An Interview with W.D. Kelley Principal Amelia Coleman-Brown

Posted by on May 17, 2013

By Eden Kainer

I interviewed W.D. Kelley Principal Amelia Coleman-Brown to discuss the types of partnerships she hopes to develop with the assistance of a Community Partnership Coordinator VISTA next year. We spoke about the number of positive programs that she and her team have already put into place at the school and their hopes for increasing the number of sustainable community partnerships in the future. Principal Brown and her team are especially interested in building up a strong relationship with a university, specifically as a source of STEM programming and student teachers. Parent engagement is another very strong interest and Principal Brown is always on the lookout for ways to help her parents gain valuable experience both in the school and out in the wider community.

Q: Tell me a little bit about your school.

A: W.D. Kelley is located in the Brewerytown section of Philly, at 28^th and Oxford Streets. Currently there are 304 students, grades K-8, but next year we are adding 170 students from Reynolds Elementary School [which is scheduled for closure]. This will mean we will have two classes at every level, K-8, instead of one. Our school philosophy is always move towards greatness. We want our students to change the world for good by respecting themselves, their school community and the community at large. I work to always model this philosophy by speaking with kind words even when I am upset, and I expect that all the adults in the building to model this as well.  We are trying to make the PSSA not be the only marker of achievement…

Q: In your opinion, what are your points of pride at Kelley?

A: I have seen a real change in the school climate since coming to the school three years ago. [Prior to Kelley, Principal Brown worked as an assistant principal in Chester, after having taught and served as a school growth leader and literacy teacher at the Lea School in West Philadelphia for a total of 10 years prior to that.] I have seen Kelley develop a climate of respect—all stakeholders are working to embrace this; parents, kids and staff are all working towards this common goal. During my first year the leadership team and I assessed that the school was missing systems to support certain routines such as, morning admissions and afternoon dismissal, as well as systems for keeping students engaged during whole group lessons. We needed these systems in place [to address climate issues] in order to facilitate becoming a high-level learning community and support student engagement. For admissions we put into place a system of coming together quietly and to repeat the pledge that school “is no place for hate” and to reiterate every day that we are moving towards greatness. We have also allotted after school time on Monday’s for teacher planning and professional development. The master schedule also allows for 8 more days common planning time and development than the School District mandates, gathering for 4 extra days before and after the school year. The School Improvement Grant (SIG) monies have made these extra meetings possible.

Kelley is soon looking to be recognized as an official “No Place for Hate” school. We have had a series of school assemblies organized by the different grades, including a Multi-Cultural Assembly and “A day of love around the world,” for which 2^nd graders researched Valentine’s Day celebrations in different countries. Also, Leeds Military Academy students did a service learning project with our students to develop a no-bullying zone at Kelley—together they created a skit about bullying which they presented to the school.

Academically there has been growth as well; more kids are now reading at grade level. We have had professional developments on what good teaching looks like and how to help students to become more fluent readers. We brought in a reading specialist who works on comprehension and added small group instruction to classrooms.  Reading levels are increasing as evidenced by quarterly assessments and we are now making a year’s growth uniformly across the grades. Basic math skills are really improving—currently we are 2^nd in place in the Philadelphia School District in First in Math!

You see the difference because of the resources we have been able to access because of the grant money [from SIG]. We have higher engagement and more students reading on level. In order for our school to improve, we needed especially to nurture reading, because the students were not quite where they needed to be. In addition, there is a definite need to increase and/or close the effective pedagogy gap of teachers across the grades. We need to be current with of all of the new techniques for teaching in support of high-level instruction.

We have great activities and partnerships to engage our kids, like after-school basketball and Saturday Academy. At the end of May, W.D. Kelley is participating in a giant mural project for the school sponsored by the Eagles Youth Partnership in collaboration with Philadelphia Mural Arts Program.   In addition, we will be the 2013 recipients of a beautiful Eagles Playground that will replace the concrete yard with play equipment, Astroturf, and a new basketball court. We have a potential partnership with the Philadelphia Water Department to add a rain garden and greenery to this area—to give the kids and the community something to take pride in.

Q: What is your greatest challenge?

A: Time!! I know I can’t do everything alone so I try and bring people together to the table to help.  The SIG grant helped us retain the School Improvement Support Liaison (SISL) [Ms. Renee Taliaferro] for two extra days, to have her work on parent engagement full-time.  We try to do small things that have big effects. We brought in the Philadelphia Writing Project to work closely with some of our parents to help improve their children’s reading comprehension. Parents came at the same time as our Saturday program for our students. To make it easier we afforded them the opportunity to bring little ones and we fed everybody.  In these workshops we worked with parents to create high-level literacy spaces in the home, dealing with how they could acquire reading materials on a budget and how to incorporate literacy in their daily routine.

Q: What are some of your goals for the future of this school?

A: I’d like to develop a close partnership with a university, either Temple or University of Pennsylvania. We are in a neighborhood that is sort of in the middle of both, but not really close to either. We had a very meaningful writing program with a student from the Temple School of Journalism, but she graduated and so did the program.  It was a partnership with a student but not really with the university.  However, she is now at United Way and sends us volunteers from time to time from there.

I would like to focus on building up STEM [Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics] and incorporating more technology and math into our program, and the university partnership could focus on helping us in this area. Because we gaining more students next year, we are eligible to purchase one more prep teacher for which I am planning to purchase a Science Specialist, since we currently have art, PE and music.

Q: How do you envision using VISTA and community partnerships to enhance your mission?

A: Parent engagement is very important to me. I want the VISTA and SISL to work together and put partnerships in place that we can sustain after the grants are gone. I like it especially when parents come in to school to volunteer and then they go out into the larger community with some experience. I really want the parent engagement resource room to really be used and useful over the years.   I want the VISTA to help us create partnerships that are sustained no matter what happens, no matter who the leader is, that it becomes a natural part of the school community.  Rather than partnerships with people they will be putting systems in place, so we know for example, that Temple always does this particular program here with us. I would like VISTA to work with us to grab hold of strong programs, put them in to place and create a binder/catalog of these resources.

Q: How can this VISTA project contribute to an improved school culture?

A: When I look at some of the schools that are successful, charter schools included, they have become hubs of their communities; they are open 8-8. The school is accessible and they continue the work after hours and they look for the most effective ways to engage the students and their families. They have things like hiking trips, and ongoing conversations about being productive citizens, so kids know what practices to adopt. Our students and parents sometimes don’t have all the skills they need to be successful; they are not always exposed to these things consistently. The VISTA could help us cultivate more of the partnerships that teach these things.

I want our kids to be seen as a viable part of the community and not pushed out [by possible gentrification].  I want to help make them part of positive change. We would like for someone to come and do a true assessment of what we have here at our school and help us create a vision for this community.  We need to bring attention to the greatness that is here.