Quest Weekly #6

Dear Quest to Learn Staff,

Each week, I will come back to our purpose and mission for the year: growth. Last year our students made real academic progress, and this year our job is to build on it deliberately, so that it lasts and reaches every student.

The House structure is designed it so that the people who share the same students are in the same room, looking at the same work and the same data at the same time. I know it’s been messy in places, and we’re adjusting as we go based on what happens in the discussions and what you’re telling us. I can't emphasize enough the value of your feedback as we iterate to ensure that what happens in one classroom is connected to what happens in the next.

In Houses we’ve started working in cycles of analysis and action. We look closely at what students are showing us, decide together what to do about it, try it in our classrooms, and come back to see what happened. That cycle is how we make sure classroom moves are purposeful and coordinated across teachers, how we learn from one another’s ideas, and how we keep track of every single student so no one slips past us.

How the cycles line up with the assessment calendar

The House meetings are timed to follow our assessments, so that each time new evidence comes in we’re ready to use it.

• September: Kid Talk gave us a shared way of talking about students, and the iReady and MAP screeners gave us our first look at literacy, which is where the literacy micro-routines came from.
• October: Progress reports went home on Friday, so over the next two weeks our Academic Progress Partners will lead us through a first academic check to see who is off track and where (6-7 and 10-12 on 10/14, 8-9 on 10/21). On 10/28 all Houses return to the screener data with a focus on math and numeracy.
• November: We’ll prepare for the November Town Hall and finalize midterms with departments, clarifying the throughline in each course from baseline to midterms, to Performance Tasks and other summative assessments.
• December: we’ll analyze midterm results together and plan our next steps before the break, specifically adjusting Performance Tasks based on what baseline and midterm data are telling them, and connecting back to the project based core of PTs.

What I’m asking of everyone

• Please come to House meetings having looked at the agenda so we can spend our time on students rather than catching up.
• House Hubs: During the Kid Talk portion of the meeting, add your notes about the outcome of parent outreach, specific interventions you have planned, non-sensitive student information to share, etc.
• Before you leave, make sure you have a concrete next step for specific students, recorded in the House Hub, and come to the next meeting ready to share what you tried and what you noticed.
• In between meetings, add your notes
• teachers and counselors have 55 minutes of remote time per week for parent engagement -- continue to log outreach in Jupiter or keep the record of message exchange there. We're looking into connecting Jupiter logs and House Hubs.
• paras, service providers, and non-teaching staff have time during instructional meetings on Wednesdays to add notes to Hubs.
• Teams that meet regularly -- Attendance, Student Support, soon MTSS -- add notes during meeting time
• Staff assigned to reach out to parents for daily absences and behavior

I want to reiterate my thanks to everyone in this community for your commitment growth.

Have a great 4 day week.

Marina

Teachers

• If a student is late to your class or cuts your class, it is your responsibility to make contact with the parent and student to address the behavior.
• Log your outreach in Jupiter (this can be at minimum checking the box that you made contact, at most "staff notes" on the call.
• When to make outreach: All teachers have 55 minutes of remote parent engagement time per week, by UFT contract. You can choose to make all the outreach at once, or spread it out -- whatever makes sense based on the behavior and your schedule after school.

Dean Team

• when a student exhibits a pattern of 3 or more cut periods and/or excessive lateness at any point in the school day, the Dean Team will ALSO make contact with the family and add notes to the House Hub
• Dean Team will partner with teachers to correct behavior after documented teacher contact.

Daily Attendance

• A robo call goes out after 3rd period to all families whose children are absent or late
• Millie tracks and ensures accurate daily attendance, including recording excuse notes: School Student Attendance

Tier 2 & 3 Attendance

• The Attendance Team rigorously studies student data weekly and works with students, families, agencies, and local resources to re-engage students who have less than 60% attendance.
• The Butterfly Pilot: a simple, face to face check in with students who have less than 90% daily attendance in order to improve it

School Closed in Honor of

• Indigenous People's Day
• Italian American Heritage Dat

School Events

• Inspiring Minds After School Begins

• Enroll here: https://forms.gle/PGis4dJDrLqHWKyf7

  
  

• PSAL volleyball, tennis, soccer

• MY team practices & games

• Individual students pulled for 30 minute ROAR secondary diagnostic based on screener (iReady & MAP) or for MAP testing

Team Meetings

• Cabinet (rescheduled from Monday)

Other

• Teach Drill Lesson in Home Base
• 
  

School Events

• TRIP: 801 to Cooper Hewitt 9am-12pm
• Soft Lockdown Drill 10:15-10:25 pm
• 601 POV Personal Gallery Walk: 7th period, open to all
• Soft Lockdown Drill 10:15 am
• SLD will begin with a PA announcement to take proper action
• School admin along with school safety will perform a sweep of the floors.
• All other staff should take appropriate action - ensure students/staff are safe in locked rooms - lights out, windows covered and remain quiet.
• Once the floors are determined clear, the "ALL CLEAR" will be called on the PA system.

