City School District of New Rochelle
News & Updates
January 22, 2021
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All District Schools are on Hybrid Again

New Rochelle High School today.
New Rochelle High School returned to a hybrid educational model this week, becoming the final City School District of New Rochelle school to allow students to return after a precautionary “yellow zone” in the city caused the schools to temporarily switch to all-remote learning.

The District initially phased from an all-remote to a hybrid model at the start of the school year, but returned to the virtual plan on November 20, 2020 after sections of New Rochelle were classified as yellow zones under Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Cluster Action Initiative plan. The colored zones – yellow, orange and red – denote concerning rises in the prevalence of the illness caused by the coronavirus.

“We’re encouraged by our current ability to return the entire District to a hybrid platform,” said Interim Superintendent Dr. Alex Marrero. “We have created efficient notification protocols when a student or staff member tests positive, and that allows us to continue welcoming students to school in cohorts while ensuring that individual staff members and students quarantine themselves if they have been in contact with another who tests positive.”

The color designations do not require Districts to close schools; rather it requires the District to ensure that 20% or 30% of the in-school population (students and staff) are tested for COVID-19.

In a hybrid plan, students are divided into cohorts, each of which is permitted to report for in-school learning on alternate days, and joins classes remotely on other days. The schools returned to hybrid models in phases, beginning with the youngest students. On Jan. 11, 2021, the Alternative Campus School returned to NRHS, and the rest of NRHS returned to hybrid on Tuesday, January 19.

Freshman Andrea Ponce said in-person learning adds a dimension that all-remote learning doesn’t offer.

“I feel like you have better interactions with your teacher, so you have more hands-on learning,” Ponce said today in her Living Environment class.

The District posts COVID-19 updates in its COVID Resource Center, including which schools are on hybrid vs. all-remote platforms, and which schools have had individual staff members or students test positive after being in school.
Click on image above for full-size version.
Sunday Event
Begins Remembrance Of Lincoln School
Desegregation Case
Luminaries in New Rochelle and the region will join together virtually on Sunday to begin a multi-event commemoration of the 60-year-old Lincoln School desegregation case that once drew national attention and changed the City School District of New Rochelle forever.

They will reflect on the landmark case in the kickoff of a series of events, Quest for Justice – A 60-Year Commemoration of the Lincoln School Decision – 1961-2021, that begins in January and ends in May.

Speakers will include state legislators such as Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins; government leaders; and representatives of other facets of the community, including Judge Jared Rice and New Rochelle NAACP President Rev. Mark McLean.

Gwen Hall, whose mother Barbara Hall was one of the Lincoln School litigants, will also deliver remarks. 

“It’s very important to commemorate this historic event that occurred here in New Rochelle,” said Linda Tarrant-Reid, Executive Director of the Lincoln Park Conservancy. “It was a national event that hit the television airwaves and Life Magazine. We were called ‘The Little Rock of the North.’ We were the first desegregation case filed and won in a northern city. Most people thought segregation occurred only in the South, but it was happening all across the United States.”

The Sunday event, on the anniversary of the historic court decision, streams live at 2 p.m. at Facebook.com/thelincolnparkconservancy.

That will be followed by four more events. They will be:
  • An exhibition entitled “Struggle – An Exhibit of Our Times,” which opens February 15. It will be located in the New Rochelle Council on the Arts Rotunda Gallery in New Rochelle City Hall, but viewing will be largely virtual on YouTube
  • A virtual webinar in March on “Women of the Movement.”
  • A screening of the documentary “Leveling Lincoln,” streamed online as a fundraiser for The Lincoln Park Conservancy.
  • A panel discussion on institutional racism and white privilege streamed online in April or May.  

The 1961 ruling by Judge Irving R. Kaufman of the Southern District of New York agreed with the plaintiffs’ claims that the New Rochelle Board of Education had created and maintained a racially-segregated school. He ordered the school board to submit a desegregation plan in compliance with the 1954 Supreme Court Decision in Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas.

The Lincoln School was torn down in 1964, but its attendance zone has never been erased. Students from the zone attend four other elementary schools based on parents’ preferences and schools’ available space.
Justice Janet Malone
Justice Chosen For NRHS Wall of Fame
New Rochelle High School will soon induct New York State Supreme Court Justice Janet C. Malone onto its Wall of Fame.

Malone, a 1982 graduate, was selected for the honor from a wide pool of remarkable nominees for her outstanding professional accomplishments and notable contributions to her community.

She said she was thrilled to be chosen, and touched that the nomination came from her youngest nephew, Adrian Harewood. He graduated from NRHS last year and now attends SUNY Alfred.

She said she hoped her example showed young people that they can succeed. 

