the community.” Three Kings Day happens every year on January 6th, and for many Spanish-speaking people around the world, the Christmas season extends until this date. “It’s the Epiphany,” explained Kim. “This is where we get the idea of Christmas presents. It was the kings bearing gifts. Little kids lay out shoes or little boxes and put in straw and food for the camels, not unlike milk and cookies for Santa.”
registered to actually participate in the parade, which was a first for BFS. “We marched as a participating school. There were floats, several sets of kings – these giant, gorgeous puppets maybe two stories high, some kings on stilts, floats with Puerto Rican bands and dancers.” The roughly three-mile route ran from 106th and Park to 115th and Lexington in Spanish Harlem. Our
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students then walked back to the museum, a six-mile round trip in the freezing cold, to enjoy the festivities there – music, a cafe, and exhibits. “We told them, go be a part of the community,” Kim recalled. “And the kids said, What? And we said, we trust you, go have a good time. And they didn’t have to fill out worksheets. You don’t have to do that when you’re celebrating.”
The Harlem parade, hosted by Museo del Barrio, is now in its 40th year. “It had a Borinquen, or Puerto Rican flavor – a lot of music with horns and drums,” said Kim. “It’s the idea of celebration and being the end of the holidays in addition to the religious significance.” Our students didn't simply tour the museum. At Kim’s urging the classes
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Cooking Up Projects in the Preschool Mix Risk-Taking and Collaboration. Stir Vigorously. Incubate Ideas. Transform into Active Learning. by Jeffrey Stanley “The concept of intellectual risk-taking applies not just to the students but to the teachers. We want the kids to do the work, but we need to be doing it ourselves.” Head of Preschool Maura Eden was explaining the deep process by which she and the teachers conceive and carry out curricular changes in the Preschool. “How do teachers come up with new ideas?” Maura asked. “Ideally it’s a parallel creative
process for both teachers and students.” Collaboration is key, not just among the teachers, but between teachers and students. Specifically, our Preschool educators have been expanding and updating the wildly popular annual museum project, a BFS tradition begun by Maura and her colleague Jane Morrissey some 20 years ago, in which each Fours classroom researches a topic, turns the classroom into a museum devoted to that topic, and invites parents to attend an open house.
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“Kids like becoming experts at something and telling their families about it,” said Maura. “You get to sit there and tell these visitors what you’ve learned.” She again gave a nod to collaboration. “It works to do this in teams and share the joy of learning with family and friends. This is true for teachers and students.”
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In the past, the museums were held on the same date at the same time for all three Fours classrooms. As of last year, Maura and the teachers updated this element so that they happen on different days. “This way, students can visit each other’s classrooms to allow for cross-pollination,” she said. Museum topics and presentation styles vary greatly, allowing teachers and students to learn from each other. It all begins at the proverbial drawing board in Maura’s office. First, the teachers look at what four-year-olds generally like, based on wisdom handed down through decades of pedagogy, as well as their own direct observations of their current students. “Where are kids’ hearts at this point, what’s in their minds? Any teacher will tell you this is the age when during lunch they stick up their hands and ask, who likes bananas? Who doesn’t like bananas? Are you my friend? Are you not my friend?” From this soap opera of emotions about friendship and categorizing the world immediately around them they gradually form a unique classroom community during the first weeks of the school year. Like teenagers, they also encounter their first identity crises. “They’re obsessed with, how I’m the same and how I’m different,” Maura said. “They’re taking surveys all the time. Who’s like me? Who’s not like me? Who’s a good guy? Who’s a bad guy? They’re super-interested in birth, in death, in injury. That’s what the whole superhero thing is about. If you ask, ‘can’t we make a place where bad guys learn to be good?’ The answer is usually no.” In keeping with the teenager parallel, four-year-olds tend to be concerned about gender, and about who’s powerful and who’s not. “They feel very powerful but at the same time they still cling to their parents,” said Maura. “Fours are the adolescents of early childhood. They’re very interested also in separating fantasy from reality. They like fantasy but they also like things that are real and powerful,” she said. “For instance, wild cats are powerful and can do amazing things, almost like a real-life version of a dinosaur.” Bottom line, she continues, “When we go and develop something, we do something that we know is exciting for four-year-olds. I start by saying to the teachers, ‘Talk to me, what are your kids talking about right now?’ Their students had a lot of people in jail,” she laughed. “Also superheroes, their friends, and acting out folk tales.” Next, she and the teachers brainstorm about potential museum topics and then finally they get cooking, sometimes literally. “The kids are bringing ideas in, too, and we want them to own the museum. They don’t develop the curriculum directly but we listen and learn from them.” Maura guides this entire process using a philosophy culled from the Bank Street Approach to early childhood education. A creation of the renowned Bank Street College of Education, the theory emphasizes “meeting” children on their own