• Common Areas

  -Gymnasiums: Quest will ensure doors are locked & secure

  -Cafeteria: SBST will ensure doors are locked & secure

  -Library: Landmark will ensure doors are locked & secure

  -Auditorium: Hudson will ensure doors are locked & secure

• Inspiring Minds after school
• PSAL tennis, soccer, and bowling matches
• MY practice & programming

Team Meetings

• Enrollment Meeting
• Studio Q
• ALL STAFF 1:10-1:30
• Announcements & information sharing
• Pedagogues: Portal Training 1:30-2pm
• House Meetings
• Progress report data analysis

School Events

• PSAL girls volleyball (JV & V), bowling, soccer
• MY practices & games
• IM programming

Team Meetings

• Attendance Team
• focus on students with less than 3 days present YTD
• focus on previously CA students

School Events

• MY Practice
• PSAL games/matches: bowling, soccer
• IM programming

Team Meetings

• UFT/Admin weekly

Other

• Individual students pulled for 30 minute ROAR secondary diagnostic based on screener (iReady & MAP)

Nominations are open for the FLAG Award for Teaching Excellence. Quest has great teachers that deserve to be nominated! Marina nominates each year and encourages PTA and students to do so -- faculty can also nominate peers. Go to flagaward.org/nominate. The process is really simple, just providing some information and answering the question “why are you nominating this teacher?”

The FLAG Award gives away $400,000 to NYC public schools and teachers every year with the winning teachers receiving $25,000 personally along with a $10,000 grant for their school. For more information about the award you can check us out in the New York Times, or CBS news.

The Teacher's Choice Accountability Form for 2026–2027 is in your mailbox. All supporting documents are attached to the email that Sandima sent on Friday, 10/9 please review them carefully.

Deadline to submit the Teacher's Choice Request for Non-Participation Form to the Teacher's Choice unit to opt out of the program: October 23, 2026:

Teacher's Choice funds will be disbursed in your paychecks: Late November / Early December 2026:

Deadline to make purchases: January 8th, 2027 ( Purchases made after this date will not be eligible)

Deadline to submit your original receipts along with your completed Accountability Form: January 15, 2027

• Ed Prep NYC provides eligible school-based staff (e.g., paraprofessionals, substitute teachers, parent coordinators, payroll secretaries, and custodial staff) with a pathway to earn their teaching certification, while continuing to work full-time in a school.

• apply by November 16.

Preparing Students

- Home Base Teachers: At minimum, teach the General Response Protocol lesson in Home Base before Friday, October 2. You may adapt the lesson to fit the needs of your students. You are welcome to teach other lessons (below)

- The General Response Protocol page (login required) includes a multitude of age-specific adaptive lessons and materials for emergency readiness.

Preparing Families

- Families were provided with information about trauma informed approach to drills, the dates of drills (required by NYCPS), and the General Response Protocol via email at the start of the year.

- Parents who enroll their children later in the year receive this information in the welcome packet

Preparing Staff

- All staff are provided with safety training prior to the start of school year.

- UFT attends monthly Building Response Team meetings

- Administration provides all dates and times of scheduled drills on the Quest internal calendar.

• Wrestling: Francisco is always looking for interested students and can be contacted at francisco@humanitiesprep.org

• Boys Varsity Basketball Tryouts: 10/19, 10/21, 10/26

• Girls Varsity Basketball Tryouts: 10/27, 10/28, 10/30 (and Interest Meeting TODAY after school in room 440 with Coach Sylvester)

• Boys JV Basketball Tryouts: 10/28, 10/29

• Gymnastics, Boys Swimming, Table Tennis, Indoor Track, Gymnastics: We do not offer these sports, but students can tryout for them at a nearby school. Please send any interested student to Mario in room 440 (or via email) and we’ll get them set up with a tryout!!!

Requirements to play PSAL sports: Updated Physical Exam Form and Parent Consent Form

Please use this form to refer students to services with SAPIS Jamie Williams. As her title indicates, Jamie specializes in substance abuse and prevention.

Knowledge sharing is key to a successful organization. I believe that when we have centralized and transparent systems, everyone at Quest can access, contribute to, and act on information that helps students. When we work more efficiently, collaborate better, and share knowledge, we grow stronger as a team and kids don't fall through the cracks.

General:

1. Internal & External School Calendar
2. Quest School Wide Google Drive

• Find all shared documents including
1. 2026-27 Email groups
2. 2026-27 Curriculum Dashboard
3. 2026-27 Staff Handbook
4. Studio Q Slides (also linked to Handbook)
5. Main Office forms and resources
• TeachHub
• NYCPS InfoHub

1. NYCPS Attendance App
2. Attendance, OMNY, walking permission, etc. (Millie's sheet)

1. Jupiter Grades
2. New Visions Portal
3. SESIS

House Hubs

These will be centralized and transparent spreadsheets per House (6/7, 8/9, and 10-12) that include important, shareable information about students from multiple teams. We will discuss and start using House Hubs on Wednesday, September 16.

Tech

1. Staff self-service tool for looking up student and parent login information: tinyurl.com/Q2lPortal
2. Student Login Credentials for Students: https://tinyurl.com/OSIS-Search