The 28 fourth grade students in the classroom were well behaved and attentive as their teacher handed out worksheets for that day’s lesson. The room was silent but the air was buzzing with noise. It was Tuesday, April 12 at Moravia Park Primary School in Baltimore and the sounds were coming from the other classrooms surrounding Todd Dalrymple’s fourth grade class.
The barriers separating each classroom are not walls, but portable easels and cubbies that are slightly taller than the average height of an upper-class elementary school student.
“It gets noisy but the kids are really good about tuning it out,” Dalrymple said.
The children were listening intently to their guest speaker who was teaching a lesson in honor of Teach for America week.
“Teach for America week is a week every year where we get leaders from the community to come teach a guest lesson in the corps member classrooms,” Executive Director of Teach for America in Baltimore, Courtney Cass said.
“We bring in community leaders from all sectors:
Stephon Jackson, VP of T. Rowe Price, helping students learn about stocks. He was visiting Moravia Park Primary School's fourth grade math class to help teach a lesson during Teach for America Week.
business, politics, education, law, etc. to serve as guest teachers in classes of corps members,” Regional Communications Director, Kaitlin Gastrock said.
These weeklong events help raise awareness about the challenges students in low-income communities face.
“It’s a great way to get citizens and interested community members engaged in the work of what teachers go through every day,” Masharika Maddison, Regional Communications Director for the Bay Area said.
Teach for America teacher Todd Dalrymple led his class in an introductory discussion of stocks that was projected from his laptop onto the rectangular white screen that doubled as a white board and projector.
Stephon Jackson, the Vice President at T. Rowe Price came to Moravia Park to help guest teach a lesson to the fourth grade math class about investing. The students seemed genuinely interested as they played a game where they acted out a mock investment scenario with selected students acting as the Adidas and Nike companies.
“Today was wonderful for the kids,” Teach for America second-year teacher Todd Dalrymple said. “We set a big goal in our classroom.”
This goal is displayed proudly on the wall, written on a large piece of poster board, “We will be the best fourth grade math students in Baltimore.”
Each day during Teach for America week different guest speakers are chosen to speak in specific classrooms at schools in Baltimore city. Some students are not aware that their teacher is a corps member of Teach for America.
At Midtown Academy, a middle school that teaches grades six through eight, Sylvia Toense, the VP of Global Investments at T. Rowe Price, came to speak about world travel.
“[Teach for America Week] provides some inspiration for our students and gives them a role model and an example of what’s possible,” Cass said. “It can also be fun for them to just engage in a different way.”
Sylvia Toense, VP of Global Investments at T. Rowe Price, presenting pictures from her trips abroad. She taught a lesson to a 7th grade class at Midtown Academy for Teach for America Week.
Toense gained the seventh graders’ attention by asking them where they have traveled and where they would like to travel in the future. Then, she showed a slideshow of pictures from the cities she recently visited for work: Hong Kong, Zurich, and London.
The students seemed fascinated by the idea of traveling to foreign countries and questioned the cultures of each of these cities.
Teach for America Week began in 1997, Maddison said. “It brings professionals into low-income school classrooms.”
“It reinforces the fact [that] all kids can learn and they should all have the opportunity to reach the highest level,” Maddison said.
Lydia Gray, a Teach for America corps member and seventh grade teacher at Midtown Academy said one of her students said that this was the best day ever after Toense finished the lesson.
“Guest teachers inspire students, sharing their real life application of the subject students are studying and show them what their possible career paths are,” Gastrock said.
While most of the days throughout this week were low key, the American Government classroom at Northwestern High School was bustling with student excitement on Thursday, April 14.
Domonique Foxworth, cornerback for the Baltimore Ravens was helping third-year Teach for America alumni Matt Thornton with his lesson about historical Supreme Court cases.
Baltimore Ravens cornerback, Domonique Foxworth, discussing an American Government lesson with high school student. He was a guest speaker at Northwestern High School for Teach for America Week.
“The commitment and sacrifice of teachers is extremely im
portant and if my celebrity at all brings some attention to their commitment and their hard work then I’m happy to do it,” Foxworth said.
A news crew inside the classroom did not deter the class from having a heated debate over hot issues such as student rights and gay marriage.
As one of the regions in the U.S. aiming for equal education for all students, whether or not they attend a low or high-income school, Baltimore is using the resources it can.
“[Teach for America] week gets the community exposed to the different efforts we’re making to close the achievement gap,” Cass said. “It also gives students a chance to see how the leaders are trying to make a difference.”
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