Greater DC Cares Serves at TMA

Thurgood Marshall Academy’s Garden hosted a group from Hands On: Greater DC Cares’ annual Servathon event this past Saturday! 

The Servathon is the largest service event in DC each year, and over 8,000 individuals volunteered their time during this year's events on Friday April 20, and Saturday, April 21.


No projects were too large for TMA's twenty-five volunteers—who did everything from moving raised beds, building new raised beds along the building, mulching the garden, clearing out and leveling the compost area, assembling a compost tumbler, and weeding, weeding, and more weeding! Four hours after the group started work, the garden looked amazing! Many thanks to the dedicated workers who helped improve several areas of the garden, making it more accessible and useful for our students. 

School Garden Love

On Saturday, April 14th, groups of volunteers wearing bright purple t-shirts showed up at various school and youth gardens around DC, ready to use their brain power, muscle strength, and good cheer to help these gardens better serve their student populations.

The volunteers hailed from Food Corps, an organization that places motivated individuals in limited-resource communities for a year of public service.

Food Corps Volunteers in front of the A-Frame trellis they built!

Working under the direction of local partner organizations, volunteers deliver hands-on nutrition education, build and tend school gardens, and bring high-quality local food into public school cafeterias.

Thurgood Marshall Academy was one of a few lucky school gardens around the DC area to host a group of these dedicated Food Corps volunteers. The purple-shirted school garden experts quickly set to work mixing and pouring concrete, digging holes for trellises, hammering in t-posts, and using drills and saws to build cucurbit (melon, squash, and cucumber) trellises. While they worked, Food Corps volunteers talked with TMA students and staff about their years of service in school gardens throughout the country.

TMA Senior Justice Long talks with a Food Corps Volunteer.

At the end of the volunteer day, the group stood back and surveyed their accomplishments: together they’d built two large A-frame trellises, two pea trellises, and a berry trellis; weeded and tilled the fruit orchard and five raised beds; and re-filled the garden’s rain barrels. We were sorry to see them leave, but are excited to hear about their many accomplishments in the coming months!

Out of the Classrom and Serving the Community

In the midst of a week of DC-CAS testing, AP practice tests, and college tours, juniors spent their Thursday and Friday mornings volunteering in the nearby community.  On Thursday, students made the short trip to Congress Heights to partner with Behrend Builders from the DC Jewish Community Center to beautify the gardens and courtyards at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, which was established in 1855 as the first large-scale federally run psychiatric hospital in the United States.  Originally serving nearly 7,000 residents, it now provides residential treatment for 280 patients.  Equipped with gloves, shovels, and trowels, students pulled weeds and cleaned the courtyards of the hospital to make the outdoor spaces more enjoyable for staff, clients and visitors.

Darricka Allen proudly displays a heap of weeds.

 

Students spent Friday morning hauling large debris and trash from nearby Shepherd Parkway, one of DC’s most neglected wooded areas.   The steep incline and deeply embedded trash provided an extra challenge leading students to problem solve and use teamwork to drag discarded furniture, rubble, and automobile tires (some even as large monster trucks) to the top of hill and thrown into the dumpster.  Congress Heights Community Association periodically hosts clean-up days of Shepherd Parkway, follow the Restore Shepherd Parkway Community Blog and  TMA's community service blog  for dates and ways to volunteer in the future! 

Cornell Thornydyke gets help from Ms. Boehle-Silva.

A team effort at work!

In a 90 minutes, students filled a dumpster and collected this mountain of tires

D'Ionni Michals-Phillips and Kenyana Williams armed with their newly found debris

Clean Up, Clean up, Everybody, Everywhere!

If cast onto an island, with a few pairs of gardening gloves, grabbers, and trash bags, what would you do? Members of TMA Unplugged: The Wilderness Club found themselves with these essential tools this past Saturday for a clean-up of the Potomac River watershed on and surrounding Theodore Roosevelt Island.  After meeting at TMA for an early breakfast, students traveled with Ms. Campot, Ms. Horn, and Ms. Gang to the Roosevelt Island parking lot, just off the GW parkway.  National Park Service rangers and staff from the Potomac Conservancy provided a brief introduction and safety advice before sending the group of volunteers on their clean-up areas throughout the island.  The Wilderness crew headed to the rocky shores on the south part of the island facing the Georgetown waterfront. 

Tenth grader Marcelus Newell teams up with Ms. Campot to find trash buried beneath the island's edge.

 While along the edge, Darnell Hudson worked tirelessly to procure a cardboard box deeply embedded in the muddy marsh.  With the help of Ms. Horn and the careful placement of several logs, his mission was a success.  Check out his efforts below!

Ms. Horn and Darnell sizing up the situation.

Almost there....

Mission Accomplished!

Students also earned community service for their participation—a good chance to secure a few final hours before the end of the year.  For future events with The Wilderness Club, come join our meetings on Friday mornings and for more volunteer opportunities with Potomac Conservancy, check out http://www.potomac.org/site/volunteer/

Planting Seeds, Worm Composts, and Welcoming Ms. Kate!

