Letter from the Executive Director
Lucretia Murphy, J.D., Ph.D.

We started the 2009-10 school year with the theme, “Show Up and Show Out in the Lives of Students!” As we closeout this year and reflect on our triumphs and challenges, I thank the See Forever/Maya Angelou family – students and families, board members, funding partners and volunteers, campus and foundation staff – for showing up everyday prepared to make a positive change in the lives of Maya’s scholars!

This year has seen accomplishments that will secure our ability to affect change for years to come. And, the power of change is evident in our work and the lives of our students, for example:

• Maya Angelou Academy (The Academy) students and staff were recently featured as a model for juvenile justice reform in a Chicago Public Radio series.
  
  
• A graduate of the Maya Angelou Public Charter School (MAPCS) was recently featured for beating the odds that seemed to be stacked against her and succeeding in college.
  
  
• The charter schools met requirements necessary to renew the MAPCS charter for five more years.
  
  
• The Academy was recognized as one of the best education programs in a confinement facility.
  
  
• The Maya Angelou Transition Center has expanded its program and staff to become a school for young adults and not just a 'transition center.'
  
  
• As an organization, we now have a long-term home in the Evans building.

As we move the Maya Way forward in 2010-11, we will continue to develop programs that not only transform our students’ lives but also have the potential to bring multiple areas of reform together. By increasing our direct impact with students, we have the potential to move the field. We’re looking forward to this work and to your continued support of our efforts.

The Power of Change
Ingrid Padgett, See Forever/Maya Angelou Development Director

The transformative power of positive change has been at the core of our school's mission since our co-founders started the Maya Angelou Public Charter School in 1997. Now, as a multi-campus collaboration of schools for adjudicated youth, court-involved students, and students in need of a second chance at academic success, See Forever/Maya Angelou is seeing the power of change in the lives of students across that spectrum! And, our students are making newsworthy accomplishments, for example:

• Maya Angelou Academy Students and Staff Featured as Reform Model
  As part of a three-part series chronicling the challenges of the Illinois juvenile justice system, Chicago Public Radio (WBEZ) Criminal Justice Reporter Rod Wildeboer offered a report on the students and staff at our Maya Angelou Academy – the educational program at New Beginnings that has been managed by the See Forever Foundation since 2007. Learn more about Wildeboers’ visit to New Beginnings Youth Development Center and the students and staff at the Academy who are witnesses to the power of positive change every day.
  
  
• Maya Angelou Public Charter School Graduate Finding Success as a Gates Scholar
  Our school’s holistic approach empowers our students to reach their potential while they are with us and to move on to college, career, and a lifetime of success when they leave us. Read more about Tommesha Scott, an MAPCS-Evans graduate who is currently a full-time student at Trinity University in the District. Tommesha is not the kind of kid most people expect to be a success in college, but the great expectations that we had for her coupled with the Gates-sponsored D.C. Achievers Scholarship Program, helped her to engineer a successful path for herself.
  
  
• Getting Back on Track the Maya Way
  Terrell Townsend is a soft-spoken, 16-year-old young man, who is just over 5 feet tall. He lives with his aunt in Northeast D.C., and he attends the Maya Angelou Public Charter School. Click here to learn more about Terrell’s journey and the power of positive change.

At See Forever/Maya Angelou, our programs are creating lasting changes in the lives of our students, and more broadly, helping to break a cycle of poverty created by broken social and educational systems. Stay tuned for more positive change updates from our learning community – we are changing lives one student, one day, and one success story at a time.

Graduating the Maya Way:
Celebrating the Uniqueness of our Program
Adriana Rodriguez, See Forever/Maya Angelou Alumni Support Coordinator

The familiar sound of "Pomp and Circumstance" can be heard at a Maya Angelou graduation ceremony, but when you look into the faces of the 73 graduates across our campuses you begin to understand the uniqueness of our program.

Whether it’s the beaming smile of an eighth grader ready to move onto our high school program, or the anticipation on the face of one of our high school graduates moving onto college or career, you’ll see that reaching this milestone is an even more significant accomplishment, when you think that many of our students and families were convinced that this day would never come. As shared by our director of academics and principal support Marian White-Hood, Ph.D., “The See Forever/Maya Angelou learning community is like a family; we help at-risk students achieve their potential with academic rigor, but we also work to instill empathy, compassion, humanism, and hope in our students – this is the Maya Way!"

The stakes our students set for us are high. At See Forever/Maya Angelou, we are not just providing students with an education, we are providing a path for them (and often their children) to a future that exceeds society’s expectations of them, and that may exceed the expectations our students may have had for themselves.

Our school has truly become a school of transformation. Everyone in our community has contributed to this second chance for our students, and we are grateful for the students and families who place their trust in us every day.

For more promotion ceremony and graduation highlights, view these photo galleries of the Evans Middle School and the Maya Angelou Transition Center.

Seeing Forever e-Newsletter: June 2010
See Forever Foundation/Maya Angelou Public Charter School
1436 U Street, N.W., Ste. 203, Washington, D.C. 20009
www.seeforever.org | (202) 797-8250 | (202) 797-8284