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Congratulations, Class of 2020 and Class of 2021! As you graduate from Bank Street and head into schools, museums, and hospitals, you will be working with children who have been through a great deal over the last 15 months I want to share a passage from an article I read last month: Rarely have America’s children suffered so many blows, and all at once, Many have experienced social isolation during lockdowns and anxiety about the virus. School closures and learning interruptions have set back many at school. Some parents have lost jobs - exacerbating parental stress and food insecurity. Thousands of children have lost a parent to the disease. It is unusual to have so many challenges at once, and for so long. As vaccinations rise and restrictions are lifted, the looming question for this generation is: What will the long-term effects of the lost year be? Over the coming months and years, you and your classmates will help determine the answer to that question. If you’ve learned one thing in your time at Bank Street you know that if we begin with a focus on children’s deficits it is a recipe for failure. We must recognize the loss and trauma many of our children have faced, we can’t sweep it under the rug. But we must begin with understanding their strengths. Our task as educators is to create engaging, supportive and creative spaces for learning, repair and resilience. We need to know what children have learned to do living through this pandemic – some have learned to cook, others have learned to care for younger siblings, others have gotten their first job or organized their first political protest What was good and special this year for you? I want to share three brief stories of how educators across Bank Street have responded to the needs of children and families. At the Bank Street Head Start which sits on the lower east side of Manhattan - the leadership team created a community project– they built a large wooden loom and cut multi–colored strips of cloth and placed it at the front door inviting all members of the community to participate in weaving a quilt. They assigned meaning to each color of cloth • Yellow: To honor your lost loved ones • White- To acknowledge hardships (the loss of a job, housing, sleep ) • Green: To honor what has been positive (more time with family, smaller class sizes, new hobbies, joy). I talked to another alum who teaches at public elementary school in Brooklyn, who described his frustration with the loss of field trips due to the COVID restrictions so he started bringing his students on neighborhood walks to study and learn about parts of their community they had never seen. My daughter Selah, is 4, she’s been learning virtually at Bank Street and her teachers recently asked children to act out some of their favorite stories via zoom – she was elated to hide under the bed with her ipad playing the troll and ferociously menacing the three billy goats gruff as they tried to cross the bridge.

For all the loss this has also has been a year of creativity and new ways of learning Now, as you graduate from Bank Street, you are called to meet this moment. The world around us is changing fast – every school is asking urgent questions about how to center the needs of the whole child – this is new and it will create space for you to do important work as you bring the lessons you’ve learned at Bank Street to life in the world. As you move forward, I hope you will also stay connected with your colleagues and teachers here at Bank Street. We are a support network that will always be here for you as you grow and develop throughout your careers and we want to stay connected. Thank you, and congratulations to the Class of 2020 and Class of 2021! I was recently asked to describe a moment in my education that has shaped me, given me form as an educator. When I thought about the request, I thought about those times that held real meaning for me, that went beyond those times when I merely added to my body of knowledge. I have been fortunate to have had many of these significant moments in my life, but one stood out to me strongly. At the time of this story, I was the Associate Dean of the School of Ed. at the University of North Dakota, working with a well-known progressive educator, Vito Perrone. Vito knew me as a thinker and thought I would enjoy attending the Summer Institutes led by Patricia Carini, a philosopher committed to deep thought about educational practice. So, a colleague and I headed off to Williams College in MA where the Institutes were held at the time. Elementary school teachers from all over the country attended this two-week Institute. My colleague and I were the only teacher educators there, the only people with doctorates. We spent our mornings in the whole group discussing ideas from the philosophical texts we had read. We spent the afternoons in small inquiry groups looking at children’s work or an issue of practice using the Descriptive Inquiry processes that were the core of these Institutes. These processes were grounded in close description and were done in collaborative groups. The formal learning I did at that first Institute is not what has stuck with me over the decades. The learning that shaped me, that had deep meaning for me, was that of the teachers’ capacities to create knowledge collaboratively through the discipline of close description. These practitioners drew on their experience and imaginations to create the kind of particular insights into children’s thinking and a teacher’s practice that could be turned into action that book learning sometimes didn’t provide. What I learned was that doing collaborative inquiry in this way created opportunities for meaning to arise. This learning has shaped my work in schools and higher ed. It became the core of how I think about scholarship—collaborative, grounded in practice, not owned by traditional scholars but by the practitioners who created it.