Although the old saying goes, “April showers bring May flowers,” Thurgood Marshall Academy’s Green Club has already been hard at work during DC’s unexpectedly warm March weather. 

We’ve planted beets, chard, cabbage, lettuce, fennel (a new student favorite since we cooked with it in the fall), cilantro, spinach, radishes, and arugula (over the protests of Ms. Fried), and have moved some of our seedlings outside, where they have bravely faced dropping temperatures and thunderstorms. 

Green Club also celebrated the arrival of new friends—worms! We have started up our worm compost again, and our 2,000 plus red wrigglers have been working to break down our garden and food waste for the past couple of weeks. 

 

Many thanks to Big Chair, a local coffee shop and grill, for their donations of used coffee grounds to help our compost thrive! 

Thurgood Marshall Academy has also welcomed a new staff member: Kate Lee, our new Garden Specialist. Ms. Lee will bring her extensive knowledge of gardening, organic farming, crop rotations, and other green things to the TMA Garden and Green Club activities. We’re very excited to have her on board! 

Law Day Tests Trial Skills

Mamie Mayo delivers her opening statement.

Last Friday ninth graders put their negotiation and advocacy abilities to the test in the March Law Day’s Criminal Mock Trial lesson.  Students first viewed scenes from the well-known law comedy My Cousin Vinny and were then given a chance to learn about parts of a criminal trial.  After hearing advice from the volunteer lawyers about how to deliver strong opening statements, witness examinations, and closing statements, students put their legal skills to the test in the case of The People of the District of Marshall vs. Zora Peters.   Armed with the facts of the case in hand, students split into prosecution and defense sides and were challenged to form their own opening statements and questions for the witnesses.  After a mere 20 minutes to prepare, the mock trial was underway.  Some students also acted as judges and with the help of volunteer lawyers called each side to the stand.  Upon completion of the proceedings, a panel of student judges deliberated the outcome.  The criminal mock trial served as practice for next month’s lesson.   On the agenda for April Law Day is the Civil Mock Trial.  A special thank you to all the TMA chaperones, law day coordinators, and volunteer lawyers for making March’s Law Day a success!

Delonte Williams questions witness DaMar Woodruff

Olivia Wilson (left) and Cierra Bailey prepare their testimonies. 

Kesha Payton, Aubrey Goode, and Cer'cia Wallace confer with a lawyer at Hogan Lovells law firm. 

Mentor Day Goes to College

Moo Bae, Thurgood Marshall Academy '11, George Washington University '15 leads a tour for mentors and students.

Ever wished you could have a preview into college life? Last Saturday, TMA students got a glimpse into George Washington University during Mentor Day. The weather was perfect on Saturday as students and mentors from TMA exited large yellow school buses and arrived at the Marvin Center, the hub of GW’s campus. TMA alum and current GW freshman Moo Johnson led mentors and mentees on a tour through the Foggy Bottom campus highlighting study spaces, dormitories, and dining options.

Pairs also joined Amada Caliz, TMA alum and GW senior or set off on their own using self-guided tours to lead them around the beautiful GW campus. Following the tours, the group gathered together for a panel on college that focused on HBCUs and public universities. Mentors who attended Howard, Hampton. UNC-Chapel Hill, and University of Illinois-Champagne, joined Moo to offer advice and answered questions from students about their experiences in college. After the panel everyone spread out and enjoyed lunch at different establishments in Foggy Bottom including Baja Fresh, Johnny Rocket’s and Whole Foods.

It was a great way to spend a beautiful spring day and start thinking about next steps in the college process!

Students Challenge Discrimination through ADL

Twelve Thurgood Marshall Academy students spent last Thursday in a day-long training session put on by the Anti-Defamation League. Students learned skills that would help them become Peer Trainers and combat discrimination and bullying at school and beyond. 

 

The training was put on by facilitators from ADL’s A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE^® Institute. The Institute is a leading provider of anti-bias education and diversity training programs and resources. The Institute seeks to help participants: recognize bias and the harm it inflicts on individuals and society; explore the value of diversity; improve intergroup relations; and combat racism, anti-Semitism and all forms of prejudice and bigotry.

Students began the day by introducing themselves and agreeing on ground rules for their discussions throughout the training. The activities ranged from brief discussions on issues that face high school youth, to games that encouraged students to recognize similarities between them and the other participants. 

Sophomore Joey Adams noted: "I learned about discrimination from bias to individual stereotypes, and I was surprised to learn that just one stereotype can escalate into genocide."

Joey also had advice for other TMA students and hopes for applying what she learned today to TMA: “Be careful about what you say because even little things you say can affect another person and hit the core.”

 Interested in joining ADL? 

We meet every Monday at 3:30pm in Room 108, and have many projects lined up for this semester, including another training day in May!