“We all have challenges, but we can overcome them,” she said. “You can accomplish what you set out to accomplish if you have some really good people in your corner and if you get a good education, which is what I got in New Rochelle.”

Malone attended Columbus Elementary School, Isaac E. Young Junior High School and NRHS. In particular, she remembers a high school English teacher, Ms. (Mary Ellen) Forte.

“She always challenged us,” Malone said. “She made us understand that we had a voice. She made us use our voice to express ourselves, and that goes far.”

In one exercise, Forte required a student to pull a piece of paper listing a random topic from a paper bag. The student would then have to speak extemporaneously on the subject.

“It was nerve-wracking, but as I got older and decided to go into law, the skill came in handy,” Malone said. 

From NRHS, she went on to earn a bachelor’s degree from the Utica College of Syracuse University and a law degree from City University of New York.

She served as a New York County District Attorney, in private practice and as senior associate for a Westchester County law firm. She also served as a support magistrate for the Westchester County Family Court. In 2008, she was elected as a family court judge and served until joining the state Supreme Court.

In 2016, she was elected to the New York Supreme Court, 9th Judicial District, covering Westchester, Rockland, Putnam, Orange and Dutchess counties.

Her photograph will be mounted on the Wall of Fame, which lines both sides of a hallway of the Stack 2 area. Past inductees are from the areas of athletics, media, government, education and more.

“We are honored to have Justice Malone join this gallery of high-achieving alumni,” said Interim NRHS Principal Steve Goldberg. “Her success represents another stellar example of how a New Rochelle education lays a strong foundation for reaching goals and achieving success in so many fields.”

Traditionally, Wall of Fame induction ceremonies are held in November. For this year’s COVID-era ceremony, the format, date and time of the ceremony have not been finalized. They will be publicized in various ways, including posting on the websites of the City School District of New Rochelle and NRHS.
'Poetry Out Loud'
Available Virtually
Check out “Poetry Out Loud; a Festival of Children’s Verse” here, featuring the writings of students in third through sixth grade from throughout the City School District of New Rochelle. The annual celebration is traditionally held at New Rochelle High School in May. That was impossible last year because of COVID-19, so organizers produced it virtually and posted it earlier this month. It is presented by The Jeremy Scheinfeld Publishing Center, a program of the New Rochelle Fund for Educational Excellence. 
Kieran Freed and Jack McCormick
Watch Science Fair Tomorrow; Read Latest Research Here
The Second Annual Science Research Fair is tomorrow! Watch it out from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. to see the innovative projects our fourth-through-eighth-graders have been executing; sign up at this link and let the organizers know which presentations you would like to see. (Check out several of them.) And be sure to keep watching at 3 p.m. for the awards ceremony, hosted by Jeff Wuebber, the head of Science Research Program at New Rochelle High School.

Meanwhile, here are projects by two more high school students in the Science Research Program:

Kieran Freed, Junior
Mentor: Prakrit Jena, Ph.D., research scholar, The Daniel Heller Lab
The potential impacts of Kieran Freed’s research could changes lives with nanotechnology.

Since his freshman year, Kieran has been exploring nanotechnology with a focus on medical applications. Recently, he developed software that can quickly and easily perform data-analysis calculations on and visualizations of carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The results could help medical professionals use nanosensors for early detection of certain diseases. 

Unable to work in a lab setting due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Freed developed his software entirely from home. He partnered with The Daniel Heller Lab, part of the Sloan Kettering Institute at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, beginning in July 2020. This provided him online access to data that could assist in the development and testing of his own software. The Daniel Heller Lab is a bioengineering laboratory that develops new nanotechnologies to treat advanced cancers and detect diseases in their early stages.

“I learned a lot more about the field of nanomedicine, and the importance of trial and error in science. There were a lot of setbacks,” he said. “I’m most proud of seeing that the hard work, time and energy I devoted to the development of this software has paid off, and that its potential impacts could help save lives.” 

Freed plans to present his new technology and related research at science fairs, and hopes to continue his research this summer through the New Rochelle Science Research Program. He is considering pursuing a college degree based on his interest in nanotechnology. 

Jack McCormick, Junior
Project Conducted Independently  
Jack McCormick dedicated the summer to studying the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on depression and mental health.
 
McCormick discovered a wide range of studies on how the pandemic impacts mental health, but none that reported mental-health effects as they relate to different demographics.
 
“I think that the environment plays a lot in the way depression symptoms are expressed,” he said. “I wanted to see what the effect quarantine would have on mental health and how it is expressed differently in different communities.” 
 
To explore that area, he developed a survey through Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), a crowdsourcing website, to collect data focusing on different ethnicities, genders and age groups. The survey, which ran from June to July, received more 1,100 responses. 
 
