Jonathan Green and Kaye Houlihan

[00:04] JONATHAN GREEN: My name is Jonathan Green. I'm 50 years old. Today is Monday, January 24, 2022. And I'm talking today with principal Kaye Houlihan, who I coach at Fort Hamilton High School. And I work for new visions for public schools.

[00:22] KAYE HOULIHAN: Hi, my name is Kaye Houlihan. I am 59 years old today, Monday, January 24. I'm speaking from Fort Hamilton High School in Brooklyn, New York, and I am the principal at Fort Hamilton and pleased to chat with Jonathan Green today, our support and coach as a school, academically and all sorts of other things where new visions comes into play to support our school. So, Jonathan I'm curious, what were you like when you were a student?

[00:56] JONATHAN GREEN: Yeah, so I. And this, this relates to a lot of these other questions, but I was, I was a, in high school and in middle school, I was a overcompensating, just maniacal re reader. I would, I have this vision of going into my basement after cross country practice. Well, I would, I would go to cross country practice. I would come home. I would eat four bowls of cereal. I would kind of go through, usually about, drain about a gallon of milk and then go into my basement and read and reread all of my homework to prepare for when I was in high school, we were reading about a novel a week. So it was, it was a ton of work. And I learned how to read in the 6th grade. So my elementary school experience was really rough. I was dyslexic. It was the seventies. There was very little understanding of that at the time. I was in a self contained class with a lot of kids from, who had a lot of varied needs. I don't think any of them were dyslexic, but it was a, it was a tough experience. And so once I clicked in and learned how to read in the 6th grade, I just kind of, I just shot like a rocket and became very, very focused and, and needed that kind of extra overcompensation. So I'd say overcompensation was my, was my mo as a student. And lots and lots of, like, help seeking, talking to teachers, asking clarifying questions, reading and rereading, spell checking and spell checking. You know, that kind of. I'm that kind of kid. How about you?

[03:00] KAYE HOULIHAN: I would say similar in some ways. I mean, I was completely diligent. I completed everything. Lots of detail, always asking questions. I listened. I was an, you know, like, obsessive note taker, trying to write down everything the teacher said. I was fortunate, you know, my mom was a big reader and she read to us every night. So I think that passion and habit passed on to me. So just as you talked about, like, reading and rereading, I think that was something that I, you know, wasn't even conscious of. It just kind of was who I was and what I did. I remember not very many opportunities to talk to peers, you know, which, of course, is what drives us now in education is having peers speak to each other. So growing up in a very teacher centered world. But that was okay for me. I feel fortunate that I was, you know, had the reading habits and the note taking habits that just what kind of came with my own curiosity and the values in education. I mean, school was always the priority. Doing well was an expectation. It wasn't a, you know, oh, you got an a. It was like, why did you get a b? So really having that. That expectation motivated me, and I ended up doing well because of that diligence and because it worked for me. I didn't have very much exposure to students with disabilities or what was maybe not perceived as a disability at that time. And students were struggling on their own, but always loved school. Summer was the biggest drag of all because I wanted to be back in school. I think, given success as a student, I thought about being an educator. But I'm curious, given your experience, especially the frustrations early on, what inspired you to become an educator?

[05:11] JONATHAN GREEN: Well, it was that. Just transformation. So when I was my dad, who was a Methodist minister for 35 years in a rural part of southern Delaware, he just. It was the seventies, and there was very little understanding of dyslexia or how it affected learning and the brain. He. We were at a. In this. There's an island in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. And he grew up in this rural part of Maryland, and we were on this island, which is this crazy little place, and there are these nuns who are eating next to us, and he overheard them talking about this program at Johns Hopkins that was doing these tests to screen for dyslexia. And so he knew that I was struggling with reading and that this wasn't working, that, you know, our little school in southern Delaware wasn't working for me. And after. After he paid the check, he went back to them, and he. And he asked them, you know, what are you guys talking? What's this thing about? And so at the time, this was cutting edge. What they were, the neuropsych that they were doing at Johns Hopkins was really was right at the forefront of this work around dyslexia. So he was able to connect me to that. And then that led to getting evaluated. Then that led to eventually going to a school for dyslexia. And there was a teacher there, Penny Maldowski, who changed my life. This one woman absolutely changed my life. And she had the, you know, the Orton Gillingham playbook that she was able to apply, which has become now like a very credible research based intervention for dyslexics and was just spent incredibly patient. Spent an entire summer with me, having me just kind of write out these. These narratives, and I kind of wrote my way into reading, which is an interesting kind of backdoor in. But she really was able to value me as a scholar and as a thinker and my voice and my perspective and gave me a lot of confidence. And that just kind of. That led to this, like, radical shift in my life. You know, I was told when I was in the fifth grade that I would probably not graduate from high school and that I would probably pump gas for the rest of my life. That's what the principle, you know, of the school. Nothing wrong with pumping gas. I pumped gas in high school, so. But I had other plans. And so, yeah, I just had this real 180, and so that just became the benchmark for the rest of my life. That's why I do what I do. How about you?