Helping you begin to think about education as being about creating opportunities for meaning to arise is what I hope to do through this brief talk at the event honoring your graduation. Where have those opportunities been for you? Where have you witnessed meaning being made by the children or colleagues with whom you work? Have there been opportunities for meaning to arise from our experiences of life in a pandemic? These are questions for you to reflect on about your education at Bank Street, your experience in schools and hospitals with children, parents, other educators. I offer here one further story that I hope provides more grist for your thinking mill. I think it illustrates how a teacher found meaning and saw a direction for change through hearing about another’s work with children. As I imagine you have experienced, the pandemic has forced changes in everyone’s work. Teachers in schools have had to learn new ways of teaching and building online relationships with children and parents. They have had really to reimagine their practice and the grounds on which to build relationship. I have learned this year about the efforts of classroom teachers as they have shared aspects of their practice in the Descriptive Inquiry Study Group. The group includes New York City teachers of children, adolescents and adults who have all had to transition from face-to-face classrooms to some version of online classrooms. We meet monthly and use Descriptive Inquiry processes to shape the sharing. In January, one of the group’s members shared her documentation of a pre-school the teachers and parents of which decided to have school outdoors and not online. She shared descriptions of the children’s explorations of the park setting, their developing relationships with each other and with the trees and rain-formed puddles. She shared descriptions of how the teachers stood to the side to observe the children’s developing interests in the varied leaves of different trees and the birds which sang and flew in the park and then offered the children ways to extend their looking and questioning. All of us in the group were rapt by the presentation, amazed by the doughtiness of the children and their teachers in all kinds of weather, and had many ideas to share in response to the presenter’s focus questions: What does this description help us think about in terms of using the outdoors as space for learning? What are its possibilities for the work we do? Now move to the end of March, when another teacher presents her work with online teaching. She has struggled with the shift, what it requires of her Kindergarten children and the distance she feels from them and the children from each other. She worries about the virus for herself and her families. She asked the group to help her think about this question: How do I build relationships with children in my blended classroom? Here is a taste of her Review and her naming of a breakthrough. In addition often the audio was so poor for some children I could not hear them at all “ Lovie I can’t hear you.” “Try going out and coming back in.” “ I am sorry I am going to have to keep you muted because of the background noise”, or some technological issue would come up on my end. Very soon I realized that I had lost the time in creating community and building relationships with the individual children in the class and that the children and I were just Zoom boxes to each other. I had no idea who liked dinosaurs, liked to work alone or get help from a friend, who needed to lie down or stretch out, who loved to bring a favorite toy from home everyday. It was after listening to a descriptive presentation about a nursery school having school outdoors that I started to see a way to possibly rebuild relationships with children. Just after the February winter break I sent a letter to families saying that with the weather warming up we could spend a little more time outside and move some of our work together outside.

She then went on to describe the ways she had created an outdoor classroom for her kindergarteners during some mornings. I hear this as meaning making, and the group’s responses to her focus questions frequently centered on the connection she made to the earlier presentation. One group member noted how her face lit up when she described being with her children outdoors, how her voice conveyed excitement. Others named some possibilities that her time outdoors with the children could be extended. She and the group could feel the ways that relationships were now being formed in deeper ways. My experience from many decades ago and the one that happened a couple of months ago share qualities of meaning making: a kind of energy, the push for a change, the sense that something that matters has happened. I would also note that while meaning can happen on our own, so often it comes when we are engaged and sharing with others. At your graduation, I wish for you memories/experiences of opportunities of this kind and future work that enables their occurrence. Education that leads to meaning is transformative, life changing, both for educators and for those with whom they work. They provide a touchstone for what matters in our work, giving us both inspiration and the wherewithal to enact it. I hope you have stories of this kind to tell. Today we honor Louise Derman-Sparks, a dedicated educator, an effective community organizer, and a vocal and tireless advocate for equity, justice, and anti-bias education. For more than 50 years, Ms. Sparks has been a warrior in the fight for diversity and justice in early childhood education. Her groundbreaking work led to teaching educators and, through her writings, to becoming an internationally known expert in anti-bias learning and early childhood education. Ms. Sparks understood early in her career that a high percentage of young children in the United States weren’t experiencing high-quality early care and education. This was especially true, as it still is today, for children who were beginning life with social and economic disadvantages. She was determined to make a difference in an early care system that wasn’t serving our children and its educators well. As a founding teacher at the Perry Preschool Project in 1960s Michigan, she and a diverse group of preschool teachers were all required to have a college education, and they were paid the same as elementary school teachers. This was a very radical idea. Their curriculum was not a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, each week, she visited her students’ families in their homes, building relationships with parents and giving families tools to support the future education of their children. Ms. Sparks understood that educational equity doesn’t just happen—it must become a priority through our focus and our actions. The success of the Perry Preschool was a proving ground that showed us how our early childhood educators can earn a living wage and how our children will benefit and go on to live more successful lives.

