BFS lifer Amanda Becker ’18 is a bright light at BFS and at many points beyond our community. She has been profiled on the Friends Council of Education’s website (see Amanda Becker: Giving Back to Quaker Education) for her hard work as an FCE intern this past summer, she is a regular […]
On Friday, September 23rd, all of our seventh graders and 40 of our 10th and 11th graders had the opportunity to participate in Forced From Home, a free, interactive, educational outdoor exhibition designed to raise public awareness about the global refugee crisis in Honduras, Burundi, Lebanon, and Syria. Guided by Doctors Without Borders field workers, […]
On November 12, Director of Service Learning & Civic Engagement Natania Kremer and a swift team of Upper School students held a half- day Community Issues Conference for the BFS Upper School as well as other independent school students and faculty in the new BFS Upper School at 116 Lawrence Street. Tenth grade co-organizer […]
It’s not unusual for BFS faculty to take advantage of summer seminars offered by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and other organizations, then return in September to regale the faculty and enhance their curricula with all they have seen and learned. This year saw some particularly colorful and profound experiences unfold. Upper School […]
The culminating experience for our 10th Grade Service & Justice Seminar: Exploring Parallel Struggles with C.A.R.E. (Community, Accountability, Reciprocity, Equity) is a New Orleans immersion experience during the first week of June. We partner with the Center for Ethical Living and Social Justice Renewal as we examine power and privilege in the context of service. […]
The 9th Grade End-of-Year experience was based in Brooklyn and focused on service learning and civic engagement in various communities in our borough. Students learned more context about the history of activism in Brooklyn and engaged with community partners doing meaningful work on a range of issues: Black Veterans for Social Justice provides assistance to […]
by Joy Roberts What do 55 fourth graders and 9 senior citizens have in common? That is the question that BFS fourth graders put to the members of Heights and Hills as part of their creative and innovative Service Learning project this year, “When We Were Ten”. Established in 1971, Heights and Hills serves close […]
by Laurice Hwang This year the middle school focused on stewardship. Stewardship is not just taking care of the environment, but taking care of the people in our community. Service learning in 6th grade incorporated a bit of both: the Billion Oyster Project, which the whole middle school participated in, focused on environmental stewardship. The […]
by Laurice Hwang The Service Learning program for the 5th grade has been focused this year on two central themes – the elderly and (dis)ability. These two areas of focus have been integrated intentionally into the curriculum through specific units of study to raise awareness and inspire action. The first theme developed because of a […]
by Jesse Phillips-Fein For 7 years, the BFS 7/8th grade dance classes have collaborated with dance programs at several public schools, including 5th graders P.S. 95 in the Bronx (Nia Love, teacher), with 9-12th graders (and alum) at Science Skills High School’s Joe-Ile-Bailar dance company (Pat Dye, director), and for the past three years with […]
11th Grader Patonya P. and 10th grader Emmitt S. volunteered to participate in the April 22nd Advocacy Day in Albany with Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement (CAIC) in support of the HALT Solitary Confinement Act. Joining a powerful, diverse group of 120 advocates from throughout New York State (including several local Quakers), Patonya and […]
The seven and eight-year-olds in our second grade classrooms are developmentally inclined to care deeply about fairness. They have a clarity of conviction around issues of equality that is often inspiring. The newly developed Change Maker curriculum taps into their emerging concept of justice, as we learn about individuals and groups who have contributed to […]