[08:24] KAYE HOULIHAN: Timing the timing for you being in that place where your father overheard a, you know, all the different directions you might have gone in had that kind of connection not been made. I mean, it took me a while to get back to education. You know, I always thought about being a teacher. I loved playing school growing up because I loved school. I loved learning, but I always thought I had to be smarter. I had to know all the answers. So, you know, I went off to college. I pursued theater and English, my other passion. And then kind of after ten years of working in the nonprofit world, kind of kept, you know, I was working for nonprofit organizations that were related to education. So I finally just decided, this is what I want to do. I want to be in that learning environment where kids are thinking, where they are supported in developing how to think, how to process information, and really just the excitement. I've always thought of myself as a problem solver, taking in information, figuring out what it means, what next steps it might reveal. And that's where I think we still need to focus on. It's the skills about thinking and making decisions and what information do you need but that supportive environment. So when I think about a classroom, I think about the learning environment, you know, and what did I do as a teacher to create that environment? So there was comfort to ask questions or to make mistakes, you know, and that's certainly what I'm looking for when I'm visiting classes now as a principal. But just again, that excitement of learning, you know, my high school teacher, mister Nod, who I'm still very good friends with, he always said that life's greatest pleasure is learning. And I bought that. I promoted it. I shared that with my own students. Whether I was doing, you know, grapes of Wrath or the odyssey, it always seemed to make sense to me. And, you know, just different ways to express learning as well, what, what students understood, not just a, you know, pen to paper or multiple choice question, just, you know, creative ways, whether it's with a dramatization or artistically or collaborating on a presentation. And again, those things that I felt were really not part of my educational experience in finding other ways other than just like writing an essay or responding to a question made, you know, kind of prompted me to want to be a teacher so that students had an opportunity, you know, they weren't good writers or they, or they didn't feel they were good writers. They had other opportunities to express that. So, you know, as we know, we've been, you know, kind of dealing with some challenging times with the pandemic. You know, you persist. We continue to have our meetings, and you are supporting us probably, you know, more vigorously than ever. What kind of keeps you going during these challenging times as an educator?

[11:50] JONATHAN GREEN: So I'm old and I have older. Well, I have some perspective. So, you know, there's been, you know, I was, I was in the classroom on 911. I stayed with my kids that day. I also have, like, a lot of mentors that are, some are still in my life, like your teacher, and some have died, but those are folks that I turn to. And the way they shaped me is that they are these, whether it's Anne Weiner or Lynn Stewart or Herb Mack or these kind of, like, biggest. I have this constellation of mentors in my mind that have helped kind of shape my career and where I am. And they were all about the long game. They're all about the marathon. They're all about, you know, Herb, who's the principal of urban academy, he would just kind of, he was always eating nuts. He always had, like, a jar of nuts by his desk. I was like, what's up with the nuts? He goes, you always have to have a snack. And, you know, he had a cot at the school. And Ann Weiner started crossroads high school when she was in her late fifties. So these are folks that like they were educators for life and always were looking at the long race rather than just what was happening right in front of us. So I think those are the folks that kind of, I turn to during challenging times to think about perspective and proportion and, and why I, and purpose. But I think what equally is keeping me just going is you all like, is K, you and your colleagues, the other principals that are in our group. I just that community. And the, the fact that like when I wake up in the morning, I think about all of you waking up in the morning and going to school every day in the ice, in the snow, whatever it is, and continuing this work. And that just gives me such purpose. So I think it's, it's the connection that we've made and the commitment that I have and I feel like that we have to each other in this, that um, I think that's what the spirit of this work kind of lives in there.

