1 Week In, Schools Chief Dances, Reads, & Plans

The city’s new public school leader Madeline Negrón kicked off her first week on the job with some summer-camp cheerleading, the occasional selfie with enthusiastic staff members, checking in on a first-grade reading session, and working through the details of a new strategy to address chronic absenteeism with the help of local grandmas.

The New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district’s new superintendent completed her first week with a bang while visiting the district’s ​“Summer of Fun” programming each day last week. 

Since her first official day on July 3 after replacing retired Supt. Iline Tracey, Negrón — a former NHPS principal and director of education who most recently served as Hartford’s acting deputy superintendent — said she has ​“maximized every minute” and spent every day last week visiting summer programs to see what NHPS has to offer to its students and families. She’s also been working on plans to tackle her top two priorities of chronic absenteeism and literacy improvements.

During a Friday morning interview with the Independent, she said she intentionally arranged for her first meeting in her new role to be with NHPS Chief of Youth, Family and Community Engagement Gemma Joseph Lumpkin. The meeting helped her to better understand the district’s past and current plans for improving student and family engagement and addressing NHPS struggles with students not showing up to school.

Negrón described her first week as a ​“warm welcome” from students and staff, many of whom she worked with in her past roles as a teacher, principal, and administrator at NHPS. 

She described her rounds of summer programming as an opportunity to see what the district is currently offering and how the students are being impacted by the district’s partners. 

“I want us to be intentional with every dollar we spend,” she said Friday morning. 

During her first weeks on the job, Negrón said she plans to encourage the collection of data to help her team to develop a strategic plan. 

“Excitement doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel being back,” Negrón told the group of students and teachers and admins she met with on Friday.

Negrón plans to present her entry plan at Monday’s full Board of Education meeting. 

"Frog & Toad" Reading At Troup

One of the first stops Negrón made on Friday morning was to Troup School on Edgewood Avenue, which is one of the district’s dozen summer programming sites. 

She made rounds in the school’s lunchroom as students ate breakfast before starting their day. 

During her visit, Negrón heard ​“It’s been too long” from across the lunch room as Mauro Sheridan staffer Sean Hardy gave Negrón a hug and they took took a selfie together. 

Negrón briefly talked with students and staff during her visit to Troup. She told teachers, paraprofessionals, and other staffers: ​“Thank you for giving us your summer.” 

Patricia Cala, a 25-year education veteran and Troup kindergarten teacher, pulled Negrón to the side to request that one of her main focuses on the job be increasing support resources for students and their families. 

In response Negrón told her ​“we’re going to be working on that, I’m making it a priority.”

Negrón also chatted with longtime Troup paraprofessional Troy Long, who has been a para for the past 24 years. Long told Negrón about his deep-rooted legacy at Troup. He is a graduate of Troup along with his two sons, one of whom is a firefighter while the other owns a trucking business. 

“I hope she’s coming in with the mindset of kids first,” Long said. ​“Reading, science, and math have to be key.” 

Long also briefly shared with Negrón about his intervention work with Troup students as a para who floats around the building, pulling students out to do intensive intervention work to get them at grade level in math, science, and literacy. 

Before heading on to her next task of the day, Negrón visited a first-grade classroom to watch as a group of about 20 students gathered around their teacher to read a ​“Frog and Toad” book. After reading a chapter aloud, students returned to their desks to write a sentence or two summarizing what happened in the chapter.

Chronic Absenteeism Rx: Grandmothers?

Negrón’s next stop was to the former Strong School at 130 Orchard St. for a drop-out prevention-focused meeting with the staffers of the Office of Youth, Family & Community. 

Friday’s meeting was a follow up to Negrón’s initial meeting on her first official day of work last Monday. She met with drop-out prevention staff and emphasized her goal to help the team to lower the district’s chronic absenteeism numbers. 

During the meeting, Joseph Lumpkin said that her team has learned while door knocking that many NHPS students are being raised by grandparents. 

She recalled her own childhood being raised by her 74-year-old grandmother. She also told a story about a current middle school NHPS student who is also being raised by his grandmother while his mother is incarcerated. 

Joseph Lumpkin informed Negrón that her team is working to recruit local grandmothers to help offer extra support and guidance to other families during home visits. 

Friday’s meeting included about 30 staffers who also shared personal stories about being raised by their grandparents. 

Charles A. Blango, who works for NHPS as the coordinator of drop out prevention, said the district’s chronic absenteeism rate is at 35.8 percent, which is down from 45.8 percent in December 2022 and marked a significant decline from 60.2 percent last June. Chronic absenteeism refers to the percentage of students who miss at least 10 percent of school days over the course of the school year.

Negrón said she hopes to keep the districts rates trending down as she starts the job with two top priorities of tackling crisis level literacy and chronic absenteeism rates in New Haven. 

“I’m walking in making it very clear that there’s many priorities but here are two that are going to be up at the top and near and dear to my heart,” she said. 

She said she next will work with the team to identify and work toward benchmark targets for chronic absenteeism with the goal of reaching 100 percent of students not being chronically absent. 

"Stop & Twist" At Nathan Hale

During a final stop of the morning on Friday, Negrón visited summer programming happening at Nathan Hale School. 

She made a stop in the cafeteria to talk with a group of Hillhouse cheerleaders who are leading a cheer camp for elementary and middle schoolers. 

“You guys have to show me some moves,” Negrón told the table of Hillhouse students as they took a lunch break. 

Negrón said the only dancing she knows how to do is salsa. 

When she said this, the high schoolers’ eyes lit up and they told her, ​“We’ll teach you some cheer and hip-hop moves if you teach us salsa!” 

Negrón agreed and showed them a brief set of salsa steps in the cafeteria. 

On the second floor Negrón watched elementary students practice some cheers taught to them by the Hillhouse students and cheer coach. The students cheered, ​“We want a basket! Dribble it, pass it!” 

She later joined a group of 8- and 10-year-olds who taught her the Hillhouse chants: ​“Stop and twist!” ​“Blue and white!”

Before the end of her visit Negrón made a quick stop in the school’s auditorium to see theatre staff and students having lunch. She learned that Nathan Hale’s summer production of the Little Mermaid Jr. will run July 27 – 29.

“I’m going to be working hard for you guys,” Negrón told the students Friday.