Faculty spend summer on professional development

Publish Date: 8/25/2022

Committed to lifelong learning, many University School of Nashville faculty took advantage of lighter summer schedules to pursue professional development opportunities. Read on for the many adventures, observations, and takeaways that faculty returned to campus with in August.

By Sierra Smith, Communications Specialist

These opportunities were made possible through philanthropy at USN. A commitment to faculty & staff development is integral to ensuring an exceptional education for each student at USN, and this commitment is amplified through the support of generous donors.

Fifth Grade Science Teacher Tobey Balzer ’02 used the 2022 Meador Grant to travel to Iceland. In her geology unit, fifth grade students explore layers of the Earth, geologic time, plate tectonics, geologic phenomena such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and geysers, and the rock cycle. Iceland is what Balzer described as “a geologist’s dream” — an ideal place to see numerous ways in which geologic processes affect a landscape. In one trip, Balzer was able to observe and capture firsthand accounts of tectonic plates, geysers, waterfalls, volcanos, volcanic islands & craters, canyons, lava tunnels & fields; she presented the findings from her trip during August inservice and will share her experiences with students throughout the year giving them a deeper look and a stronger connection to the scientific concepts they’re studying.

High School Math Teacher Anna Dailey traveled to London for a two-week summer intensive on Islamic art including instruction on how to construct geometric and biomorphic patterns from across the Islamic world. After two years of studying the artform online, Dailey described the opportunity to work with experts in person and receive feedback in real-time as invaluable. In her geometry class, Dailey leads a unit each year on constructions where students create midpoints, perpendicular bisectors, and other geometric figures using a straightedge and a compass; the unit culminates with students creating an Islamic pattern. She’ll bring a deepened knowledge of the history of the art form and the mathematics within the patterns created to her classroom this year and now has connections all over the world to artists who can continue to support her work by sharing additional insights.

Assistant Head of High School for Academic Affairs Jeff Edmonds went to the Folio Summer Institute in July. Folio Collaborative is an online platform created to help school administrators and human resources professionals support educators' professional growth by collecting goals, conversations, feedback, and more in one easy-to-use location. The three-day conference focused on ways to leverage this platform. Edmonds gained valuable insight into how other schools are using Folio, and during inservice in August he shared with colleagues his thoughts on how to improve the school’s current use of the platform to foster deeper connection and engagement across USN’s many divisions and departments.

Director of College Counseling Aaron Fulk attended the Association of College Counselors at Independent Schools Summer Institute, where some 200 independent school college counselors convened to discuss current trends and best practices in the field of college counseling. University of Oregon Professor of Indigenous Studies Michelle Jacob delivered a talk on the concept she termed “The Auntie Way” in which she described the role of women in many indigenous tribes and connected that to the need for more “academic aunties” for all students.

Fulk shared Jacob’s speech as a highlight of the conference and said, “The talk resonated with me since aunties in Samoan culture play a similar role, but also because I could immediately picture the aunties in my own educational journey.”

Additionally, Fulk enhanced his understanding of the shifts happening within digital PSAT and SAT testing and strengthened relationships with college counseling peers in other areas of the country. Fulk even made time to visit University of Oregon’s new track stadium where the World Athletics Championships track & field competition was held the following week.

Third Grade Teachers Ellen Hicks & Kyleen Shyer attended the Teachers College Columbia University Reading Institute held virtually in July. Throughout the week, they listened to keynote speakers, participated in both small and large group discussions, and developed a network of fellow educators around the world that are implementing the same reading curriculum as USN’s third grade. Hicks and Shyer learned a great deal and ended the week inspired and excited to teach reading this academic year; what’s more, they wrapped the conference eager to share what they learned with the rest of the third grade teaching team and ready to implement changes right away.