[14:35] KAYE HOULIHAN: I mean, I agree. And when I think of what keeps me going in challenging times, I think of the team, you know, I think of the leadership team, all the assistant principals, I think of my secretaries, everybody that reports directly to me, but also across the building, people who are genuinely committed to making the best environmental conditions for learning with younger people. And again, this last almost two years now has been hard because everybody's had their own challenges. But I think that the crisis of the time, whatever it is, post 911 or mid or post pandemic someday, is that that crisis also reinforces how important learning is and how to think critically and be responsible, not just for yourself but for everybody around you. So it almost, you know, makes it more pressing that we, you know, figure out what we need to do with, you know, distributing tests or masks or whatever the case might be in, you know, sort of our most recent challenging times and then get back to, you know, what's our objective? You know, yes, we want kids to graduate, but the objective is still, you know, making sure everybody has a post secondary plan and has the means to execute it. You know, that's always the plan. But, you know, we have a large school, as you well know, around 4200 students this year, smaller than ever since I've been here in the last ten years. But we still have everybody in kind of different places again come back to that commitment. And I think the continuous improvement work has been a big part of filling in some of those gaps for our students. And I know you've been involved with the work at new visions from the very beginning. I don't know if you want to talk about this year, but like, what was your biggest kind of aha. Moment with the continuous improvement work with the Gates foundation grant?

[16:51] JONATHAN GREEN: Yeah, I have a hard time. The pandemic and the CI work is so interconnected for me. And I think, one, they're accelerants in a way, and they kind of work off of each other. One aha moment was just this understanding of identifying this time and place. Like for example, when we're looking at, you know, students coming into the 9th grade or students that are in their fifth term that are off track for on time graduation and understanding these, these critical windows of time and then assessing need within these windows of time and really attending to these, widening our attention and attending to these other benchmarks rather than just the benchmarks that I've traditionally at least always paid attention to, which are, you know, earn rate and attendance and graduation and so just becoming much more nuanced there. I think I, the one aha for me is just how I've expanded.

[18:17] KAYE HOULIHAN: The.

[18:17] JONATHAN GREEN: Kind of the data that I think about when I think about student success and scholarship, and it's much more inclusive of wellness, it's much more inclusive of the socio emotional learning piece and kind of bringing those things together to really understand the whole child has been, and having some ways of having some instruments and some other kind of strategies to be able to pull these data together and have conversations that are much more, that allow for much more of a, a fuller portrait of the child than any conversation I've had with educators in my time like that, especially at a school like Fort Hamilton, where there's just, there's so many students, to be able to be able to have that conversation about a child at a large school is just fantastic.

[19:23] KAYE HOULIHAN: I mean, lots of aha moments. But kind of in keeping with what you were saying, looking at, you know, the, the less quantifiable things, you know, I mean, that certainly we are driven to look at certain students who have lower attendance or not accumulating credits. But over the course of the years that we've been, you know, working on how to support students to achieve an ad GPA, to have more, you know, skills, to self advocate for themselves and to engage with the learning, kind of recognizing we needed to make more of a commitment. This wasn't a, you know, once a week kind of program that, you know, they were going to do during their lunch. We needed to figure out a way to help them earn credit at the same time they were involved in service learning. And that really, I think for me, is value of our school, giving back, contributing. A lot of our clubs and our classes do actually have those efforts. But this class in particular, that's part of its cohesion is service learning and, you know, learning how to self advocate, you know, for yourself and your needs, but also your community members. And how does that make you a stronger person, a smarter person, you know, just a more satisfied person? I think that was a recognition. And also, on the other hand, giving that extra support to students really required that we make a commitment to the teachers that it wasn't an extra class for them, that it was part of their regular program, because we have, you know, high expectations that they are getting to know students more, you know, kind of deeply, you know, the pressure of a regents exam isn't there. So really being able to dedicate and really nurture the teacher team that is working with the students and just, you know, community is something else that we've recognized, is why, you know, students feel attached to Fort Hamilton. We do have some special programs in the arts. We have an honor academy. We have a JROTC program, but this was also the advisory program. And again, this elective class with an advisory component was a way to build community. You know, in the 9th grade, you know, they see each other every day in class. They're doing events every month, and certainly seeing them all come together. I mean, not all of them participated, but we had an event to have a dinner and then go to our performance of the Nutcracker with our Joffrey Ballet Academy. And just to be able to know that they wouldn't have come to the Joffrey performance otherwise, you know, to help them feel more connected to the school, not just to the individual elective and advisory class, but to the school and finding more opportunities within the school. So I'm ultimately just really grateful for being involved in the program that, again, kind of, you know, guided us to think more closely about what did students need. And after a couple years of one day a week, we decided it needed to be more, you know, but there are still challenges with the work. So now, again, I don't know the challenges that come first and foremost to your mind, but how are you kind of coping with the challenges of the CI work?