Now faculty emeritus at Pacific Oaks College, she has remained a tireless advocate for equity and justice, working with educators to explore their own biases and helping children using concrete learning strategies to understand a biased world. She has authored many seminal books, which have become must-have resources for early childhood educators, including in our graduate courses at Bank Street. With a fierce passion, she has worked to shine the light on racism, misogyny, homophobia, classism, and ableism in education. She has fought hard for her ideas to be heard, including delaying a second revision of one of her books for over a decade because she refused to take out references to sexual orientation. Here at Bank Street, our work seeks to continue her pioneering efforts for equity in early childhood education. So, Louise Derman-Sparks, in honor of your service to past and future generations of early childhood educators, we confer upon you, the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, Honoris Causa. Hello all. I am very happy to accept an honorary doctorate from Bank Street, whose work I have long admired. One example is personal. Many years ago , I taught a Bank Street weekend class about anti-bias education. One of the students was a kindergarten teacher at the elementary school I went to as a child. I asked to visit her classroom. When I attended PS 61, it had all the inadequacies of schools in low-income neighborhoods. This time, to my happy surprise, it was wonderfully transformed. I was greeted by a welcoming team of parents in the lobby. Explaining I was an alumna of PS 61, they took me to the Principal, to whom I explained the reasons for my visit. She gave me a tour of the school, and then me to the kindergarten classroom. Turns out , the many wonderful changes I observed were fostered by this Principal, who had participated in a Bank Street leadership program . From the beginning of my work as an early childhood education practitioner, two passions energized me. These are the wonder and delight of working with young children; and the urgency of participating in movements for social justice in the larger society. In 1985, I found a way to integrate my two passions through the anti-bias education work that became my life-long professional focus . The journey has been exhilarating , challenging, enlightening—and sometimes awe-inspiring. I learned that early childhood education programs are a vital bridge between family and the larger society. If they choose to, ECE programs play a vital role in countering the harm of racism and other forms of systemic prejudice on children’s development. Early childhood education practitioners also have a special role in working with others to build a humane, just, and peaceful world where all can thrive. Now you carry on the essential work of early childhood care and education. My warmest wishes go with you.

Hi, I'm Margie Brickley, instructor, advisor and content specialist in the Infant and Family Development and Early Intervention Program. Hi, I'm Allison Tom-Yunger, instructor and advisor in the Infant and Family Development and Early Intervention Program. It is with great pride and pleasure that we announce the candidates for the Master of Science in Education and Master of Social Work degrees in the Infant and Family Development and Early Intervention Program, dual degree with Hunter School of Social Work: Emma Claire Kraft Badner Serena Marie Baroudi Jamila Oseye Bryan Maureen Christine Burke Valerie Cespedes Aia Ribadeneira Emily Rodriguez Melissa Rosario Caroline Heather Rudin Melissa Janet Sotomayor Morgan Zajkowski And the candidates for the Master of Science and Education degree in the Infant and Family Development and Early Intervention Program: Andie Amit Jennifer Bellegarde Dussuau Genevieve Hope Blau Carolyn Nicole Calfee Sarah Anne Toles Allison Cecilia Gaylock Rachel Hannah Gindoff Abigail Hedrick Rhoannon Muller Congratulations to all our graduates. We love you and know you are going to do amazing work with children and families. In celebration of this significant achievement, we are pleased to confer the degree of Master of Science to students from the General Education Program:

Phoebe Allardice Danielle Michelle Arfe Caroline Bannan Emma Caroline Banta Kelly Bakker Emily Kyle Bennetts Elizabeth Higginson Byerly Helen Jia Qi Chen Claudia So-Hee Chung Phoebe March Costello René Adele de Jongh Andrea Sue DeJonge Ian Michael Dudley Victoria Elias Emily C. Finnegan Adina Fromowitz Molly Rebecca Hartz Erica Beth Held Jessica Shawn Hertz Alexander McClintock Kavo Rachel Kleinman Christina Konnaris Tanya Lyon Mark Anthony McCook Meredith Young Miller Klarrizze Yvhonne Muros Posadas Margaret Elizabeth Prendergast Kristiana Elisabeth Roth Julia Paige Sarna Meredith Joy Scholl Charlotte Margaret Markham Silver Joseph G. Selenow Linda R. Shabot Caroline L. Simon Elizabeth B. Sorem Isabel Adena Taswell Shalini Trehan Gabrielle Urken Karl Richard Weber Nella Loree Williams Morgan Hyman Wright Abby Welsh Vorenberg Emma Pearl Butensky Andrew F. Carr Caroline Frewen Carr Abigail Rose Cook-Gonzalez Sean Dolgin

Rhonda Doreen Cox Justine A. Engel-Snow Julia Ferrari Dominique Grelsamer Nicolette Ashley Heldberg Adam Michael Litt Sophie Ellen Rocker Paci Joshua Penn Samuel Brewster White Athena Wyman Battalen Carly Zurcher We are thrilled to confer degrees on our students in the following program: The Early Childhood General Education Masters of Science in Education; students in the Early Childhood Urban Education Initiative, cohort two. Congratulations to: Keshea Levette Spencer Winsome A. Campbell Abigail Marie Carmer Sonia Castro Tiffany Love Chalmers Zenobia Yasmeen Collins Renee Latoya Cooper Barbara Fernandez-Negron Kathryn Hartman Meyers Josmary Lopez Rachel Paoly Nolasco Kate Ofori Naomi Ortiz Sally Maria Pereira Alison Loree Rattray Lauren Alyssa Rattray Maria Rodriguez Angeline Salvatierra Lisandra Santana Chandra Spears Elisa Velez Jasmine Danielle Williams Congratulations. We're so happy for you!