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terms and understanding that individual kids learn at different paces. The approach is also thematic, linking many areas of the curriculum together under a common theme. For instance, when studying astronaut training and space, students used art time to make celestial bodies while gym time was used for astronaut-specific training exercises. “It’s a thematic approach, with elements of constructivism or discovery learning,” said Maura. Refreshingly, Maura encourages creative, not just intellectual, risk-taking among the teachers, which isn’t just a feel-good effort. It’s based on the latest research which shows that accomplished innovators in any field are also highly creative in hobbies and interests outside of their careers. Thus, Maura urges teachers to bring their own passions to the table when mapping out class projects. Last spring’s culmination of this group work included an astronaut training program in the Green Room and bread making in the Purple Room. “There was a lot of collaborative effort and energy going on,” said Maura. “With astronaut training there was the athletic part, art, science, and teachers shooting a video and doing voiceover work. When parents were seated in the classroom, the kids marched in and each got a diploma and a necklace for completing the astronaut training. Then the parents sat and watched the video.” Green Room Teacher Lisa Ventry elaborated on the educational components. “We began on Earth by talking about day and night, then blasted off into the clouds and discussed three cloud types. Our next stop was the moon,” she said, “followed by the sun and stars and finally the planets. Threaded throughout the unit was a focus on how to prepare to travel in space as green room astronauts.” She and Associate Teacher Laura Harris were fortunate to have a guest expert visit the students, a stargazing BFS parent who brought along several telescopes and a set of binoculars. “We learned how astronomers use these tools to study the sky and went to the roof to try them out,” said Lisa. “In the classroom we read books, looked at photographs, and watched videos. We did a lot of projects to make the abstract more tangible: we made a cloud, the sun, and the moon phases. We also transformed our dress-up area into a space center with a rocket and NASA ground control, and led the children through exercises that replicated astronaut training.” Just like with real space travel, not everything went off without a hitch. “This was our first time doing this unit together and on such a grand scale,” she said, “so it was all very new and we weren’t always sure what to expect. We wanted to see what kinds of things would spark the children’s interest, so planning was sometimes very day-to-day depending on where conversations lead.” continues on next page
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In the end, the project felt like a resounding success that they will surely repeat. “It was very gratifying to see how proud the children were to share all that they had learned with their families, to notice that they were identifying themselves as ‘space experts’ and really owning their knowledge,”said Lisa. “The work they produced was beautiful and spoke to their individuality, but they also collaborated and came together as a group when preparing for their families to visit at the study’s conclusion.” Laura Obuobi and Danielle Clarke in the Purple Room were “a big impetus for the curriculum revision,” said Maura. “They were bursting with new ideas to take things in a new direction. They did a bread unit, an intersection of culture and science. Almost every family came in and shared a bread from their culture: flatbreads, fry breads, yeast breads. Students got to choose which breadmaking group to join. Their expert was chef Zachary Golper, owner of the top-rated Bien Cuit French bakery on Smith Street. “He brought in all kinds of yeasts and they did science experiments into what yeast does.” Liam’s family, Bryant Rahaman and Vernessa Felix, were also bread-making experts, teaching the children how to bake Trinidadian bread and delicacies. As with the astronaut project, the presence of an expert and related activities linked classroom learning to authentic, practical, real-world experience. As part of the thematic approach, students also created art projects that incorporated elements of bread. At their museum opening, all the kids had made chef’s hats to wear, and showed parents a slideshow of all their baking experiments. At the end, every family was presented with a cookbook of the students’ recipes.” “It was interactive, hands on, child centered, and fun,” said Laura. “Bread is universal. Everybody eats bread or has eaten some kind of bread at least once in their lifetime. In this unit we looked at how bread is made in different parts of the world. We looked at maps of the various countries, learned about how and when each particular bread is eaten.” The teaching duo, Dani and Laura, brought their own knowledge, cultures, passions and creativity to the project in a way that connects us all. They used West African Anansi stories the students were studying, and when they moved into a study of bread it was more organic. The students saw themselves as bread makers.” As for the science component, the teachers began by looking at the typical ingredients of bread, and “how yeast works for example, with a yeast balloon experiment,” said Laura. “We looked how mold happens on bread and had a piece of bread molding on our science table for about a month...Within the yeast bread group, the children studied bagels and brioche. Within the fry bread group the children studied doughnuts and Native American fry bread. Within the flat bread group the children studied injera (from Ethiopia), tortilla, and pizza.”
