Nadia Lopez, founder and principal of a Brooklyn public school that’s showing strong success despite deep poverty, will be the third and final speaker in a Teach For America Charlotte series on creating strong performance at high poverty schools.
Lopez will speak from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Thursday at UNC Charlotte Center City, 320 E. Ninth St. The event is free; to register, go to https://newreality3.eventbrite.com/
Lopez founded Mott Hall Bridges Academy, a New York City public middle school where virtually all students come from impoverished homes, in 2010. She came to national attention when one of her students, Vidal Chastanet, was featured on the Humans of New York blog.
Asked to name the person who most influenced his life, Vidal named Lopez: “When we get in trouble, she doesn’t suspend us. She calls us to her office and explains to us how society was built down around us. And she tells us that each time somebody fails out of school, a new jail cell gets built.”
That post was shared more than 145,000 times, and Lopez has been featured in national news media. She and Humans of New York used the fame to raise more than $1 million to endow a scholarship fund for Mott Hall Bridges alumni.
Lopez’s talk, which includes a discussion monitored by WBTV education reporter Dedrick Russell, concludes a lecture series titled “A New Reality: High Poverty and High Performing Schools.”
Poverty levels are so high at 76 of Charlotte-Mecklenburg’s 168 schools that all students automatically get free breakfast and lunch. Many of those schools log persistently low test scores and high suspension rates. The school board is in the midst of a student assignment review, trying to figure out ways to use socioeconomic status to break up concentrations of disadvantage.
[READ MORE: Why CMS suspension data could shape student assignment talks]
[READ MORE: Teach For America: We support success, not segregation]
TFA Charlotte staff say the focus on helping “hypersegregated” schools thrive doesn’t signal support for the status quo in CMS. They say it simply reflects the reality that those schools need help right away, while change that comes through new assignment plans is likely to be slow.
Ann Doss Helms: 704-358-5033, @anndosshelms
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