SI Honored by Today’s Catholic Teacher
This article was first published in Genesis IV, Spring 2004.
SI was one of 12 schools nationwide to be honored by Today’s Catholic Teacher magazine for excellence and innovation in education.
The magazine announced the winners of the 2004 Catholic Schools for Tomorrow Award for Innovations in Education in its March issue and presented the award to the school at a ceremony in Boston April 15.
The magazine praised SI for “embarking on a unique approach to forming a school that learns,” for “rooting professional growth in every aspect of school culture, and for “learning from the best models available, both locally and nationally.”
The magazine singled out SI’s professional development program for praise, noting that “the first cornerstone of professional development at St. Ignatius is the Excellence in Teaching program, which emphasizes the integration of research in learning, teaching, curriculum, and technology. To support this effort the school sponsors a series of courses that serve as a foundation for common language that educators at St. Ignatius and other schools use to discuss, analyze and observe teaching.”
SI also earned top marks for its renewable tenure program, leadership training, support for professional growth, the collaborative summer curriculum grant program and adult spirituality program. The directors of these programs, (Steve Phelps for Professional Development and Rita O’Malley, Fr. Greg Goethals, SJ, and Mary Abinante for adult spirituality) “nurture relationships with local universities, other schools and local and national programs.”
The magazine also praised the SI faculty for attending national and local conferences, “keeping current in curricular and extracurricular areas and working together in subject level teams.”
SI President Anthony P. Sauer, SJ, noted that “professional development characterizes the spirit of the new SI. If we are different from other institutions, it well may be due to the emphasis on the growth of our teachers at whatever stage of their careers they are. For example, All the teachers here, including myself, try hard to improve each year after reading our student evaluations.”
Fr. Sauer also praised SI’s “tenure program, which requires self and peer evaluation every five years, and our 5-4 program, which allows for more faculty interaction, class preparation, essay correction and cura personalis for individual students.”
He thanked SI principal Charlie Dullea ’65, who, with the assistance of Kate Kodros (assistant principal for academics) and Steve Phelps (professional development director) for helping SI earn this honor.
“This award will help us to redouble our efforts to do everything we can to improve and thereby deserve the honor all the more,” Fr. Sauer added.