[23:07] JONATHAN GREEN: I mean, I think there are different challenges now than there were before when this started. And I think when it started, the big challenge was just, I think we underestimated the, what this meant in terms of the role of teachers and of staff that were involved in this work and how this was a fundamental, like, shift in role and shift in understanding what it meant to be. You know, as a high school teacher, I taught English and I taught social studies, and I never really saw my role as. As doing the work that I traditionally associated with a guidance counselor, you know, one on one, conferencing and understanding what was happening at the home. These types of things. This idea of being responsible for understanding and looking across an entire child's program and understanding that I have responsibility for this student's pathway, not just the course mark that she's getting in my class and also checking in on their wellness and also checking in on their own kind of vision for post secondary and their future and starting to seed some ideas there. Those are radically different. The understanding of role and identity is a real shift. And I think that that was just a very strong challenge at the beginning. And I think that the pandemic has been an accelerant there. I think that it's much easier, I think, coming back and reentry, no matter how bumpy this has been this year, selling something like advisory when it's so obviously critical for students that haven't been in school since the 6th grade. So I think this. I like there's such need and the primacy and the just. There's. This is. This has become such an essential anchor point for student success. And I think that's recognized across the board in a way that it may not have been if we hadn't had this pandemic and we weren't in this situation. And the fact that we were kind of set up to anticipate this. However, you know, we didn't anticipate a pandemic, but the fact that advisory, the legs of advisory were being built and this motto was being built and this attention was being. Was starting to get developed within this team. I think those were great things to leverage. I think that the challenge right now is around. It's what it always is. It's about attention, it's about focus, it's about follow through. It's about the details that we all have blind spots to. But I especially do because I'm not sitting where you're sitting and can't see into. There's just a lot of things that I can't see that we need each other and we're interdependent in trying to solve.

[26:21] KAYE HOULIHAN: Definitely. And I think the follow through, what you just said, really rings true to me because the students who were involved in the advisory work again one day a week in previous years, it's not like, okay, 9th grade, good luck. 10th grade, 11th grade, you're on your own. We really always wanted to continue with the upper grades, even though the focus was always on the incoming 9th grade and establishing that foundation. But it took us a while to figure out how to do it. Space is usually, well, not usually. Space is always an issue. Like, do we have a room where students can meet? Do we have enough teachers? And do we have the right teachers? So I think that's, you know, especially with a commitment to a real curriculum and projects and coming together with events. There really was a need to have a core group not who just wanted a smaller class. But, you know, really we're going to take on that. I'm going to ask you some tough questions, and I'm going to have to hear some challenging information and know that I don't have to know all the answers, but be committed to supporting whatever resources are necessary. So along those lines, it's really, you know, in a big school, it's about coherence. You know, we have different teachers involved with the continuing improvement work. But again, I think the coherent part is the commitment, but it's kind of the persistence of, okay, I didn't get a chance to meet with that student, but I need to meet with them before the end of the week that in a new kind of effort, we're still finding our way to some coherence there. And the nice thing, too is we've got teachers involved across the disciplines, PE, the arts, social studies, English. But again, that also makes it a little more challenging to be coherent. They're bringing different skills to the table with the curriculum and certainly the advisory work. But I think sewn to grow is a tool that's been helpful. Those regular check ins that students are doing the academic as well as the social emotional. But again, I think the training of the staff directly involved or at least the, the ongoing meetings and the opportunities to share has been really important to get through the challenge and to really, you know, push through, you know, the month of January, which was a huge surge, and lots of people were out, both students and teachers that, you know, I mean, now we got to reset for term two in a way because we couldn't always follow through on some of the things we had hoped to do before the end, you know, of the term. But, you know, the work remains exciting because we're seeing an impact. So what would you say keeps you rolling along?

[29:38] JONATHAN GREEN: I think that, as you were saying, the, even where this work is seeding lots of. So we've been really focused on getting students at the end of first year to hit that 80 plus GPA mark and just the primacy of that number and how that number kind of stands at this intersection between all of these other variables that are super critical to having a strong first year. And I think that that focus and intention, especially around the durable systems that are needed to, to underwrite that work, have now started to kind of, these little fires have started in other places, you know, like in the 11th grade with special ed or in the honors program, or when I look across the schools in rethinking their, you know, the way their, their program for February between Lunar New Year and midwinter break and thinking about reentry. And so I just think that there's a mindset shift that's happening across all of us where, or at least what I'm seeing is we're thinking about these durable systems that can sustain and continue to build momentum and generate outcomes no matter what. You know, January was crazy town. There were teachers out, kids out like, but these systems are seeding and they're remaining and they're going to allow us to continue to build and develop. And that's, and that's, that's what excites me because I think that it has, you know, I was around starting schools. I got to, I was fortunate enough to help start a bunch of small high schools during kind of early BlOomberg climb when we were talking all about knowing children well and the small school, and you're more than a number, and all of those things were really, I still believe in all of that. The systems weren't there, though, and we hadn't realized or articulated what it took to actually do that. And I think we're getting closer to that. And it doesn't mean you have to be in a small school. You can do it in a really, a large school like Fort Hamilton. That's so, I guess the other thing I'll say about Fort Hamilton that I love as an example for the city is that you're, when I walk into your school, there's just such a, there's this, sometimes I think folks misidentify or understand what we're talking about around Sel and everything as being soft and not equated with excellence. And what I see you all doing there is, this is all in the service of a school that is absolutely dedicated to excellence. And you just see it, the pride and the, yeah, it's just, there's, there's, those two things are intertwined and they're coherent in a way that I think is a really important, a statement for our city.

