P a w - s i t i v e l y C o n n e c t e d

G r e a t P a t h A c a d e m y a t M C C

students that school is a safe place and someone will always support you. The culminating event was a student-run, whole-school assembly on October 3rd, in which the students shared out their ex-periences and stories, then broke out into their Advisory groups in order to turnkey the activities that they completed during training to their clas-ses.

The “From Bystanders to Allies” and "Names Can Real-ly Hurt Us" programs are two pieces to the overarching fo-cus on a positive school cli-mate that is taking place at Great Path Academy. As a Positive Behavior Interven-tions and Supports (PBIS) school, Great Path Academy has made great strides in mak-ing it “cool” to do the right thing in the past three years.

‘This is powerful stuff.”- Ja-vante D. stated, as she under-went the training. Many other students agreed and appreciat-ed the positive message that the program sends.

Partnering with the Anti-Defamation League, Great Path Academy students and staff begin the school year with participation in trainings for "Names Can Really Hurt Us" in order to continue to support the growth of a posi-tive school culture. As the Anti-Defamation League web-site states, “It is a call to ac-tion for everyone. Together our goal is to inform students, families, educators and the public on what can be done about bullying and cyberbully-ing.” The Great Path Acade-my Allies are a group of 18 students, grades 10-12, who underwent a vigorous ac-ceptance process in order to become an Ally. Once inter-views were completed in the spring of last year and six hours of training were com-pleted, Great Path Academy students received their Ally blazers in a Blazer Ceremony which honored their choice to always stand up for the target of any negative behavior.

This September, during two afternoon three-hour long

trainings entitled "Names Can Really Hurt Us", 18 Great Path Academy Allies, 27 addi-tional student volunteers (including freshmen) and 32 staff members participated in activities, which included de-signing their own "Ally", nam-ing them and giving them words to use when facing

challenges. Stories were shared of experiences, both negative and positive and the group bonded with the unify-ing goal to send the message to all Great Path Academy

Gr ea t Pa th Academy S tuden t s Move

f rom “Bys tande rs t o A l l i es”

Akeel Benjamin, a senior at Great

Path Academy, was selected by the

ADL to participate as a panel re-

spondent for the “Youth, Civics and

Positive School Climate Summit”.

This event took place at the State

Capitol and was held by the Commis-

sion on Children in partnership with

the Born This Way Foundation, the

Yale Center for Emotional Intelli-

gence, the Neag School of Education

at the University of Connecticut, the

Connecticut Department of Educa-

tion and the CT Regional Office of

the ADL.

As stated in the event’s press release,

“it was a morning-long summit on

youth leadership and social and emo-

below of Akeel with Lady Gaga’s

mother).

The focus of the event was told

through the perspective and the

voices of youth and their own experi-

ences of what they have done or what

they hope that the adults do in order

to create a safe emotional learning

environment for all students. Akeel

felt the strength in this attention

to students, “it was not just

youth listening, but giving in-

sight. The whole event was

youth-led and that was really

cool.” Many experts weighed in

on the effect of the educational

landscape within this context.

Dr. Brackett, the Director of the

Yale Center for Emotional

Intelligence, stated, “Schools are

built around too many rules and

not enough feelings.”

tional intelligence and supports. This

is an outgrowth of bullying-

prevention work done by the Com-

mission on Children and its partners.

Youth from across Connecticut, along

with superintendents, principals,

teachers, parents and academic ex-

perts attended

this event.

Closing remarks

were delivered by

Cynthia Ger-

manotta, who co

-founded the

Born This Way

Foundation in

2011 with her

daughter, Lady

Gaga” (photo

GPA S t ude n t Pa r t i c i pa te s i n “ You t h , C iv i c s

a nd Pos i t i ve S choo l C l i ma t e Summi t” Sp e c i a l p o i n t s o f

i n t e r e s t :

GPA’s “A Second Cup of Coffee” for

parents to gather and discuss our

school community is here! The

2nd meeting is on October 28th,

from 3-4 pm.

Transportation Inquiries can be made

to (860) 524-4077.

Our website is “under construction”,

as MCC transfers to a new

program. We will keep you

updated with School Messenger

until the switch is completed!

Staff used their half professional

development day to plan cross

content area lessons and units.

I n s i d e th i s i s su e :

Unified Arts News 2

English/ Social Studies

News

2

GPA’s Student Council 2

Science News 3

Math News/ Students

of the Month

3

2014 Greater Hartford

Torch of Liberty Award

Reception

4

Octobe r 2014

Vo lume , I s s ue

GPA Students and staff attending after school

sessions of trainings from the Anti-Defamation

League in the GPA Community Commons.

