Welcome to my personal profile! My name is Laura Fayer and I am very excited to be applying for General Assemb.ly's Web Development Immersive program in New York.
A little bit about me...
I was born in New York City and raised in Larchmont, NY. The past six years I have lived in our Nation's Capital, where I attended Georgetown University and taught High School Algebra through Teach For America.
Much of my time at Georgetown was spent watching the Georgetown Hoyas dominate the Big East, working as a barista for Georgetown's student run Corporation ("The Corp"), organizing Georgetown's Relay for Life event to raise money for the American Cancer Society, studying Chinese for hours on end in Lau (Lauinger library), and spending time with my awesome friends.While at Georgetown, I studied Chinese language and culture. I spent seven months during my Junior Year studying abroad in Hangzhou and Beijing, China. Below is a picture of from me (left) camping on the Great Wall!
I became a Chinese major largely because of an amazing Chinese teacher I had in High School, Le Lao Shi. Her passion in the classroom was contagious. Her expectations were high and she made sure all of her students met her expectations. Le Lao Shi instilled in me the importance of hard work, and opened my eyes to a culture and society very different than my own. She created an inspiring and life changing classroom culture; all 21 of my classmates went on to either major or minor in Chinese during college. The time spent with a single teacher was fundamental to the choices I made in college. Outside of my Chinese classes I took many other courses related to social justice. In all of my classes I was most concerned with the sad state of our country's education system. In Washington, DC, where I was about to graduate from a top-tier university, only 56% of students were graduating from High School. When I learned about Teach For America I felt inspired by their mission to provide an excellent education for all students regardless or race or income.
Going into my first year I had minimal training or experience and was provided with limited resources; no curriculum, no textbooks, and no one else in the school taught my course. I was not given a team, so I made a team. I built relationships with the special education teacher, the math instructional lead teacher, parents, and my principal because I knew my students would be more successful if I was collaborating with others. According to my school's standardized testing data, my students preformed, on average, at a sixth grade math level, yet my principal told me I needed to teach a tenth grade level course. At the end of the year my students made the largest gains in the school, by growing 1.6 years, putting them on the path to catch up with their more affluent peers.
After my first year, the Cesar Chavez PCS Charter Network recognized me as a leader within the high school Algebra team. I was asked to work with a select group of math teachers to write curriculum and assessments for four different campuses and three different content areas. Over this past year, I was the liaison between the 15 Algebra teachers and the administration in order to implement a new curriculum and communicate expectations between both parties. Beyond my daily responsibility as a math teacher, I was responsible for ensuring teachers' voices were heard and problems solved.
My two years in the classroom were far more challenging and life changing than I ever anticipated. I was quickly exposed to the uphill battle teachers must climb to ensure students are successful and learning. I learned how to be meticulously organized, think and plan logical lessons, build relationships, and manage my time. I hope by learning programming I can promote technology in schools and create software to improve our education system for ALL students, regardless of where they come from. Below is a picture of me, my co-teacher, and our AWESOME third period!