Congratulations to the students of the Early Childhood Advanced Standing Program, cohort number one. Congratulations on earning your Bank Street degree Master of Science in Education. We're so proud of all of you. Barbara Abdella Esther Acheampong Dana Badr Hae Sun Baek Elissa Beaton LaShanda Bell Robert Burke Cayetania Evans Robinson Jenny Gonzalez Jana Hampton Ruth Joaquin Candace Jones Jennifer Mazzarelli Lily Nguyen Rachel Ortiz Esther Ramirez Julio Rivera Latrina Russell Katherine Salinas Nicole Salmon Ferdousi Uddin

It is an honor and pleasure that we announce the candidates for the Master of Science in Education and Master of Education degrees in the Early Childhood Special Education programs Kirsten Mara Benjamin Jacqueline Beyda Lauren Alyssa Binder Alice Rose Bishop Kasey Blau Lea Danielle Cook Vanessa Marcia De Riggs Rashida Pamela Deshong Samanta Alana English Carissa Renae Fleury Aditi Gang Noah David Garson Naomi Rachel Genshaft Clare Stevens Gilbert W. Travis Gluck Madeline Victoria Grebow Sasha Grin Stephanie Davis Hazelkorn Susannah Ruth Kahler Robbi LeGrant Jennifer Rebecca Lerman Alexandra Joy Levin Madeleine Diago Lhuillier Rebecca Pamela London Galit Lopatin Bordereau Skye Chandra Malik Rachel Marie Mason Isabel Rebecca Metz Haven Grace Mitchell-Rose Kristie Love Denise Nusum Inna Paskhaver Lance W. Piao Jenine Puello Arianna Nicole Puleo Sianni Kluver Rosenstock Hilary Shar Aafia Syed Briana J. Tavarez Laura Elayna Paolachelli Trinchaysi Aliza Esther Willig Angela An-Tsyr Yang Congratulations to our graduates! Congratulations everyone!

Today we’re honoring Hubert Dyasi, a leading science educator and dedicated human rights advocate whose life work has unfolded around the globe and changed how we as educators think about inquiry-based learning. As a child growing up on a rural farm in South Africa, the natural world was his laboratory. Then, in an oddly relatable twist of fate, an outbreak of scarlet fever during his freshman year of college put him in quarantine for months with a small group of friends, most of whom were also science majors. Locked out of the university laboratories, they used the rich natural world as their classroom. Their very individualized observations of natural phenomena led them back to their science textbooks and, with fascination, Dr. Dyasi started understanding that deep learning in science should always start with the learner. In the 1960s, Dr Dyasi came to the United States to earn his PhD at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana. Upon graduation, he did not return to South Africa for political reasons, but, convinced of the need to stay focused on Black African human rights, he joined the faculty at the University of Sierra Leone as a specialist in science education. This led to his life’s work. As executive director of the African Primary Science Program, Dr. Dyasi began building a network of science centers that became internationally renowned. Over 18 years, Dr. Dyasi tirelessly worked with teams in Sierra Leone, Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, and more. The network is still thriving today. At its heart, the curriculum in these centers started with an understanding that the natural curiosity elementary school children have should be front and center. Where do butterflies come from? What causes clouds? Instead of teaching science as a set of isolated facts and knowledge, teachers connect the questions to the real-world phenomena and model the answers for deep learning—an idea that is now at the core of science learning in today’s educational standards. Always seeking ways to support Black human rights movements, Dr. Dyasi then came to City College in New York in 1984 as director of the Workshop Center, a professional development center for teachers, and continued his efforts on behalf of underserved children. Here at Bank Street, our goals and beliefs are greatly advanced by the human rights work Dr. Dyasi’s life represents. So, Hubert Dyasi, professor emeritus of science education at City College, we thank you for all you’ve given to this graduating class—and to many generations of Bank Street students. And we confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, Honoris Causa.

