I Got Hired!! New Chair of Curriculum

Lighting the Way High School Light the Way School District

January 10, 2012

Mr. and Mrs. James Jones

2710 Parkway Place

Poughkeepsie, NY 12580

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Jones:

Hello! My name is Jessica Mushel and I have recently been named the new chair of the Curriculum Committee. I have had the pleasure of teaching in Light the Way School District for seven years. I am honored that I have been given the opportunity to serve as a change agent for our curriculum, with the goal of benefiting our students.  

I am writing you today to explain the first course of action that myself and the curriculum committee will be taking. With a constantly changing world, we at the Light the Way School District find it necessary to start implementing a multicultural curriculum. Multicultural education is a progressive approach that is grounded in the ideals of social justice, education equity and critical pedagogy. The objective of multicultural education is to provided educational experiences in which all students can achieve their full potentials as learners and as socially aware and active beings.  This curriculum transformation is essential because practices that identify some as "the norm" and everyone else as "the other" need to be replaced with practices that offer students a more complete and accurate understanding of society, the world, and themselves.

To ensure multicultural curriculum is being implemented properly we have begun to host workshops for our teachers and administrators. These workshops are designed to provide the proper education about multicultural curriculum and to recognize that it is going to be a slow but necessary implementation. This process will begin at Lighting the Way High School and then will gradually progress to the middle and elementary schools. In addition to workshops for the administrators and teachers, we will be hosting a series of workshops for you, the parents and guardians, who wish to gain a better understanding of multicultural curriculum; dates of workshops to follow.
On behalf of the Curriculum Committee we appreciate your understanding and patience as we move our curriculum towards the future. This change will help our students remain open-minded, and become the agents of change that we aspire them to be. 

Thank you for your continued support!

Sincerely,

Jessica Mushel

Jessica Mushel

Chair of Curriculum

2000 Light way • Poughkeepsie, NY • 12580 Phone: 845-567-3000 • Fax: 845-567-3001  Multicultural Education