AED Middle School Leadership Project (MSLP)

The AED Middle School Leadership Project Team

The AED MSLP team, led by the MSLP director, is staffed by New York City educators with deep and varied experience in middle-grades and high school reform, youth development, postsecondary access and success, evaluation and accountability, adolescent health, and educational equity. Staff and consultants from AED’s New York City team are organizing the AED MSLP, and they are supported by a range of other AED associates. Below is a brief snapshot of the team.

Calvin Hastings, AED MSLP Director

As an AED senior program officer with extensive experience in middle-grades education and school support, Mr. Hastings has recently taken over the role as PSO Director. An active part of the management team for AED Middle Start programs, he is responsible for integrating the work of AED programs into the PSO and disseminate the best-practice work being done with our network schools to other AED programs. He works closely with the AED MLP principals and APs to regularly analyze school data and create focused plans for providing the support and services to help their schools accomplish articulated goals. Mr. Hastings also oversees the New School Development process and the AED PSO. Mr. Hastings manages the multiple teams working in each of these areas to ensure that all projects benefit from a unified vision and support structure.

Maud Abeel, Program Officer

As a program officer for AED, Ms. Abeel supports the development and expansion of Middle Start to new areas and to new partner schools. Her prior work at New Visions for Public Schools and Carnegie Corporation of New York gave her the opportunity to work with a variety of school-wide improvement models. Maud is a contributing author, researcher, and editor to Turning Points 2000: Educating Adolescents in the 21st Century, a follow-up to Carnegie’s landmark Turning Points report. As a part of the AED PSO, she will help in the planning and implementation of programs in all network schools.

Risa Sackman, Professional Development and Coach

Ms. Sackman creates and delivers much of the MSLP professional development in the following focus areas that help lead to successful middle grades schools: 1) Academic Rigor and Differentiated Instruction (focus on curriculum and instruction); 2) Young Adolescent Development (focus on climate and environment); 3) Effective Small Learning Communities (focus on collaborative instructional planning, assessment, and student management). Her years of experience as a Middle School teacher and administrator, curriculum developer, and national consultant in curriculum and instruction, assessment for learning, and teacher development informs and shapes this work. Ms. Sackman also provides direct coaching services to some of the schools in the PSO.

Susan Crossley, Business Director

As the director of business and administration at AED, Ms. Crossley oversees all contractual and business aspects of the AED PSO.

Carmen Jimenez and Laura Dukess, Senior Advisors

Ms. Jimenez and Ms. Dukess will oversee the Fellows program and advise AED in the general planning and implementation of the Middle School Leadership Project. Ms. Jimenez and Ms. Dukess bring many years of experience to this principal preparation program. In addition to serving as principal for three middle schools in New York City, Ms. Jimenez was the founding director of the Professional Development Leadership Center in Region One (Bronx, NYC), where she designed and facilitated leadership support and development programs for aspiring and sitting principals and assistant principals. In addition, Ms. Jimenez was the Director of the AED PSO, where she supported ten middle school principals in the Bronx. Ms. Dukess was the Director of Leadership Development for Region One, where she managed public and private leadership grants, created leadership development and support programs, and facilitated an aspiring principal program with Ms. Jimenez.

Yvonne Torres, Senior Advisor

Yvonne Torres works closely with team members of the Middle School Leadership Project (MSLP) to support AED in the general planning and implementation of the project. She helps oversee the Partners in Leadership program of the MSLP. Ms. Torres brings many years of experience in serving principals and assistant principals in the area of leadership. She worked closely with Ms. Jimenez and Ms. Dukess in the leadership initiates of District Ten and Region One. Some of the roles she has served in are Region One’s Superintendent, District Nine Community Superintendent, Deputy Superintendent of District Six, principal and assistant principal in District Ten.

Patrice Williams, PSO Research Associate

As a research associate, Ms. Williams provides program support for all NYC Middle Start projects, providing accountability tracking fto ensure we are constantly collecting and analyzing the data to determine the impact of our work. She supports the professional development initiatives through event planning, coordination of workshops, and analysis of program effectiveness. Patrice also provides editorial support for the new AED Middle Start website.

Aurelia Enache, Program Associate

Aurelia Enache joined AED in 1988. Currently she provides program and administrative support to the Middle Start programs and supports the Middle Start National Center at AED in activities and services related to educational reform. Ms. Enache has been an asset to the development of the Middle Start, which started in 1998 in Michigan and expanded to other states, including Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Wisconsin, and New York. Prior to joining the Middle Start team, Ms. Enache worked on a number of projects related to school-community collaboration, literacy education, afterschool programming, self-assessment, youth employment preparation, and other services for economically disadvantaged youth. Some projects include: Alternative Schools Assistance Project, Youth Employment Program Assistance, Assessment in Youth-Serving Agencies, Expeditionary Learning Outward Schools Evaluation, and School Self Assessment Program.

Middle Start Team — Supporting the PSO Work

AED’s Middle Start program team has transformed many middle-grades schools, particularly those located in high-poverty areas, into high-performing environments that are academically challenging, responsive to the unique characteristics of young adolescents, and able to demonstrate social equity. They now bring their experience to the AED PSO in New York City.

Sandy Weinbaum and Patrick Montesano, Vice-Presidents and Co-Directors

The AED vice presidents and directors of the AED New York City office will support the AED PSO program director and the entire team and help integrate the range of AED resources into PSO support services. Mr. Montesano is the director of Middle Start, where he oversees AED initiatives that promote the learning and healthy development of young adolescents and improve the schools and other organizations that serve them. Dr. Weinbaum directs a range of AED programs and research related to educational leadership and reform; gender equity; school-community partnerships; improving student learning; and postsecondary access and success.

Linda Simkin, Director of Adolescent Health Programs

Ms. Simkin is a senior program officer at AED with a focus on adolescent and community health, emergency contraception, HIV/AIDS/STD and pregnancy prevention for adolescents. She also brings an expertise in school-to-work programs. Ms. Simkin will support the AED PSO in these areas, particularly in the connection between health and learning.

Adria Gallup-Black, Senior Program Officer

Dr. Gallup-Black is a senior program officer for research, evaluation, and accountability programs at AED. For the PSO, she will manage the collection of school and student performance data, administration of surveys, and the development of school data notebooks. Dr. Gallup-Black will also work with the director to strengthen the work of the coaches as they guide schools in reviewing data in order to improve instruction and accelerate student learning and achievement. She will also provide schools with protocols for conducting their own ongoing analysis of student performance data.