Assistant Head of High School for Student Affairs Nicole Jules joined a group of High School students at Tearing Down the Walls, a two-day race and leadership conference for independent school students in the Southeast that aims to provide students across all racial and socioeconomic backgrounds with opportunities to lead in the arena of race relations. Held locally at Ensworth in June, Jules and USN’s students were able to use the conference to plan joint work with other Nashville-area schools for the upcoming year.

Diversity & Community Life Director Roderick White also attended the conference as one of three keynote speakers along with Author & Columbia University Professor Bettina Love and Vanderbilt University Professor Rich Milner.

“The keynote speeches … were so reaffirming to those that are doing the work of [diversity, equity, and inclusion] in their school communities. They challenged us to keep going while remembering we are humans living a human experience,” Jules shared reflecting on takeaways from the event.

First Grade Teacher Marty Kennedy took part in Project Zero Sparks 2022, a virtual, one-day conference held by Harvard Graduate School of Education in July. The workshop opened with informative findings from recent research in the field of education, then Kennedy opted to attend two breakout sessions — one exploring the pedagogy of play from preschool through middle school and another on using inquiry practices to facilitate deeper learning. After the conference, Kennedy shared that it reinforced the importance of focusing on student engagement and refining curriculum to highlight student interest, something Kennedy will continue to prioritize in her classroom.

Kennedy also tapped into her teaching experience and two decades of professional development provided by USN to lead Responsive Classroom advanced courses in Wisconsin, Iowa, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. She led four training sessions for elementary educators in strategies for social-emotional learning, equity in education, student identity, and student engagement. Additionally, she coached virtual workshops on visible thinking through Harvard Graduate School of Education. Kennedy attributes the numerous opportunities for professional growth that USN has provided as the reason she is able to give back in the summer by training other educators and calls it “one of the greatest benefits [she has] received as a USN employee.”

Eighth Grade English Teacher Christine Park participated in two virtual learning opportunities over the summer. Park attended Learning & the Brain’s “Executive Skills in the Classroom” online institute. This weeklong program offered Park a chance to engage in intensive training on the topic of executive functions with applications to the classroom. The training placed a special emphasis on how to orient students to intervention efforts and help them move from being externally controlled to internally self-regulated through the use of bridging strategies.

Next, Park spent two days immersed in the anatomy of the Folger Method in Folger Shakespeare Library’s “The Folger Method in One Fell Swoop” workshop. The workshop offered Park new strategies for teaching complex texts including Shakespeare and for getting students engaged with words. Park will put these new strategies into practice teaching “Taming of the Shrew” this academic year.

English Department Chair Freya Sachs ’00 went to the Departmental Leadership Institute at Pomfret in Pomfret, Connecticut in June. The five-day residential institute gave Sachs a chance to learn and practice skills for using departmental time effectively, facilitating meaningful and productive feedback conversations, and guiding organizational change, all aimed at developing a strategic plan for USN’s English department that aligns with the school’s mission and strategic vision.

Sachs shared that she is looking forward to bringing her takeaways back to her colleagues in the English department and said, “I appreciated the chance to build relationships with peers at other independent schools, to see the challenges we are all considering, and to better understand USN and my work here, and the amazing opportunities we have, by way of that.”

High School History Teacher Anna Stern attended Augsburg University’s AP Summer Institute in Minneapolis. The College Board-endorsed workshop is designed to support all aspects of advanced placement course instruction. Stern plans to directly apply the best teaching practices and methodologies learned this academic year in her AP U.S. history course.

In July, Stern continued her summer professional development pursuits at the National World War II Museum in New Orleans where she participated in The Power of Propaganda: Teaching Media Literacy Through WWII, an interdisciplinary, weeklong seminar designed to provide educators with an in-depth look at teaching media literacy through the analysis of WWII propaganda. Learning from historians, educators, and museum staff, Stern gained effective teaching strategies to help students analyze WWII propaganda, evaluate primary sources, and cultivate media literacy. The beautiful museum with endless exhibits to explore offered Stern a renewed enthusiasm for teaching students about WWII.

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