Midtown’s Student Support Specialist Cheryl Nahmias came to Midtown looking at all the different support avenues Midtown had in place for students and has since implemented more, such as Saturday School, Community Days and Teen Mental Health First Aid.
“The idea was to come in and look at what all things were doing for students and figure out where there are some gaps or places where we could really help,” Nahmias said. “You know, make sure that all of our students are getting the support academically, socially, emotionally, that they need to be successful here.”
Nahmias used her previous experience working at Blue Board, an educational company, to format some of her lessons at Midtown.
“[Blue Board] is a really cool company,” Nahmias said. “I enjoyed it, I was a content writer, but I was writing and mostly alone at home, working virtually, and I just was not enjoying that. I really like being around people, being around students, and so when this opportunity became available, I was like, ‘Yeah, this is great.’”
Midtown graduation coach and parent Susana Roberts first met Nahmias when she started working at Midtown at the beginning of this school year.
“I first met her on my first day during pre-planning,” Roberts said. “And I thought, ‘Wow, she’s a whirlwind, and she gets things done.’”
After working more closely together for some time, Nahmias and Roberts have collaborated to help students at Midtown with grades, community service and student welfare overall.
“We work well together, we have the same mission,” Roberts said. “It’s nice to be able to mesh together, work together, tag team, help each other out in our specific roles, but then also come together for the greater good.”
Nahmias has introduced new initiatives during her time at Midtown. Nahmias said these programs have been put in place with the hope of benefiting students’ well-being.
“One of the best things that I’ve found here that’s made it really easy for me to do my job is that we have our own foundation, and getting connected early in my time here with the Midtown High School Foundation has allowed me to spearhead like several projects that I think have been really good,” Nahmias said. “Saturday school, community days, Teen Mental Health First Aid have all been supported through the foundation, and without them, I don’t know that those things would exist.”
Junior Eden Sharp is a member of the Student Mental Health Advisory Board and has worked with Nahmias since last year.
“With the Mental Health Advisory Board, she’s [Nahmias] made it completely successful,” Sharp said. “I think that she’s really consciously aware of both students’ and teachers’ perspectives when you’re talking to her, you can tell that she understands where you’re coming from, whether you’re a staff member or a student.”
Sharp said that Nahmias cares for her students’ overall well-being as an utmost priority.
“I feel comfortable and very accepted by her,” Sharp said. “I see a lot of effort from her regarding student welfare, and to me, it’s clear that she puts in a lot time [and] effort to ensure the best for all of her students.”
Nahmias and Roberts started a new program this school year called ‘Grad You.’
“It’s for students who are significantly behind in their graduation credits, and it’s an opportunity for them to come and work with us and get caught up on those and get back on track for graduation,” Nahmias said. “The two of us do that for half the day every day.”
In addition to the introduction of ‘Grad You,’ Nahmias and Roberts also spearheaded a project called ‘Unit Recovery.’
“This was something that’s always existed as a possibility [at Midtown], but it had kind of fallen out of utility, and people weren’t using it as much,” Nahmias said. “Unit Recovery is where students who failed a summative assessment in a core class can use Edgenuity as a way to recover a single unit. The idea with unit recovery is if we can recover while we’re in school, that way you’re not having to do summer school or a course recovery.”
Roberts and Nahmias work together to help students and ensure that the programs they run go smoothly.
“There’s never enough that we can do, we can always do more,” Roberts said. “And when there’s a problem, there’s usually a solution. We just have to figure it out. If we just keep working together and focusing our work on our goals, we can ensure that we will be successful and that we’re here for our students.”
