New Teacher Center New Teacher Center

Listen to Gary Briggs and Joshua Martinez, two former educators currently on NTC’s Professional Learning Systems team, speak about the challenges of addressing the commitment to reexamine your ideas of who the stakeholders are in your ecosystem.

Aurora Juarez Lopez, 18, is a recent graduate of Benjamin Franklin High School in New Orleans, Louisiana. Aurora’s family immigrated from Mexico and she grew up in a Spanish-speaking household. As the oldest of three children, she wants to be a role model for her younger sisters who are 15 and 4. Aurora shares her experience translating for her family, her thoughts on what teachers can do to support multilingual students, and what she's looking forward to next year when she goes to college.

High school seniors Grace Ayena and Mikayah Cheeks are part of the Chicago Public School's Student Voice Committees. Run through CPS’s Department of Equity, the student voice committees aim to give upper elementary through high school students leadership opportunities, improve school climate, and foster communication between adults and students. In addition to being active members of the student voice committees at their schools, Grace and Mikayah are also part of a district-wide high school leadership program, the Student Voice and Activism Fellowship, also known as SVAF. The fellowship is a year-long program where students participate in an intensive summer of learning and planning and take part in stakeholder meetings, conferences, and student-led events. Grace and Makayla have both been part of student-led professional development for adults. They shared their perspectives on how adults in schools can build trusting relationships and foster open communication with students, and what they wish their teachers knew about them.

Sixteen-year-old Alizea Daniels shares her experiences moving from a small school in a rural community on a reservation to a bigger middle school in a town of 40,000 in Northern Idaho. As a member of the Coeur d'Alene and Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, she also reflects on being an Indigenous student at a predominantly white high school and offers advice on how teachers can help Native students feel at home in their classrooms.

Jonathan Fratz, 16, has more accomplishments on his LinkedIn as a 10th grader than most adults. Last year, Jonathan made a big change from middle school as he started at San Pedro Senior High School in San Pedro, California, part of the Los Angeles School District, in the middle of the pandemic. As a student with autism, he is passionate about advocating for his fellow students with disabilities in his school district and state.

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