ACE Advocates News

Megan Adzima was going to do this for Joy. She wasn’t feeling particularly joyful thinking about it; in fact, she was feeling a little nervous and a little awkward. But if energetic toe touches with high kicks and enthusiastic renditions of “Waves of Mercy” with choreographed dance moves for high schoolers was what Joy required, then Megan was going to shed her self-consciousness and dive right in.

“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.” - Sherlock Holmes

Though perhaps relatively few use seemingly minute details to solve major crime cases like Sherlock Holmes, data and its analysis enable people to make informed decisions in any field today—and education is no different. Nobody knows this better than Chris Broughton, who has spent the bulk of his professional life using data to find key intervention opportunities that change the trajectory of students’ lives. Chris, currently the Executive Director at Bottom Line in Chicago, graduated from the 11th cohort of ACE Teaching Fellows and taught middle school in Oklahoma City. He has learned through years of data-work that it is truly not the numbers that matter, but the people behind those numbers.

We always live at the time we live and not at some other time, and only by extracting at each present time the full meaning of each present experience are we prepared for doing the same thing in the future. This is the only preparation which in the long run amounts to anything. (Dewey, 1916/1966, p.30). 

From an early age, Kevin Kimberly remembers his Paw-Paw telling him to “pass it on.” For many years, Kevin did not understand the depth of this simple phrase, but it has since become his animating ethos. Kevin serves as the principal of Memphis Catholic Middle and High School in Memphis, Tennessee, and is a graduate of the 18th cohort of ACE Teaching Fellows. His dedication to educating children reveals a deep internalization of his grandfather’s message and is a living testimony to the value of solid educational foundations. That “pass it on” mantra is what drives the lessons and virtues near and dear to the education a student receives at Memphis Catholic.

Emily Puetz likes to say, “We can do school better.” In our evolving world, we have many more ways to think about learning, and what it takes to equip this generation with the skills, dispositions and mindsets necessary to solve complex challenges as they build more compassionate and loving communities. From her role as a fourth-grade teacher in Savannah, Georgia, in ACE Teaching Fellows 2, to her position as the chief academic officer of Minneapolis Public Schools, Emily has striven to make schools a place where students learn academic concepts and thrive as human beings.