I want to thank the Bank Street College of Education and its community for this precious award of a doctoral degree. I am most honored to accept it. I spent the first half of my career living and working in Africa. From that time on I worked to develop and implement professional teacher education programs that enable educators to provide productive and joyful science learning experiences for children; experiences that connect harmoniously the worlds and attributes of childhood on the one hand with the worlds and practices of inquiry-based primary science on the other. The result is a science education that is authentic to childhood and at the same time authentic to inquiry-based science. Inquiries of children and scientists may differ in scope and depth, but they share the very important attributes of curiosity, a strong desire to find out, to know and to understand natural and human-made phenomena of the world. Interactions with phenomena lead to creation of experience-based mental models of the world in the case of children and to creation of evidence-based science models in the case of scientists. The goal in primary science education, therefore, becomes one of helping children learn to use the lens of inquiry-based science in their own inquiries into phenomena of nature. In the second half of my career I continued my science education work at the City College of New York (CCNY). I came to CCNY because I had found out that some leading faculty there and I held closely aligned education ideas, practices, and commitments. Most importantly, just as we did in Africa the ideas and practices were evident not just in statements and publications, but they could also be seen and examined firsthand in concrete learner-centered teacher education programs and learner-friendly learning environments. As it happened, this was true of Bank Street College education programs as well. I later learned that faculty members at the Workshop Center at CCNY had prior direct connections with Bank Street College. I joined them in maintaining the connections. Those connections with Bank Street College as well as the continuing congruence of our education ideas and implementations make me especially grateful for this award. Thank you. Congratulations to the graduates of the Childhood Special Education programs from Bank Street College of Education. The names we're about to read are candidates for a Master's of Science in Education. Pam, take it away. Thanks Jess. From the Childhood Special Education Dual Degree with Columbia School of Social Work program: Ariana Beers From the Childhood General and Special Education Dual Certification, Dual Degree Program with the Columbia School of Social Work: Lauren Michelle Schreier

Amanda Marie Cordell From the Childhood Special Education Program: Jekia Brockman From the Childhood Special and General Education Dual Certification Program: Kyalik Lefewitz Clark Chelsea E. Genn Takesha A. Graham Chaylor L. Johnson Victoria Monte Rociel Pena Charlotte Wing Bradburn Stephanie Chan Kelly Anne Delane Avital Katz Shirley Lieu Rachel Allyn Pradillo Isabel Rubin Tracy Simeone Peter Nicholas Tedesco Jordan A. Thaler Audrey Wallerstein Fleischner Janai Joanne Gilkes Jennifer Barbara Granderson Avigail Leora Hirschfield Ruth Sara Longobardi Menucha R. Lowenstein Drew McCann Kayla Ashley Snyder Alexandra Faith Wood Monique Paige Andrea Goldstein Allison Eveloff Berman William Lee Fletcher Maya Lauren Grant Gia Hamilton Marissa Miller Michael Kenworth Nelson Ashley Anna Okonma It gives us great joy and a whole lot of pride to celebrate this accomplishment right alongside with you. We hope you can feel our love and support through the screen. We're going to send you some really good celebratory energy right now, so team here we go! And one more candidate from Childhood General and Special Education Dual Certification:

Ursula Esther Auguste Congratulations to the candidates for a Master of Science in Education Degree in the Dual Language Bilingual, Early Childhood and Childhood Special and General Education programs: Karla Aguilar-Espinoza Gladys Ayala Brenda Bowen-Arenson Mariela Cohen Sabban Jimmy Cruz Andelkyz De Los Santos Heidi Margarita Feliz Emily Becca Gordon Nadine Bernadette Muñiz Maria Alejandra Sagues Cruz Joselina Tejada Daisy Vivar Congratulations to the candidates for a Master of Science in Education Degree in the Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Program Grace Marie Bianchetti Christine Elise Johnson Krysta Camea Josue Manayon Elisabeth Bess Morales Zoe Mei-Wah Potter Victoria Stempel Aneponi Roger Tye David Thorpe

I am a reader. I read. All the time. Reading is what made me want to become a teacher. I wanted to encourage kids to love reading the way that I love reading. How hard could that possibly be? I wondered naively after accepting my first teaching position. I had no training and no classroom experience. I’m sure it won’t surprise any of the graduates listening today that the reality of encouraging my students to give themselves over to books was much more like pulling teeth than I ever could have expected. Why didn’t my students want to read? Often I heard the lament, “there’s nothing good here” (despite the plethora of brand new books in our classroom library) or “this book is boring” (though they had only read the first 5 pages). I would become exasperated. There were books! The books were good, right? What was wrong with these kids? The kids were not the problem. The kids are never the problem. What the kids needed was guidance, but guidance was not something that I was prepared to give. I hadn’t read a middle grade book since I was in the middle grades myself. I had this fantasy of being That Reading Teacher, a goal which, it turns out, takes actual effort to accomplish. I learned this lesson through the expert modeling of my own teachers and mentors at Bank Street: Lynne Einbender, Susie Thompson Rolander, and Mollie Welsh Kruger. They held children’s literature to the highest standards, shared with us the good and the disappointing, and invited our opinions, our wonderings, and our recommendations. Inspired, I started reading every children’s book I could get my hands on, and then I passed those books on to my students along with genuine reasons why I thought they might enjoy the book I was giving them. And it worked. The kids read the books. Then they gave the books to their friends. They started to swarm me, asking what I thought they should read next and “did I have a book for them?” They started to leave me notes on their reading logs that said things like: “I’m sooooo close to being done! Soooo frustrating!!!” and “Shelby, you should really read this book. It’s so good.” I have kids calling me over to their desks during our independent reading times to share favorite lines and leaving books on my desk that they think I might like to borrow. Sometimes it hits me all at once. I did it: I’m That Reading Teacher now. But I wouldn’t have gotten here without Those Reading Teachers, the ones who showed me the impact a teacher’s readerly life can have on their students. So to Lynne, Susie, Mollie, and all of my instructors: thank you for a life-changing three years. And to the rest of you graduating today: congratulations, and good luck. We, the Reading and Literacy Faculty, are proud to present our candidates for graduation. I am Laurie Rabinowitz. I'm Susie Rolander. I'm Diane Tortu. And I'm Mollie Welsh Kruger. And these are our graduates: Shelby Patricia Brody