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Parents were invited to either come to help bake bread or to donate a bread snack for the class. As the completed classroom chart showed at the end of the project, the students tried roughly 20 varieties of bread from around the country and the world. Although presenting such a complex curriculum for the first time was a challenge at times, “seeing how well the children took ownership of it and enjoyed it, and how well the parents enjoyed it,” were the rewards for everyone. The bread curriculum and the astronaut training curriculum will be repeated this year in the Purple and Green Rooms, while the Orange Room will be charting a new course with a curriculum and a children’s-run museum on Big Cats. How did that come about? To begin, early in the fall teachers Niamh Dolan and Zoe Goldberg-Stewart noticed that their students were playing games about lions, cheetahs, and what the children called “palace cats” during their outdoor roof time. “Their play had a predator/prey or good guy vs. bad guy aspect to it.” Niamh said. In a music lesson with teacher Nancy Tanney, there was a song about lions in trees, and Zoe (who had lived for several years in Uganda) told the class about the tree-climbing lions in Uganda. Then, Niamh saw a National Geographic TV program about the origins of domestic cats, which had a segment on “pallas cats.” She made the connection to her students’ games and their “palace cats,” and with Zoe’s enthusiastic support and Maura’s strong endorsement, the Big Cats curriculum was born. Like a proud parent, Maura was nothing short of effusive and boastful of her teachers and their dedication. “Early childhood education doesn’t just happen,” she said, “where kids go out and play and that’s it. It takes a lot of work and pedagogy.” She was especially proud to be part of a growing trend in which early childhood educators around the country are on the cutting edge of new learning methods. “Only now are teachers also thinking this way for older students in terms of how kids learn developmentally. A lot of older grades are drawing from early childhood pedagogy.”
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Soccer, Ireland, and Above All, Friends
Niamh Henchy, ’18 PORTRAIT of a YOUNG FRIEND by Joan Martin Niamh Henchy ’18 has been playing soccer since she was 8 years old and has racked up an impressive set of statistics in games played, goals scored, and assists. But ask about her most recent championshipwinning soccer season at BFS, and the talk is all about her teammates.
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“The soccer season is the happiest time of the school year for me,” the IB Diploma student says. “Our team is so close, so supportive, and so loving to each other.” So close that when the transition to the 2016 season proved to be a rough one and the team sustained some hard losses, the players called a team meeting to address the problems head on. Niamh explained that the team had to adjust to a new coach, a new style, and many days that lasted until 7 at night. “In the beginning we had the hardest opponents, and we weren’t communicating well,” she said. “After the meeting we were united and worked together.”
most students interviewed for the “Portraits of Young Friends” series, Niamh has had a mixed experience with Quaker Meeting for Worship, which occurs once a week at BFS. “I have learned to really enjoy Quaker Meeting,” she said. “In lower and middle school, it was seen as a ‘chore’ by many students, including me. Even as a 9th grader, I didn’t really appreciate it. However, now, Quaker Meeting is one of my only free and quiet moments in my busy week.”
Working well with others comes naturally to Niamh, whose older sister Aoife Henchy ’15 had an exemplary record on the BFS soccer teams and who went on to even more success on the soccer pitch at Bard College. The two sisters played together on the varsity team, and Niamh was a member of a traveling team and even a coed team at one point. “It was difficult to get the boys to pass to me,” Niamh laughed. “But I learned to be aggressive.” This combination of modesty, authenticity, and selfassurance is an apt characterization of Niamh, a BFS student since preschool (also known affectionately as a “lifer.”) She has fond recollections of her first teachers, Suzanne Stevens and Debbie Prince, and of how she made friends quickly, adding, “Some of those friends are still friends today. I remember enjoying school a lot at that point.” That joy in friends and in school has carried forward through Niamh’s many years at Brooklyn Friends. In explaining how, she turned once again to the influence of others: “BFS has some of the best students and young people anywhere. I’m inspired by the people around me, and all their accomplishments.” Her esteem extends to the faculty as well. “One of the biggest strengths of BFS is the faculty,” she said. “The teachers have had a positive attitude and a genuine desire for their students to learn and to do well.” Doing well at BFS also embraces the Quaker dimension of a Friends education, something that Niamh knows well in theory, in practice, and through experience. Like
This year, Niamh – along with five other upper school students and six more upper schoolers who were conference planners – participated in the 20th annual Quaker Youth Leadership Conference (QYLC) in early February, which was hosted by BFS and Mary McDowell Friends School. QYLC brought together 180 students from throughout the US and internationally for a threeday gathering aimed at “Building Bridges.” In addition to keynote speakers, cultural excursions and service learning experiences, there were numerous facultyand student-led workshops. Niamh led a workshop on rejecting rape culture. [Rape culture is defined by Wikipedia as “an environment whose prevailing social attitudes have the effect of normalizing or trivializing sexual assault and abuse.”] Niamh became familiar with continues on next page