Eng l i sh / Soc ia l S tud ies News

ing the Ebola crisis and other world

events. Students have been making

connections to their current events

and the impact they have on their own

lives. In U.S. History this month we

will be focusing on our nations shift

from a regional power to world power.

We will begin with the concept of

Imperialism, as seen through the

Spanish-American War. The students

will be creating magazines that illus-

trate both the causes and effects of the

War. We will end the Unit by investi-

gating the United States involvement

in World War I.

English Language Arts is in full swing

as October arrives. English I is work-

ing on societal norms and traditions in

"The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson.

English II Honors is working on

character analysis and biblical allusions

in Lord of the Flies. English II Col-

lege Prep is working on impact of

point of view and character motivation

in Elie Wiesel's memoir Night. Ameri-

can Literature Honors is working on

The Crucible while American Lit

College Prep just finished an essay and

preparing to read Huck Finn. College

writing is continuing to discuss and

read One Hundred Years of Solitude.

In Civics, we are wrapping up our first

unit "Why Government" by applying

our studies of the purposes of govern-

ment to the ongoing crisis in Syr-

ia. Students will also connect related

events to the unit, namely President

Obama's recent address to the United

Nations.

In Mr. Buder’s classes, we are finish-

ing up our unit on "Ancient Religions

in a Modern World" and we will be

going into early exploration of the

world. Students have been completing

their current events projects and shar-

ing them. Students have been discuss-

GPA’s 2014 - 15 S tuden t Counc i l Can Really Hurt Us” program

(see above for details) with a

dress down day, date and

details to be announced.

Students will be dressing in

orange to support anti-

bullying efforts. Kaitlyn and

Treonna spoke of their meet-

ings and how the student

council discussed making this

year as fun as possible, with

school activities that involve

all grade levels more commu-

nity-centered events.

Congratulations to the mem-

bers of our student council!

Student Council Elections

were just held recently and

the members, voted on by the

school community are:

Arroyo, Destiny , Asante,

Gifty, Avila, Karen, Clarke,

Talia, Danvers, Javante, Diaz,

Tatiana, Dukes, Tamia, Faith,

Jayleah, Filigrana, Kaitlyn,

Hamilton, Ricky, Hawley,

Treonna, McCalop, Azaria,

Medina, Rufino, Pardo, Ade-

lina,, Richardson, Forest,

Rivera, Mikaela, Rivera,

Tiana, Warburton, Natalia,

Whitford, Mattea.

The 2014-15 GPA Student

Council is currently planning

out their calendar for the

school year. The first event

they plan will be a day to

Honor the powerful “Names

P a w - s i t i v e l y C o n n e c t e d P a g e 2

GPA has two international trips in the works for our eligible

world travelers already! This year, they are heading to

Costa Rica and next year, the Science department is heading

up a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to visit the

Galapagos Islands for Spring

2016.

Destiny A., Ricky H., and John K. work

collaboratively to solve a Spanish para-

graph jumble in Ms. Ruoff’s class.

Students making guacamole in Span-

ish Culture Club.

Uni f i ed A r t s News

Music:

Check out the new music depart-

ment website!

www.GreatPathMusic.com

Culinary:

Students have been learning about

safe food handling and proper

hygiene and steps you should fol-

low while being in the kitchen.

They will be moving into Nutrition

unit shortly

Personal Finance:

The students have been learning

about steps and ways they could

start budgeting and what they

should do in the budgeting process.

They are now discussing loans and

the pros and cons of it.

Gym:

We will be saying goodbye to stu-

dent teacher Dennis Machado on

11/17. Immediately following on

11/20 we will be welcoming a new

student teacher Alex Clark who is

studying at CCSU.

Spanish:

Students have just finished creating

a personal ad in SP II to describe

their likes, dislikes, personality and

physical appearance and that of

their ideal love interest. Spanish I

students have learned how to greet

and introduce themselves to each

other. Also students articulated

telling time and the date. Students

will be creating a children's short

story using chapter "para enipezar"

Tech:

I am currently creating an Android

App for GPA

Media Tech classes in groups are

creating 2-30 second commercials

on products

Intro to computer classes are set to

begin their power point projects on

national and world issues.

