News

Author Alyson Gerber returned to Gaynor on December 6 to speak with the Green and Blue Clusters about her path to becoming a published author and the lessons she learned along the way. Gerber last visited Gaynor in 2019. Gerber’s novels resonate with Gaynor students, particularly Focused, which tells the story of a girl with ADHD who is hyper-focused on chess.

Author Chelsea Clinton visited the Purple through Silver Clusters on November 29 to read from two of her books and take questions from the students. Clinton was invited to Gaynor by the Parents’ Association through a connection with Gaynor parent and Book Fair Committee member Dana Raucher, in conjunction with the Scholastic Book Fair held on December 1. This year’s Book Fair Chairs Samantha Regan and Katy Williamson welcomed Clinton to Stephen Gaynor School’s Performing Arts Center and introduced her to her attentive audience.

As part of their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) work, Red Cluster students have been exploring the concept of “identity” by discussing different aspects that make up a person, such as faith or beliefs, family structure, gender expression, skin color, and interests. To show what they learned, each student created a puzzle of six different pieces to represent themselves. Once complete, the puzzles were placed in the North Building Cafeteria for the Red Cluster Identity Showcase.

Teaching Artists from New Victory Theater came to Stephen Gaynor School for a drama workshop with Blue Cluster students before they saw Romeo and Juliet at the theater on November 9.

Walking around the halls of Gaynor, you may see Jackie Smith’s smiling face once, twice, or even three times! That’s because in her seven and a half years at the school, Jackie has taken on various roles in the community. Along with teaching science, she also serves as the assistant athletics director and has helped develop Gaynor’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion curriculum. We sat down with Jackie for the latest installment of our “Five Questions With…” series to discuss what started her career in education, and what she enjoys the most about teaching.

On November 4, Gaynor welcomed two officers from the 20th Precinct, Officer Murphy and Officer Scalici, to talk to the Pink Cluster students as they continue their unit of study on services in the community.

November 1 marked the launch of this year’s Annual Fund campaign. If we were to write a book encompassing the past 60 years, it would include thousands of pages of those who advanced Gaynor’s mission with support and generosity. Our story is not complete without every member of the Stephen Gaynor School community’s participation.

This week’s TWIGS covers the week of Oct. 24-28 for Gaynor athletics, with an additional feature for the November 1 volleyball game.