Abigail Rebekah Caumartin Emma deBeer Charno Rebecca Miriam Corrigan Coretta Garlow Bethia Rabinovitch Wendy Goldsmith Kate Elizabeth Hest Ani Barbash Katz Danielle Seung Youn Rachel Carly Manaster Christina Unhock Mason Morgan Peel McCall Alyssa Swart Katherine Conklin Augustus Sandra Becker Nicole Erlich Beatrice Crawford Maryah Greene Julie Michelle Kline Elizabeth Jeannette Malone Molly Moore Glaura Shintomi Paiva Natasha Pena Talia Redlich Kaleigh Rebecca Rohner Eliana Kerbel Ilana Eva Weisz Anna Williams What an honor it has been for us to be in this learning community with you. We look forward to seeing how you bring your Bank Street out into the world. Congratulations! It is my greatest pleasure to announce the 2021 graduate students of the Museum Education Program receiving the degree of Master of Science in Education. They are: Melissa Ethlyn Davis Gabrielle Rose Feldman Margaret Hoffman Amber Renee Hunnicutt Leah Ruth Koontz

Christina Hill Milbourne Olivia Morgan Paige Jacob Matthew Premo Katherine Simone Robins Stephanie Kay Tarras Charlotte Woolf Vari Morgan Sara Wells Spencer Friend Wight And Margaret Elizabeth Wilson On behalf of the faculty at Bank Street College we wish you all of the best. Congratulations! When I was asked to be the student speaker back in March of 2020, it was over shared snacks at what would be our very last in-person conference group. I eagerly began writing the first few drafts of my speech. These drafts were filled with humor, joy, and a fire that showcased my experience as a graduate student at Bank Street. Over a year later, I returned to my drafts to prepare for this convocation and, I’m not going to lie, reading my words after enduring a year of this pandemic, a global timestamp that changed our perception of normalcy and life, was incredibly eerie. I reflected on my words and realized my speech was no longer applicable. The speech was written in memory of an experience that took place at a different time and in a different setting. In fact, I wrote it on the subway, unmasked and sandwiched between commuters traveling from job #3 to job #4. My biggest worry was the train stalling due to “train traffic ahead.” I wasn’t concerned if the commuters beside me were sick nor if I was sick. I was thinking only of myself and my needs. Indeed, the speech I wrote before the pandemic was no longer applicable. Not because it didn’t adequately describe my experience as a graduate student, but because I failed to address the most profound gift that Bank Street instills in their graduates: the gift of understanding and fostering meaningful relationships. It was the relationships with my professors, peers, students, and family that carried me through this past year. It is my relationships with children, families, and colleagues that act as a buffer to the stress and trauma of the everyday experience of living in a crisis. As Bank Street graduates, we have cultivated the tools and affinity for building the powerful relationships to which children thrive, families grow, and communities flourish. Although I cannot speak for other graduates, yet I believe they would agree with me, but I am truly ready to take on my future. Ready because I attended a college that understood the power of relationships and modeled to me the very essence of what a progressive educator is. So today I thank Bank Street for being the beacon of light that guides the fiery passion, curiosity, and empathy of its students. To my fellow graduates, although this convocation does not look like the graduation we were expecting, I am honored to say: congratulations.

It is my honor to read the names of students graduating from the Curriculum Instruction and Studies and Education Programs. I celebrate your success. Congratulations graduates! Arjun Achuthan Robin Beth Amorosino Elizabeth Renee Apollon Sara-Rivka Bass Charlotte Brigitte Bonnet Janiqua S. Davis Casey Fernandez Jennifer Finn Faigy Gelbstein Rebecca Gottfried Sarah Danielle Greenberg Tawanna James Sophie Klein Corin Lea Kremnitzer Elizabeth Listhaus Chris Lytwyn Hannah Gray Miller Katie Taylor Muniz Luke Max Muscat Ellen R. Peiser Kellie Elizabeth Smith Sheena Washington Elizabeth Mae Wilbur Elisheva Yondorf Masters of Science in Child Life: Gretchen Elizabeth Blackmer