Art:

Art I students have been learning

about still-lifes and oil pas-

tels. They will be making masks for

the Thomas Hooker Parade on

October 18th. Ceramics students

are working on glazing their pro-

jects and are also Constructing

bowls for the "Empty Bowls"

Charity Event.

From the GPA Guidance

Counselors: College Visits

are happening! Stay in-

formed and a good place to

start your college search is

using Supermatch at http://

www.collegeconfidential.co

m/college_search/, or you

can google Supermatch.

This will match you to a list

of colleges that will be a

good fit for the student!

Empty bowls at MCC is October 25th,

from 11– 3 pm. GPA students are making

and contributing bowls to the charity

event, which raises money for Foodshare.

S tuden t s o f the Mon th – Sep tembe r

S c i ence News

Ma th News

P a g e 3 V o l u m e , I s s u e

Students in Chemistry class brewing up

experiments.

Mr. Jacobson, the Assis-

tant Principal, serves up

some lunch.

Coming soon (next month): Staff Mem-

ber of the Month! We will use this space

to not only highlight the students who

represent Great Path Academy, but also

the staff that students and staff vote on

that are recognized through our

“Staff Gotcha Paws”, an extension of

the Student gotcha paw system for

our staff members- students, parents

and fellow staff members can fill out

the staff gotcha

paws and submit

them– they are

available in the

GPA main office.

We would like to honor and

recognize the following stu-

dents for their positive con-

tributions of Respect, Re-

sponsibility and

Safety to the GPA

community. Con-

gratulations

to: Angela Zor-

rilla - 12th, Mat-

thew Smith - 12th,

Jasmine Cruz - 11th, Marcel

Mitchell - 11th, Jadea Harris

- 10th, Keenan Gadson -

10th, Jacinda Pinnock - 9th

and Timothy Powers - 9th

(photos below and to the

right) Wear your “On a

Great

Path”

shirts with

pride!

characteristics that can be used to

describe and classify any curve.

In Ms. Kondratuk’s Statistics

class, we are currently analyzing

data and how to represent it

correctly with histograms, dot

plots, frequency tables, stem

plots and box and whisker plots.

In Algebra II, we will begin to

explore inverse functions and

explore functions using technolo-

gy.

Mr. Hoffman's Algebra classes

have recently finished up their

units on patterns and are moving

into the dreaded world of Alge-

braic Equations. However, with

Mr. Hoffman as their guide, these

students will make it through the

dark forest of letters and num-

bers unscathed and stronger than

ever before! In College Prep

math we have been focusing on

financial math, by teaching kids

how to calculate different pay

rates, employee benefits, and

loans. These college prep stu-

dents will also be prepared for

life!

In Geometry, students have been

studying transformations on a

plane and how artists and archi-

tects use these transformations to

create more aesthetically pleasing

works using both rotational and

reflective symmetries. In Pre-

calculus, students have been

learning the "driver's license"

breeding pairs. We will be moving into

a unit that looks at the structure and

function of DNA, RNA, and proteins

and how their interdependence con-

nects to phenotypes.

Physical Science: Students are currently

working to understand the Periodic

Table of Elements and the information

that it can provide them. They are

creating their own versions of the table

and using the information to create

models of atoms for the first 18 ele-

ments. Soon we will be shifting to

study the properties of the elements

and how those relate to information

given by their placement in the Periodic

Table.

Anatomy & Physiology: We are cur-

rently learning the proper use of our

microscopes in preparation for our

studies of cells and tissues. The stu-

dents will begin investigating the struc-

tures of the body systems and how they

function upon completion of our pre-

sent work with the microscope.

Chemistry: We are learning about

matter and its different types. We

learned that matter can be classified

into substances and mixtures. In class,

we are investigating methods to sepa-

rate ingredients of different types of

mixtures based on their physical prop-

erties. We have applied the techniques

of filtration, evaporation and chroma-

tography to separate homogeneous and

heterogeneous mixtures.

We are looking forward to celebrate

National Chemistry Week by incorpo-

rating different activities during the

week of October 18th through the

25th.

Biology: Students have just completed

their first unit on sustainability which

sets the stage for the remainder of our

topics throughout this course. Next we

will be learning about sustainability

issues surrounding how to feed the

quickly growing global population, but

we will do so through the lens of genet-

ics. Specifically, students will learn

about basic monohybrid and dihybird

crosses seen in Mendelian genetics and

they will apply their knowledge to

looking at genetically modified foods.

Students will debate the usefulness,

health risks, and trade-offs associated

with GMO's and GMO labeling.

