Great with numbers

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Zulma* and I sat at a round table in my office. The principal’s office– I assured her she wasn’t in trouble. She had just turned 17. She looked dull. Resigned. 

Our journey with Zulma started two years ago in January when my assistant principal and I drove to the West Bronx on a quest to find her, our car doors scraping the snow as we stepped out.

Zulma had been absent for weeks. We were in remote learning. It was her first year in high school, and her second year in New York since arriving from El Salvador.  We found her apartment building and through the intercom, a sibling told us Zulma was at the laundromat a block away. So there we went, finding her in a hoodie and flip flops, taking a load out of the washer. 

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7 Red Flags

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So we’re in the season of wanting– Spring is the hiring season for schools. 

Last year around this time, I found myself wanting to hire a certain teacher candidate after I saw his resume. He was dual-certified in two subjects that we needed, and he coached track, which we also needed. He spoke French, Spanish. A glorious combo in a school for English Language Learners. I did notice his resume was long, and wordy, but . . . 

I called him for a short phone interview, which we do to vet people before an in-person interview. I talked about the school, and I kept speaking and speaking, and — this is usually a warning sign that I feel the need to please someone. But, I thought, maybe I was just out of practice interviewing . . . 

A few minutes into our conversation, he said, “OK, now I can talk. I’m in my driveway.” What? He had been driving this whole time? Why had he agreed to take an interview while driving? Maybe I had scheduled it too early and should have made sure. . .

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Hanging out

/ Julie Nariman / 1 Comment

The other day, I found two boys hanging out in a small alcove in front of our school health clinic. I can always relate when I see kids hanging out and not wanting to be bothered– as a teenager, this was all I wanted. But now is now, and I have a job to do. “Hi gentlemen, nice to see you both. I’ll need you to go back to your classes now.” 

“We have passes,” they said politely. Each handed me an official pass to the health clinic, waiting for me to profusely apologize to them and allow them to keep hanging out.

“Great, thanks,” I said. “The health clinic doesn’t open for 10 minutes. You can come wait in my office while I work so you’re not in the hallway.” 

There was an awkward silence. “Oh, OK. Thanks.” I had taken away their privacy. 

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Taking a risk

/ Julie Nariman / 1 Comment
Oumou with a framed copy of her Times piece.

In the last unit of 12th grade English, our students write “100-word stories,” modeled after the New York Times column “Modern Love Stories.” At the end of the unit, each student submits their best story to the New York Times. 

This year, one of our students, Oumou Sow, was published by the Times. Her piece was “Sprinting in Senior Spring.” Here is her story.

How it all started

To be honest, I never took the assignment that seriously. I never thought I’d be the one to get published. 

It all started with my class’s science fair. We were outside in the field for one of the science experiments. My friend and I were hungry and we wanted to eat burek, an Albanian food you can get at the pizzeria. We asked our teacher and of course she said no. I knew we shouldn’t leave in the middle of the science fair, and I had never cut class, but it seemed like such an adventurous thing to do. We were outside, there were lots of kids, no one would notice, and it was the end of our senior year. 

So we still snuck out and ate burek. I felt a little guilty, but we didn’t get caught and I ended up winning the science fair. 

A few days later in English class, I thought, why not write about that experience? I finished the story in 5 minutes. 

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Why I write this blog

/ Julie Nariman / 10 Comments

Years ago when I started this blog, a colleague asked me why I was writing it. She didn’t understand and for some reason, I felt embarrassed explaining. She kept asking, “But why?” and I kept giving reasons that were like bland, mushy oatmeal: “I like writing”, “It’s just a thing I want to try.” It never occurred to me to say, “Why not write a blog?”

I now have answers to both questions. 

Why do I write this blog? 

  1. I am in awe of my job as a principal, and I want a record of it. 
  2. I write myself out of my worst disappointments. 
  3. I am happiest when I am creating something.
  4. It brings my students to life. 
  5. I want more truth to be available about myself than untruth. 
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Graduation Day

/ Julie Nariman / 2 Comments

Delivering their speeches, the class of 2022 shined particularly bright at this year’s graduation. 

Elira,* the class president from Albania, talked about “The breakfast club,” when her math teacher would open the classroom early and chat with the students over school muffins and yogurt. 

Adam from Yemen joked about meeting “my first bald teacher,” who was demanding yet caring in pushing his students to write. 

Christina, our valedictorian from Dominican Republic, reflected on the challenges of Calculus. 

Oumou from Senegal was still glowing over getting a piece published in the New York Times, a Modern Love Story, “Sprinting in Senior Spring.” 

On the day of our graduation, the Supreme Court was overturning Roe vs. Wade.

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Showing skin

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Students at HSLI doing henna.

In a diverse high school like ours, students’ clothing can fall at two ends of the spectrum: revealing, or very conservative. Students from Dominican Republic might see a crop top as normal school wear, while a student from Yemen might see a female’s bare arms or hair as taboo. It’s an interesting balance. 

When I founded our school in 2011, our students wore a uniform, but  enforcing it became too much of a full-time job. Instead of saying, “Why aren’t you wearing your uniform?” I wanted to just say, “Hi!” Parents and kids said they wanted the uniform but so few wore it that we abandoned it. Now, students can mostly wear what they want. 

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Makeda from Panama

/ Julie Nariman / 6 Comments

As a principal, I usually operate with generosity. That doesn’t mean my mind isn’t stingy.

A student can enter the school system at any point in the year, September to June. As a Bronx public high school for newcomer immigrants, we take kids in at any time, no matter when they arrive. About half of our students come from an NYC middle school, and the other half arrive throughout the year, days after their planes landed at JFK. We’ll welcome a student whenever they arrive.

Ideally. 

On June 1st, I got an email from the Bronx office of enrollment: a student, Makeda,* had just arrived from Panama and was being placed in the 10th grade. I forwarded the email to my school’s New Admit team and wrote, “We have a new student.”

That is what I did. 

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A job I won’t delegate

/ Julie Nariman / 4 Comments

At our school this year, we do a “grab and go ” lunch in which students can grab a packaged hot lunch and take it home, or eat it in a classroom. We did this to avoid using the cafeteria due to COVID. To make sure students don’t get hungry earlier in the day, we give them a mid-day snack. 

We discovered early on that some lunches were more popular than others: chicken nuggets and french fries? There would be a frenzy of students and not a single meal would be left over. Fish and green beans? We’d end up with 50 leftovers. (Unfortunately the healthier the lunch, the less popular it is. Luckily we had a teacher who took the leftovers to a food pantry where they were much appreciated.)

To get our lunch quantities right, I assigned myself the job of visiting the cafeteria kitchen every morning. I chat with the staff, learn what they’re serving, and then together, we make a lunch estimate so there’s minimal waste. 

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A bird in the room

/ Julie Nariman / 2 Comments

It’s been a quiet year to work in a school building: 10 or fewer kids per class seated six feet apart, wearing masks, while the other 2/3 of our students did remote learning from home. No more interruptions or discipline problems. I felt almost like I had an office job, hopping onto Zoom meetings and online classrooms most of the day. 

Before the pandemic, we had a system for responding to discipline or other classroom problems: teachers would send a group text, and an administrator or counselor would respond. However, this year, we hadn’t received a single “need help” text. 

Suddenly, one day in May, I got a text from a teacher, Ms. M. “Can you come to room 304? I need help.” 

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