The results of the survey indicated that depression symptoms increased significantly in only Black participants. McCormick believes his findings raise several questions about the pandemic’s impact through a social lens and COVID-19’s effects on distinct demographic groups. He plans on taking his research further.
 
“Over the course of the next summer, I want to study the actual effects quarantine can have on the brain,” he said. “The Science Research Program has been very helpful because it reinvigorated my love for science and I think that I might look in terms of a career in science.” 
NRHS Students Rise To Challenge of Tuesday's Civics Symposium
Tune in Tuesday when New Rochelle High School Advanced Placement social studies students present their position papers on the community issues, education and more to such heavy hitters as a best-selling author, former president of the National Urban League and the head of the philosophy department at Iona College.

The Civics Symposium – an annual highlight in the intellectual life of the high school – will be presented virtually, allowing anyone to watch the debate and discussion. It is presented by the New Rochelle Fund for Educational Excellence.

The symposium will be held on Zoom in two sessions, from 9:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. and from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. Both sessions will be moderated by Dr. Amy Bass, Chair of the Division of Social Science and Communication at Manhattanville College.

Morning session
Panelists in the morning session are New Rochelle Board of Education member Katie Castellano Minaya, a fifth-grade teacher in New York City; Rev. Dierdra Clark, Associate Pastor of New York Covenant Church; Dr. Alexander Eodice, Chairman of the Iona College Philosophy Department; Joe Klein, best-selling author of Primary Colors; and Hugh Price, former president of the National Urban League.

Student presentations:
  • “Bike Lanes” by Neil Costa, Esmerelda Lopez, Matt Mango, Promise Opurum.
  • “The Princeton Plan” by Ian Barnett, Melanie Brome, William Lathan and Zoe Seward.
  • “Universal Pre-K” by Maya Cole and Sonia Morris.

Afternoon session
Eodice, Klein and Price will also serve as panelists in the afternoon, along with New Rochelle Board of Education member Adina Berrios Brooks, Assistant Provost for Faculty Advancement at Columbia University; and New Rochelle City Council member Yadira Ramos-Herbert, Associate Dean of Students and Registration at Columbia Law School.

Student presentations:
  • “Community Policing” by Kate Conroy and Kimberly Dawson.
  • “Sustainable Cafeterias in CSDNR” by Isabel Camara, Ruth Muriel and Ariana Velasquez
  • “The Inclusion Project” by Chris Colavito, Maeve Ingram and Ava Vernor.
David Luhman and Dr. Beatrice Lopez
Each Middle School
Gets Full-Time
Humanities Leader As Result of New Hire
The addition of a humanities chairperson at Albert Leonard Middle School will bolster leadership in language arts and social studies at both of the City School District of New Rochelle’s middle schools.

David Luhman, an experienced educator, will become the full-time chairman of the subject area at ALMS on February 8. When he takes the post, Dr. Beatrice Lopez, who has been splitting her time between ALMS and Isaac E. Young Middle School, will become the full-time chairperson at the IEYMS.

“I am very excited by the prospect of serving one of the largest and most diverse districts in Westchester County,” Luhman said. “It has long been a belief of mine that a community’s diversity is one of its greatest strengths if the systems and practices of that district are designed to expose the treasure that all students have to offer.” 

Luhman and Dr. Lopez will support the English language arts (ELA) and social studies departments and promote literacy (listening, reading, writing and speaking) across the content areas.

“The addition of a full-time humanities chair will provide a pathway for our students to explore and understand the human experience through a balanced and integrated approach to the study of English language arts and history,” said IEYMS Principal Dr. Tawanda Robinson. She said Dr. Lopez “will work collaboratively with the school’s administrative team and other department chairs to implement a cohesive instructional vision. Her expertise in literacy and ELA will prove valuable to implementing a school-wide approach to teaching and learning.”

Dr. Lopez said, “A shared approach in ELA and social studies will support the cultivation of critical thinking and communication skills with a broadened understanding of cultural diversity, inclusion and social justice for students to become informed global citizens and agents of change.”

Luhman, formerly the Director of School Partnerships and Innovative Practices for Southern Westchester Board of Cooperatives Educational Services, has been a teacher and leader in secondary-level humanities and special education. He has implemented challenging curricula and impactful instructional strategies across a variety of school systems. 

“David has a wide array of experiences as an instructional practitioner and coach,” said ALMS Principal John Barnes. “In addition to his collaborative mindset and warm personality, he has been very successful in supporting teachers and district level teams with their professional development initiatives and teaching and learning practices. We look forward to Mr. Luhman bringing his wealth of expertise, various talents, and passion for people to serve the students, staff, parents, and administrative team at Albert Leonard.”
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