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PORTRAIT of a YOUNG FRIEND: Niamh Henchy this trending issue in the 10th grade Service and Justice Seminar and led a similar workshop for the Upper School’s Community Issues Conference. Niamh has another connection to Quakerism – one that happens to be combined with her Irish heritage and culture. She explained: “My dad is Irish and grew up in a small town in County Clare, in the West of Ireland. He left Ireland in his twenties and met my mom who grew up in Great Neck, New York. We used to visit my grandparents in Ireland twice a year, and it gave me a perspective of a different way of life than my own in New York.” It so happened that five years ago Niamh’s mother, an artist and an art professor, received a four-week studio art fellowship in County Mayo. The family came along and Niamh made a connection with a student attending Newtown School in Waterford. Last year, with groundwork laid in the BFS Upper School and the Quaker Life Committee, Niamh made a trip to Newtown School to investigate the possibility of an exchange program between Brooklyn Friends and Waterford Friends. While her visit was brief – three school days – she observed a great deal and gathered enough information to write a narrative report and make an initial proposal for a student exchange to Head of Upper School Sidney Bridges.
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In reading Niamh’s report, one of the differences that stands out between BFS and Newtown is what one would call a “top-down,” adult-in-charge approach to teaching at Newtown with BFS’s more collaborative approach with students and teachers learning together within a strong advisory system. Still at Newtown, there were regular classes in Gaelic, current events and politics, as well as a daily “collect,” in which topics like the 100th anniversary of the Irish Easter Rising and the Syrian refugee crisis were addressed. Newtown’s 9:00am starting time would surely appeal to a number of BFS upper schoolers, as would its acres and acres of land. When it was suggested that the work Niamh has put into the school exchange would readily qualify for the IB Diploma Program’s Creativity, Activity, and Service requirement, this buoyant and secure young woman quickly demurred. “I really want to work with young children and teach them how to cook,” she said confidently. When she was accepted into the QYLC and further developed her workshop on the consequences of rape culture, she decided to make that program her CAS project. Niamh’s response is one of many examples of a young woman who knows herself well and looks forward to the many ways in which her life will evolve. As she said when discussing her life on the BFS soccer team, “I came onto the BFS varsity team as a scared eighth grader. I am now captain. This team has helped me cultivate my leadership and my ability to persevere, to adapt to changes and to meet challenges.”
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A Teacher’s Journey, Sustained by Friends HOW JAZELYN MONTANEZ ’98 FULFILLED HER MARATHON DREAM by Jazelyn Montanez as told to Joan Martin I’ve always played sports. The first was indoor track. When I came to Brooklyn Friends, I continued; I was the first BFS student – along with a fellow upper school girl – to participate in the Colgate Women’s Games. Later I was captain of the varsity volleyball team. I played volleyball in college at a Division III school, and I learned a lot about teamwork and camaraderie.
“What do you do when something doesn't go your way? The answer — try again.” — Jazelyn Montanez
When I came back to BFS in 2004, it was through the sports program. There was a job opening for an assistant volleyball coach and I was hired. I stayed on for six years, assisting also in basketball, softball, and administrative work. I moved on to working in afterschool and eventually the Preschool as an Assistant Teacher. My background and love of sports was helpful in the afterschool program when someone needed to take over the tennis program. I jumped right in. Always in the back of my mind, I had a goal of running a marathon race. My uncle was a marathoner and he bought me my first pair of running shoes. The New York Marathon ran right past my house in Park Slope and I always cheered on the runners. It was exhilarating. Then in my early 20s, I was hit by a car – it was a hit and run – and I sustained serious injuries. I thought I would never be able to run in a marathon race. A couple of years later, continues on next page
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I started running, for fun and exercise at first. But I saw and observed a lot of runners and running programs in the park, and I thought to myself – let me give it a try and see if I could make it a reality. While training for a three-mile race, I was bike-riding though Brooklyn and stumbled upon a bib party in Dumbo for the Brooklyn Half Marathon. [A bib party is where registered runners pick up their bibs and numbers for the race.] I stopped and got some information about the New York Road Runners (NYRR). It was serendipitous and I took it as a sign – running the half-marathon would bring me closer to my full marathon goal. My journey began. I became a member of NYRR. I learned that if a member were to run nine races and volunteer at one, you would get an automatic invitation to the New York City Marathon. How amazing! At that point I never ran more than five miles. To successfully run the Brooklyn Half Marathon would be a real test. At