Genetics: Students are wrapping up

their first unit which reviewed Mendeli-

an genetics, went deeper into non-

Mendelian traits, and showed them how

to relate probability and calculations

using fractions to predictions about

Ms. Canty, GPA’s social worker, is

participating in a research study

called STARS (School-based

Treatment of Anxiety Research

Study). The study target group is

students who have excessive anxiety,

worry and/ or shyness. If eligible,

your child will receive one of two

types of talk therapy from Ms. Canty.

Your child will meet with her for 12

weeks during the school day. After

treatment, you and your child will

meet with the UConn group for 2

more times to see if your child’s

anxiety has improved. There is no

medication involved in this study. All

evaluations and treatment are

provided at no cost to families.

Families may earn up to $120 in gift

cards for participating in the study.

Contact Dr. Jeffrey Pella at (860)

523-6476 or STARS@uchc.edu.

GPA S tuden t s A t t end ADL’s 2014 Gr ea te r

Har t fo rd To r ch o f L ibe r t y Award Recep t ion

out, the person who was handing out

the awards discussed their achieve-

ments and what they did in order to

achieve their goals. Words in the

speeches resonated with the students

watching. “I don’t want to be toler-

ated, I want to be celebrated, but I

will accept being understood,” Cato

T. Laurencin stated in his speech, as

he accepted the Torch of Liberty.

This experience was a “life-changing

experience which raised our aware-

ness, “ Jadea H., a GPA student from

Hartford. Rufino agreed, “It was a

great experience to have, all of the

important people that we met. We

met the CEO of Cigna, a representa-

tive from UConn…they were talking

to us- they said they were honored to

meet us!”

Ten Great Path Academy students

and two staff members attended the

Connecticut Regional Office of the

Anti-Defamation League’s 2014

Greater Hartford Torch of Liberty

Award Reception on October 7th,

2014. The Great Path Academy

students were invited in order to

assist with the ushering of guests and

attendees, as a result of Great Path

Academy’s partnership with the Anti-

Defamation League. The event

honored Cato T. Laurencin, M.D.,

Ph. D., C.E.O. of the Connecticut

Institute for Clinical and Translation-

al Science at UConn and Max Javit,

the ADL National Commissioner.

Max Javit, one of the honorees, came

to Great Path Academy to witness

the "Names Can Really Hurt Us"

assembly in action in the school

community. Upon experiencing the

Great Path Academy school-wide

assembly, he was proud of the pro-

gram implementation. “Out of all

the programs that I’ve been to, Great

Path Academy demonstrated the

program the best.”

The students in the beginning, took

turns greeting people, then became

official guests, mingling, networking,

and spreading the word on the GPA

Ally program and the "Names Can

Really Hurt Us" assembly and how it

has positively affected the Great Path

Academy school community.

“I teared up during one speech,”

Rufino M., a GPA student from

Farmington, recalled. There were

stories of discrimination, prejudice,

violence and hate shared by the

speakers. The awards were handed

60 Bidwell Street

Manchester, CT

06040

Phone: (860) 512-3700

Fax: (860) 512-3701

Email: nilet001@hartfordschools.org

R e s p e c t ,

R e s p o n s i b i l i t y a n d S a f e t y

A Middle College High School

The guidelines put together collaboratively by

the group for the trainings and assembly.

“R.O.P.E.S.” , with words to guide the experi-

ence starting with each letter.

We’re on the web!

Www.greatpathacademy.org

Thank you to the following donors to the PBIS Gotcha Cart:

Walmart Manchester location, Dunkin Donuts Newington Corporate Office for 100 hot or cold drink vouchers, Mrs.

Kliman, Mrs. Vousden, Mrs. P.-D., Mr. Buder. We appreciate the support for helping to recognize GPA Student Cougars

for being Responsible, Respectful and Safe!

If interested, donations can be made to Ms. Canty– please email cants001@hartfordschools.org or call (860) 512-3723.

G R E A T P A T H A C A D E M Y

A T M C C

Photo collage

from the ADL

training sessions after school

in the GPA Community

Commons.

Great Path Academy @ MCC does not discriminate on

the basis of race, color, religious greed, age, gender,

gender identity or expression, national origin, marital

status, ancestry, present or past history of mental

disorder, learning disability or physical disability,

political belief, veteran status, or sexual orienta-

tion. The following individual has been designated to

handle inquires regarding non-discrimination policies:

Susan Canty, Title IX Coordina-

tor,cants001@hartfordschools.org.