Spotlight of an Odds-Beater: Alfred-Almond is the Pride of the Community
By Catherine Kramer, Research Assistant for NYKids
Respect is seen as an important part of the Alfred-Almond tradition. The principal, a former special education teacher, remarked, “When I came here back 27 years ago, you felt that everyone—all of the teachers, the faculty, and staff—had a high regard for respect.” Importantly, maintaining high expectations for respect is not seen as a one-way street. Instead, an explicit focus on developing adolescents’ abilities to self-regulate is seen as feeding how students perceive expectations of their peers and adults with whom they interact in and outside the school.
Alfred-Almond Junior-Senior High School is located in New York’s southern tier. The district is situated between the towns of Alfred and Almond, with the former home to Alfred University and Alfred State College. However, the community has changed over the years, with rising numbers of students growing up in poverty. With a mission to keep expectations high, educators nurture students’ independence and both build on and evoke community pride based on producing good student outcomes.
Administrators and teachers do not rest on their reputation to pave their way forward, however. Educator after educator echoed concerns about rising poverty and mental health issues in their community and spoke of balancing pride with the humility to address challenges head on. Therefore, they attempt to balance upholding traditions that have made them the pride of the community with the expectations, as one district leader put it, to “change” their “game up” and innovate.
Read the complete Alfred-Almond Junior-Senior High School case study.
Alfred-Almond Junior-Senior High School is located in New York’s southern tier. The district is situated between the towns of Alfred and Almond, with the former home to Alfred University and Alfred State College. However, the community has changed over the years, with rising numbers of students growing up in poverty. With a mission to keep expectations high, educators nurture students’ independence and both build on and evoke community pride based on producing good student outcomes.
Administrators and teachers do not rest on their reputation to pave their way forward, however. Educator after educator echoed concerns about rising poverty and mental health issues in their community and spoke of balancing pride with the humility to address challenges head on. Therefore, they attempt to balance upholding traditions that have made them the pride of the community with the expectations, as one district leader put it, to “change” their “game up” and innovate.
Read the complete Alfred-Almond Junior-Senior High School case study.