Sarah Elizabeth Cahill Camille Teresa Colarusso Courtney Ann Dellinges Krista Jeanne Dolan Danielle Angelique Dugas Sydney Rose Epstein Christy Cosby French Molly Kathleen Gallagher Sarah T. Graham Fatema-Zahra Jaffer Stephanie Jurado Jessica Mae Kaiser Caitlin Marie Lillis Jordana Rachel Lumerman Stacy Ann Madelmayer Emily McLellan Allison Sharples Moore Heather Taylor Murphy Sara Ryan Pagano Jennifer Lee Reeves Frances Mary Sarcona Reagan Schmidt Kelly J. Schmitz Mary Margaret Reilly Sheehy What a privilege it is to be here today and share this moment with you, VIRTUALLY. I have grown in this program together with a cohort of exceptional people. Our graduation year was both historic and unprecedented as we have collectively experienced a global pandemic, a national uprising in a demand for racial justice, the end of a presidential tyranny and the voting in of our first female African American Asian Vice President, go Kamala Harris! I will admit it. It was challenging to work on my masters degree at this point of my mature life, and I wasn’t sure I had the stamina to do it. Once a month, I flew on the red eye from Los Angeles to arrive in a city that was just waking up. I had a full time museum job, a husband and two active children, and simply too much to read and write. But I did it! I am so thankful for all my support systems, including you! Jamie, Jocelyn, Jasmine, Nicole, Maria, Bill, Lili and Haley.

I know that each one of you also made sacrifices but had a support system to help you. We cannot do this alone. Now, I have my first pair of glasses, strengthen my knowledge and pedagogy, thank you, Brian Hogarth,met my leadership mentors, Julie Johnson & Shari Werb, I got to experience a city that I always wished I lived in, walked a lot, went to amazing museums, ate delicious food, sang karaoke, walked a lot, had tremendous conversations, got lots of alone time, and walked a lot. Remember, I am from L.A. The importance of education was a value that my parents had instilled in me as immigrants coming to this country to set forth a path for a better life. This included my immigration which led to different access to education and helped create the opportunities that shaped my career today. It required resilience and grit to stay on that path, and later on ownership, responsibility to learn and the work needed to do it. In my arc, I set forth the dream I envisioned for this education. My dream is to help be a catalyst for change within our museum and to help us contribute to a better shared society. And in the worlds of Nelson Mandela, “An education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” And as we have seen in many countries around the world and in earlier times in our own history, keeping someone from an education was also a weapon of oppression. What does this mean when you have completed an education like ours, a graduate degree from Bankstreet College in Museum Education and Leadership. We work in an incredible field but they have been built on systems of white supremacy and academic structures. So, do not shy away from our past but boldly challenge this history and do not let it keep us from realizing the aspiration and power of what the cultural field can change for the betterment of our collective worlds. Take risks, push and challenge yourselves, your colleagues and our institutions to help us contribute to a better shared society. I know what plan to do with my new education, and if we all do this together, imagine what we could change! And I leave you with a Korean phrase of encouragement which means “you can do it!” Go Fighting! Love you all and hope to see you soon!

I am happy to announce the names of those candidates who have successfully completed the Early Childhood Leadership Program. They are: Sophy Aponte Ilana Beth April Katherine Elizabeth Baldwin Helen Barahal Brochie Brander Maria del Carmen Bruns Ellen Cerniglia Nicole Geller Dulce M. Jorge Samantha Keene Patricia Leahy Brendalyn Alisha Lopez Tracey Mina Maimuna Mohammed Shaniquia Phoenix Jennifer Rodriguez And Tashoy A. Saddler-Morris A job well done! My name is Jackie Levine, and I am presenting the graduates of the Future School Leaders Academy FSLA, a dual certification educational leadership program leading to a master’s degree in education. It is a partnership between Bank Street College of Education and Putnam Northern Westchester's board of cooperative educational services. On behalf of our FSLA program I am happy to announce our graduates: Rosa Amendola Ann Marie Barron Dominique F. Ciaffone Eleana A. De Luna M. Christine Dowd Jennifer Jean Driggers Milagros Guzman Henry Pierre Johnson Deana M. Longden Dixelia del Carmen Lopez Margaret R. McKay

Andrea Nardella Andrea Lynn Perdicho Michael Gary Pincus Keturah D. Proctor Joy Alyson Reynolds Jacqueline M. Salvato Kristen Danielle Samet Timothy Joseph Scholten Lauren Mary Soprano Deni K. Thomas Minu Susan Thomas Joanna Venditto Congratulations Graduates. Hi I'm Gil Schmerler. And I'm Jessica Blum-DeStefano. We have the great honor of announcing our 2020 and 2021 Leadership for Educational Change graduates with both the masters of education and master of science in education degrees. We are so proud to celebrate you and your accomplishments. And here are the graduates: Heidi Nyser Allen Vielka Anglin Lisa V. Conway Sarah E. Duer Valerie Marchionno Leslie Martinez Albania M. Mejia Travis Miecnikowski Rosa Carolina Cushman Miller Emily Devasia Oliapuram Caryl Oris Kerry Roeder Mireia E. Rothman-Simon Katie Schmelzer Angelina Yucht Swenson Melissa Isabel Soto-Bosworth Samantha R. Diaz Christian Robert Dienna