[32:59] KAYE HOULIHAN: Thank you. I mean, I do feel a lot of pride. I share that pride with students that I have in them that they are, you know, cooperative, you know, they're adolescents, they make bad choices. They need to be reminded all of those things. But it's exciting that I do feel we are a real community of, you know, 5000 people, and then we have these little tighter communities, the advisory program, our honor academy, etcetera. But really trying to make sure that everybody feels part of that community. And again, I think, you know, kind of driving the curriculum. You know, the core learning other than, you know, the advisory pieces are about, you know, equity and service and the impact it has on every individual and getting comfortable with talking about, I think that's one of the big challenges. Our large community with a lot of teachers who, you know, you said it earlier, they were not getting into teaching because they wanted to be a counselor. They wanted to teach math, that math was their thing. So really trying to figure out a, you know, small but moving ways that could help people feel more comfortable with taking ownership of that, you know, not being responsible for the social emotional well being of the kids, but just being comfortable with facilitating a conversation and setting some basic ground rules. I think a lot of our staff has come a long way in that work, but I think the commitment to the advisory and the crossing across the building has made a big difference and just exploring how we can do more for all students. What things are we doing in advisory that we need to do for everybody? Whether we do it in all english classes or all social studies classes. We're doing a lot of social emotional lessons based on some of the competencies that are not where we want them to be. Decision making, social awareness, really some of the critical pieces that we're always trying to highlight, but just working to be more explicit. So I'm trying to be more explicit in my work with leadership and staff. I know the AP's are doing the same thing in their work with their respective departments and in their classrooms, but that I think is going to keep us going because then we will see the fruits of that, those efforts. A lot of things. When we were talking earlier about our own experience as a student, I was really lucky. I had a family that valued education. There was no question I would be going off to college. I knew from day one I'd be paying for it myself. So I started, you know, saving my pennies and babysitting and all that kind of stuff. But some of those things are not even on the table for our students. So, you know, really integrating that, you know, we will have a plan. We will support you to reach your goals, and I think, you know, really nurturing students to go from, you know, you're in a gen ed class of global, but, hey, we've got an honors class. You know, if you're, you know, you've done so well, let's. Let's see how you like a more rigorous opportunity that will just put you in a better position to be ready for next steps and to really challenge your thinking. You know, again, I come back to, we've got a great team, committed. You know, people really find things satisfying at Fort Hamilton. We have great kids, and I think we have a great staff who are, like I said, committed. And I, as a leader, do everything I can to support teachers. And, you know, a lot of decision making is kind of an after the fact with our pandemic and the way things have just been rolled out. But, you know, I feel we're getting back to, you know, what's really most important, which is the kids in front of us and what's going on in their minds, not so much. You know, did they get another test or, you know, they quarantined for five days or so. You know, all of those things that have just been kind of, you know, a little bit of weighing us down. Yeah. But back to the business that we all committed to from the get go. So, you know, Jonathan I don't know if you have any final words, but it's been a pleasure talking to you and. And really learning more about your own experience as a student and to think of the opportunities that really turn things around for you. That's an amazing story.

[37:58] JONATHAN GREEN: Yeah, it's been a pleasure. I've always wanted to have this. We should set this up. Maybe it might not be storycorps, but let's keep these one on ones going because it's good. I've wanted to check in like this, so it's great to have this time with you. Yeah. Yeah.

[38:18] KAYE HOULIHAN: Well, and now I want to know, you know, really, everybody, what kind of a student they were.

[38:24] JONATHAN GREEN: I know these are great questions.

[38:26] KAYE HOULIHAN: Yeah. It opens up just something you didn't think about before, because I guess I make the assumption everybody was a good student who became a teacher, but I find that's more often it's the opposite of. So. To be continued.

[38:42] JONATHAN GREEN: All right, thank you.

[38:44] KAYE HOULIHAN: Thank you.