Welcome back to Early Impact, our bi-weekly roundup of strategies and tools vetted by the student agency experts at Gateway Impact, designed to help you super-charge student learning and engagement in the new school year. Whether you’re a teacher, administrator, or work with students in a different capacity, you’ll find resources, research, and learning opportunities centered on best practices for serving diverse learners.

Whether your adventures lead you to an exotic beach or just to your favorite spot on your patio, we hope you’re making the most of the season. At the same time, for those of us who support students both in and out of the classroom, it’s all but impossible not to think ahead to the new school year! To aid in your planning and help you start the year off strong, we’re introducing Early Impact, a bi-weekly roundup of strategies and tools vetted by our student agency experts at Gateway Impact. 

At Gateway, we are making the dream of college a reality for all of our students. Year after year, nearly 100% of our students are college bound, with 40% of these students being first generation college bound. 

As part of their National Board Certification, Gateway Middle School Humanities Teachers, Elizabeth Colen and Lucy Hilarides, created a tool to help students read, understand, and analyze complex texts deeper.

In my last blog I explained what student agency is and the important research base behind it. But what are some best practices to teach and develop student agency? How do I, as a classroom teacher, start integrating student agency strategies into my classroom? Here are a few daily and weekly strategies which, when used regularly, help students to become more self-aware and grow in their skills as learners.

Gateway teachers are exceptional and are constantly exploring new ways to support our students and create safe spaces for learning and growing, even over the summer. In addition to participating in professional development trainings and workshops during the summer months, our teachers read books that helped deepen their teaching practice.

Who knew that a summer working at an ice cream parlor could change a young person’s life? We knew. For high school students, summers provide an opportunity to learn, grow and evolve into more mature and confident versions of their pre-summer selves. At Gateway, we work hard to ensure that every student has a meaningful summer opportunity to keep busy, build their resume and college applications with new skills and experiences, build community, and earn money.

A year ago, Americans were preparing for the inauguration of Donald Trump. Teachers and students at Gateway were having lively discussions in and outside of the classroom about what Trump’s presidency would mean for all of us. Overwhelmingly, there were strong feelings of anger, disappointment, and fear. As teachers and staff talked more, a theme in these discussions emerged around immigration.

Welcome to Gateway Impact’s Conversation Spot. Though some might refer to this as a “blog,” we disagree. Yes, we will publish periodic online writings that share thinking and educational practices that are near and dear to us at Gateway. However, blogs tend to be one-sided; our goal is to start conversations.