Leslie Ricky Forde Sandra E. Fritz Tiffany Lenoi Jones Christopher R. Johnston Kathryn Coughlin Maggiotto Janice Manning Sarah Rose Silverman Mary Frances Valentine Rachel Leigh Weis-Stone Congratulations! Congratulations to the graduating classes from the Leadership and Mathematics Education Program 2019 and 2020: Melody Allan Erin Bailie Beal Altshuler Charmaine Anderson-Cobb Keith Lizardi Andre Dionne Beckford Kristine Bennett Sophia Brady Sean-Rae P. Campbell Francesca Casale Jennifer M. Chung Mel Comerchero Erin F. Cramm Patrice Duncan Alisha Dunn Mary Kathryn Fitzgerald Ayanna Marissa Niambi Emanuel Carys Luz Garcia Milerbin Genao Nina Gribetz Lauryn Michelle Grefe Deborah Ann Healy Jessica Hollins Nicole Marie L. Honrado

Ebony Nicole Howard Kelly Husted Margaret Elodie King Erica J. Koval Peggy Ann Kump Jean Evans Matelus Laura Schultz Moore Lindsay Noey Linda Paparella Maritza R. Parker Leila Rached Kayla Alexandra Roby Terrance Roumph Edward Barry Rust Sasha Sam Christine Sparks Walter Stark Stephanie Velez Kissonda Williams Bernadette Wilson Rachel Woolley Congratulations! Congratulations! I am very pleased to read the names of graduates receiving their Master of Science in education in the Leadership in Museum Education Program. The names are: Emily Sue Addis William Nash Ambler Daniel James Atkinson Jamie Sheree Bowers Haley Coopersmith Michael Tsu Hui Liang Rachel Elizabeth Marino Liane Martins Lindner Kirsten McNally Delia Meza Maria Nikitin

Hae Su Oh Jocelyn Flynn Packman Jasmin Macavinta Tabatabaee And Nicole D.C. Wallace Congratulations everyone! Congratulations to all our students. In particular, congratulations to the students in the leadership Department: Michelle Renee Boyd Julissa Acevedo Christina Freds-Villa Kristin Azer Steven Viola Kima Lititia Johnson Liza Marie Carfora Hilarie Shaine Gilinson Amy Shira Heinrich Maria Juanita Landi Elicia Dolores Rodriguez Kaitlyn Ryan Kyrollos Magharious Dayna De La Rosa Danielle F. Segal Alexander Guye Duff Amanda Ruth Stessen-Blevins Aracelis Araujo Rebecca Arsham Tomas Baez Eric Checo Chloe Elizabeth-Mary Davis Jeanette De Jesus Kofi Edusei, Jr. Meredith Flynn Jennifer D. Gonzalez Stephanie Anne Grace

Kadeem Leon Howard Tanya Howell Adam J. Lee Barrie Ling Amanda Marchesani Mariah Ellisse Plunkett Nathaniel Roberts Zenobia Rodgers Naomi Ruth Rodriguez Christina Sardelis Megan Christine Tobiasen Devora Unger Cafeiro Hi my name is Nicole Limperopulos and I'm a faculty member in the department of leadership at the Bank Street Graduate School of Education. Over the past two years I've had the distinct privilege of working with aspiring leaders in two of our partnership programs. the Roc Urban Leadership Program and the Yonkers Urban Leadership Academy. Students in the aforementioned programs are graduating with either a Master of Science in Education or a Master of Education. Both degrees also culminate in an institutional recommendation for New York State School Building Leader Certification. We're extremely proud of all of our students’ accomplishments to date and look forward to the transformational impact that their leadership will have on schools, students, families, and communities. Amy Marie Alvarez James Anderson Daniris M. Burgos Elvonni Lamar Capozziello Joseph Chirayil Alexandra Nicole Credendino Tonia Yvette Douglas Elizabeth Dunne Ruckdeschel LaCassa Denise Felton Jessica L. Flanders Rita J. Ross Gabrielle Elizabeth Graves Donna Nakeisha Gray Sonja Lenore Griffin Kesha James Teresa Arnette James Elan Matthew Kheyman Veora S. Layton-Robinson Tellis Lott Amanda Marie Nigro Kimberly Ann O'Connell Melissa Pantoja Stella Akosuah Quarshie Yohaira Reynoso Jael Rivas Katherine Ruiz-Guzman

Manoucheka Small Shana Anne Valerio Diane Watkins Congratulations! By the power vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Bank Street College, and in conformity with the rules of the New York State Board of Regents and the regulations of the Commissioner of Education, and on the recommendation of the faculty of the Graduate School of Education; it is my pleasure to confer upon you the degree you have earned, along with all the rights and responsibilities associated with that degree.