Junior Group Performance
3rd Place New York State
Ancient Order of Hibernian’s Award for Irish History
Jenna Alma, Robyn Alma, Sienna DeBenedittis & Christine McLaughlin

A special congratulations to the contestants that are continuing their journey to the
National History Day Contest in Washington, D.C!

Junior Individual Exhibit
2nd Place New York State and going to the Nationals!
Gabrielle Vance

Junior Group Exhibit
2nd Place New York State and going to the Nationals!
Kathryn Pender & Maria Caminiti

St. Ephrem School recently held its annual ‘Bowling with the Boys’ event at Maple Lanes. This popular fundraising event brings together fathers and sons tohave fun bowling together, share dinner, and has the added possibility of winning a variety of cool prizes.  Whether you win or lose the bowling game, each child walks away with a memento, a bowling pin inscribed with their high score.  Additionally, everyone receives a t-shirt and a photograph which were donated to the school.

The Thursday Night Mixed League at Maple Lanes generously donated an iPad mini and an iPod Nano to the event, in honor of Michael Mastroianni–the father of a fourth grade boy who helped to make this event a huge success in years past.  The event continues on in his memory to the benefit of the students of St. Ephrem School!  The league’s donation helped to raise a profit of $1,500 for the school!

Steve Halama (Pre-K) and his dad have fun posing together for a photo!

First grader, James Price and his uncle are ready to throw some strikes!

On April 23rd 2013, students and their parents gathered together in the parish hall, adjacent to the academy, also to honor representatives from Home Depot and Behr Paints. These corporations joined to paint the cafeteria with fresh and vibrant colors, a renovation at no cost to the academy.

“Over February break, as you know, we completed several renovations,” said Mr. Robert DiNardo, Principal, to students and their parents. “We got a new sound system, we fixed the elevator, we got new lights in the classrooms, but we also had our cafeteria painted and I’d like to recognize representatives from Home Depot and from Behr Paint, who very generously brought a crew here and did that job for us.”

Special thanks also go to Ms. Elsie Ryley, a parent volunteer that contacted Home Depot and arranged for the painting.

“St. Joseph the Worker Catholic Academy honors Veronica De Jesus Dockery of Home Depot Corp. and William Farrell of Behr Paint Corp. in recognition and appreciation of their efforts in the painting of our cafeteria. Our students will always be grateful,” reads a plaque that was presented to both of the representatives. The plaque will be displayed in the building for all to see.

Left to Right: Robert DiNardo, Veronica De Jesus Dockery, William Farrell, Elsie Ryley

Left to Right: Lauren Borgia, Allie Giordano, Mark De Dona

Congratulations Diocesan Primary Math Bee Winners!

After winning first place at the Diocesan Primary Math Bee, third grader Allie Giordano gathered with math coach, Mrs. Scotto, and her family in joy.  Special gratitude to the host principal, Mrs. Patricia Winters, and the staff at Our Lady of Perpetual Help School in Brooklyn for their hospitality and assistance with the final Diocesan Math Bee of the year which was held on April 16^th, 2013.  As the academic year comes closer to a close, the Office of the Superintendent would like to give special recognition to all of the Diocesan Math Bee Winners!

Congratulations to the Primary Diocesan Math Bee winners:
First Place: Allie Giordano, Grade 3, St. Ephrem School
Second Place: Mark De Dona, Grade 3, Our Lady of Hope School
Third Place: Lauren Borgia, Grade 3, Holy Angels Catholic Academy

Congratulations to the Intermediate Diocesan Math Bee winners:
First Place: Kaiqi Liang, Grade 6, Our Lady of the Angelus School
Second Place: Isaac Rivera, Grade 6, SS. Joachim & Anne School
Third Place: Ting Yan Li, Grade 4, St. Joan of Arc School

And finally, congratulations to the Junior High Diocesan Math Bee winners:
First Place: Brian Lai, Grade 8, St. Adalbert School
Second Place: Marc Julien Calza, Grade 8, St. Ephrem School
Third Place: Andrew Johnson, Grade 8, Incarnation School

The Math Bees would not be possible without the help of judges and observers: a special thank you to all of them and to the reader, Sylvia Ana Nomikos.  Gratitude also is given to Cathy Kenny, Coordinator of Special Projects for Curriculum, Evaluation and Assessment for coordinating all of the Math Bees.  The Office of the Superintendent would also like to thank Anna Ferraiuolo and Sadlier Publishers for their continued support of all Regional and Diocesan Math Bees.

Check it out here.

“The day was very informative and offered principals many suggestions regarding Common Core assessments and the rigor and instructional shifts needed in order to ensure academic achievement for all students,” stated Diane Phelan, Associate Superintendent for Evaluation of Programs and Students.

As the TerraNova standardized test is changing to align with the Common Core Learning Standards, the focus of the Nuemann Day was Common Core Assessment.  Presentations were “Reflecting on the Quality of our Common Core Assessments to Meet the Demands of the Common Core Learning Standards” by Jennifer Borgioli, Consultant at Learning Centered Initiatives and “TerraNova Common Core: How we are proceeding within the Diocese of Brooklyn in 2013-2014” by Shannon Puente, Consultant at CTB/Mc-Graw-Hill.

“My goal for today was to offer you a toolbox full of ways to think about your assessment design to meet the increased demands of the Common Core Learning Standards,” said Borgioli who in addition to presenting,  provided principals with a number of rubrics and packets of resources for assessment design.

“The new TerraNova test has more writing, more synthesis, and more analysis … it has multiple-choice on it, but it doesn’t have just multiple-choice.  What we’re moving to is evidence-based assessment … If the students understand what they’re being asked to do, providing the evidence wouldn’t necessarily make it difficult; it’s just a new way of doing it.  Before, I was just choosing an answer and now I need to support it and provide substantiation…constructed-responses enable us to get to the heart of the standard: what are the students being asked to learn and do?” said Puente.

One tool handed to principals during the day was the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy Educator Wheel which moves through Bloom’s classified levels of cognition: remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating and creating.  These critical-thinking concepts are essential as schools/academies within the Diocese of Brooklyn continue to implement the New York Common Core State Standards for education.

“The instructional nature of our jobs is the one that is most important.  I know that these changes are not easy, but you have many tools here and so I urge you to focus on one thing at a time,” said Anthony Biscione, Deputy Superintendent of Schools to the principals.

Special thanks to Barbara McArdle, Assistant Superintendent for Principal Professional Development for coordinating the event and to Arlene Barcia, Principal at Our Lady of Trust Catholic Academy for hosting it.

Left to Right- Shannon Puente, Diane Phelan, Anthony Biscione

Congratulations to Leslie Cajamarca, 8th grader at St. Sebastian School and winner of the Annual Mission Childhood Association Christmas Artwork Contest 2013!

Leslie was one of 24 “winners” in the Annual Mission Childhood Association Christmas Artwork Contest for 2013.  This is a nationwide contest which is open to the over 170 dioceses in the U.S!

Click here to see the art piece enlarged!

Immaculate Conception eighth-graders Amanda Lallenande, left, Gabrielle Hollant, Kyle Hoosein, Tobi Ayeni and Kimberly Ramcharitar with some of the results of their research into Jamaica’s colonial history. Photo courtesy of Carl Ballenas.

Read about it in the Queens Chronicle