Alumni News: Dr. Matthew Certo (FCRH '93, GSE '94) and Rashid Ferrod Davis ('03)

The Westwood Regional Board of Education recently approved Ramsey's High School Matthew Certo to take over as new principal of Westwood Regional High School starting this summer. The boards decision to hire Certo at a special meeting May 31st was unanimous, according to board president Carol Mountain. Certo, who served as an assistant principal at Ramsey High School for the past nine years, is in his 19th year as an educator, and earned a doctorate from Columbia University in Educational Administration and an MSE in elementary education from Fordham University (he is also a 1993 graduate of Fordham College at Rose Hill). To read the full story on NorthJersey.com, click here.

Rashid Ferrod Davis (M.S.Ed. Administration & Supervision '03) is the founding principal of Pathways in Technology Early College High School, and will be one of the principal honorees at the 2012 Education Update Outstanding Educators of the Year on June 25th in New York City. He also participated in Change the Equation's STEM Salon on May 23rd in Washington, DC. The STEM Salon provided a forum for participants to demonstrate how business involvement in school creation can infuse innovation into outdated schooling models, as well as to highlight and discuss how business involvement in creating STEM-focused schools can form new pathways and innovative opportunities for students in post-secondary schooling and careers that education cannot do alone. View a clip from the event below:

Los Ninos Conference Sketches Permanent Effects of Childhood Stress

 700: The number of new neural connections formed every second in the first year of a child’s life.

18 months: The age at which differences in vocabulary appear between children of college-educated parents, and children whose parents did not graduate high school.

90 to 100 percent: The chance of significant developmental delays for a child who experiences risk factors such as poverty, maltreatment, a parent with mental illness or substance abuse problems, hunger, homelessness, or a mother with a low education level.

1 in 3: The odds that a child facing these stressors will later face heart disease.

The fragility of young, rapidly-developing children cannot be understated, said Shelia Evans-Tranumn, Ph.D., on April 18, at the ninth annual Young Child Expo and Conference, co-sponsored by the Graduate School of Education (GSE). Adverse circumstances can interrupt that development severely, and possibly permanently. Kicking off the three-day conference, James J. Hennessy, Ph.D., dean of GSE, presented Evans-Tranumn with the Excellence in Early Childhood award for her “extraordinary championship and advocacy for young children and their families.”

James J. Hennessy, Ph.D., dean of GSE, left, and Vincent Alfonso, Ph.D., professor psychological and educational services, right, present the Excellence in Early Childhood award to Shelia Evans-Tranumn



Summer 2012 New Student Orientation

If you are beginning your education at GSE in Summer 2012, join us for an Orientation to learn about student services, get important information for new students, and view the campus. Come meet your new classmates and enjoy an afternoon at Fordham!

Thursday, May 10th, 2012
1pm - 3pm
12th Floor Lounge, Lowenstein Building
Lincoln Center Campus
Fordham University
113 West 60th Street, New York, NY

If you are an admitted student, you may login and RSVP via your VIP Page. A detailed agenda will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Please email gse_admiss@fordham.edu or call (212) 636-6400 with any questions.

Upcoming Event: Teaching Latin in NYC Public Schools

The Fordham University Department of Classics and the NY Classical Club are proud to sponsor:

"Teaching Latin in NYC Public Schools"
When: Friday May 4th, 5-7pm
Where: Fordham University, Lincoln Center, McMahon Hall 109

Moderator:
Ron Janoff, Curriculum Director for Latin at Williamsburg Charter School

Panelists:
Kathleen Durkin: Latin Teacher, Masbeth HS, Queens NY
Jason Griffiths: Headmaster, The Brooklyn Latin School
Lester Long: Executive Director, The South Bronx Classical Charter School

Dr. Ron Janoff, Curriculum Director for Latin at the Williamsburg Charter School, will open the proceedings and moderate the discussion during which the panelists will be asked to share their experiences and shed some life on the teaching of Latin and on the place of classical learning in their schools.

Alumni Notes: Rashid Ferrod Davis (GSE '03)

Rashid Ferrod Davis (M.S. Ed. in Administration and Supervision '03) is the founding principal of Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-Tech) and was recently named a 2012 Cahn Fellow. The Cahn Fellow Program for Distinguished Principals at Teacher's College, Columbia University is committed to recognizing outstanding principals and providing them opportunities for professional, intellectual and personal growth.

Davis also recently published "To Encourage Good Habits, Test Early and Often in High School" in the New York Times School Book. Davis supports introducing Regents exams early, during the ninth and tenth grades, so students have the opportunity to experience success early on. In support of this theory, Davis outlines an innovative program he has introduced at P-Tech that advocates teaching through the test rather than teaching to the test.

Faculty Publications: A Psychobiography of Bobby Fischer

Joseph G. Ponterotto, Ph.D. (Professor of Counseling Psychology) authored a book entitled A Psychobiography of Bobby Fischer: Understanding the Genius, Mystery, and Psychological Decline of a World Chess Champion, which will be released this month by Charles C. Thomas Publisher.

The book examines the inner workings of Fisher's mind- the genetic, personal, family, cultural and political factors that collectively provide a penetrating window into the "why" of Bobby Fisher's genius and bizarre behavior. Though there have been many articles, books and films on Bobby Fisher, this text represents the first scholarly psychological assessment of the world's most famous chess champion.

Professor Brings to Light the Darker Side of Genius

The story of Bobby Fischer has for decades garnered international intrigue. At 15, Fischer became the youngest chess grandmaster in the world. To Cold War-era Americans, Fischer’s victory in 1958 over the reigning eastern European champions rendered him a national hero, resulting in accolades like “genius” and “boy wonder.” His 1972 capture of the World Championship from Boris Spassky of the USSR is still considered to be the most widely watched chess match in history.

But over time, Fischer’s reclusive and increasingly bizarre behavior alienated him, until his vitriolic anti-Semitism and endorsement of the 9/11 attacks ultimately sank him into infamy. He died an exile in Iceland in 2008.

So, how could one of America’s greatest minds have ended this way?

That is the question Joseph G. Ponterotto, Ph.D., tackles in his groundbreaking book, A Psychobiography of Bobby Fischer: Understanding the Genius, Mystery, and Psychological Decline of a World Chess Champion (Charles C. Thomas, Publisher, Ltd., 2012).