PTI Planning Retreat

PTI Planning Retreat

In the first week of July, six proud educators, finally a bit relaxed from a full week of summer, got together in Manhattan to reflect on the past year and make big plans for the 2019-2020 school year.  (We also made a push to make this lovely website go live.)

It was gratifying to look back at the fruits of our labor over the past year.  For the first time this year, at a Proud Teacher Gathering at Essex Street Academy, we invited students to share their voices about the impact of having out queer educators in their lives.  It opened our eyes to the idea that our work of becoming role models in schools is not just a matter of acceptance, it is a matter of safety for these students. We developed some amazing new partnerships with Michelle Fine and Maria Elena Torre at CUNY Graduate Center and with the Out for Safe Schools program with the Department of Education.  

This year we had some unforgettable events involving telling our stories about being queer educators who self-disclose to our students.  We met in January at CUNY Graduate Center for the Story Sharing Workshop, which we absolutely will repeat next January. We also had our first Story Slam Event in June.  This moth-like storytelling event was hilarious and moving, but mostly hilarious. We will be hosting several more of these events this year.

Finally, we shared our voices with wider audiences in a few different ways. We were honored to present at the Decolonizing Education conference this spring.  Principal Jose Jimenez also shared his story of coming out to his school on a bulletin board on WNYC during their Pride Week call-in event. 

We planned our heads off this week.  Please take a look at our calendar to see what is happening next.