that point, I came to learn that there were many Brooklyn Friends parents who were runners and who would be participating in the Brooklyn Half. I organized this group to run and raise funds for the Brooklyn Friends financial aid program, something that is very important to me. It became part of the annual PAT benefit and we raised $1,200. After running the Brooklyn half-marathon and the other required races successfully, I felt I was doing really well. I was registered for November and I was ready to go. Then I began to feel some nagging pain that didn’t go away. I went to the doctor and had some tests done. On the Friday before the Sunday of the Marathon, I learned that I had two stress fractures on the neck of the femur bone. It’s an area that holds all your body weight. The only remedy was to take weight off of my feet. I couldn’t run the marathon, and I spent the next 10 weeks working at BFS on crutches. Maura Eden, the Head of the Preschool, was around when I got the bad news and she and the other teachers were super supportive of me. I was out only one day and with my colleagues’ encouragement, I used my personal setback as a teaching and a learning experience. It opened up a new conversation with students. They saw me on crutches and learned that I wasn’t able to run the Marathon so we asked the question, ‘What do you do when something doesn’t go your way?’ The answer – try again. We talked about having able bodies – ‘walking and moving around in a different way doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you – you’re different.’ It led to conversations about how to care about people and how to help each other out. I even got a rolling chair from the Upper School to move around the floor when the crutches became too much. We all pulled together and
worked it out. I am so thankful to the Preschool and people I work with. They accommodated me and allowed me to dive right into the conversation. Being able to continue to work in the classroom was helpful and distracting, but I was still so upset and so sad. I became introspective. I asked myself, ‘Will I ever get to run the marathon? Am I in over my head? How much do I want this?’ I started to get fearful about how I was approaching my body and my training. Then I became more determined to come back. Fractures are common, my doctor told me. I powered through my physical therapy and rehabilitation and I focused on a combination of resting, cross training, and running. Starting in the spring of 2016, I worked from the ground up. I had a game plan and registered ahead of time for the races. January to July was hellish but I was trying to transfer out from my physical therapy. When I came back to school in September I was in the midst of the most intense part of marathon training. I brought my passion for running and the New York Marathon back into the preschool classrooms, particularly the Red Room, my home base. Fun and creative ideas were brought into the curriculum. Our librarian Christina had found a children’s book called Marathon Mouse, and I read it to the kids. They created a poster for me and a special T-Shirt with their handprints, which I wore in the race. All the Red Room parents got together on Lafayette Avenue in Fort Greene to cheer their classmate Charlie’s father and me. The time had come. It was a beautiful amazing day, but I had a bad cough and didn’t feel 100 percent. But I did it – I came in at 4 hours and 3 minutes, which is considered a little bit above average. I really wanted to break below 4 hours. The good news is that I qualified through the lottery for the Chicago Marathon in October of 2017, and then I’ll be in the 2017 New York Marathon, so I have two more chances to set a new record.
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FALL TEAMS AND RECORDS Girls Varsity Soccer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8-5-2 League Champions Boys Varsity Soccer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-10-1 Girls Gr. 7/8 Soccer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-5-2 Boys Gr. 7/8 Soccer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9-4 Girls Varsity Volleyball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10-7 League Champions Girls JV Volleyball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4-10 Girls Gr. 7/8 Volleyball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12-0 Undefeated Varsity and Gr. 7/8 Cross Country
WINTER TEAMS AND RECORDS Boys Varsity Basketball . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13-11 League Champions Girls Varsity Basketball . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9-11 Boys JV Basketball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17-4 League Champions Boys Gr. 7/8 Basketball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12-3 Girls Gr. 7/8 Basketball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-8 Varsity and Gr. 7/8 Indoor Track Varsity and Gr. 7/8 Squash Club/Team Varsity and Gr. 7/8 Swimming Club/Team
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Non-Profit Org. U.S. Postage PAID S. Hackensack, NJ Permit # 79
Brooklyn Friends School 375 Pearl Street Brooklyn, NY 11201
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In the 2017-2018 school year, Brooklyn Friends School will celebrate our 150th year educating children in the Quaker tradition.
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Everyone in our community â&#x20AC;&#x201C; parents, grandparents, alumni, faculty, staff and friends â&#x20AC;&#x201C; will have an opportunity to joyfully participate in this recognition.
Please save the date for the culminating event of the sesquicentennial year: Friday, May 11, 2018, a Gala at the Brooklyn Museum.
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