WESTFIELD – Westfield High School Advanced Placement (AP) Teachers Jill Keenan, Jennifer Levesque and Tawnya Tiskus have been honored with Mass Insight Education’s Partners in Excellence Award for helping more students take Advanced Placement (AP) courses with success as they prepare for college. The award recognizes 54 Massachusetts AP teachers for their outstanding contributions to student achievement and their dedication to college success during the 2014-2015 academic year. The teachers were selected out of a pool of more than 600 AP teachers who participated in Mass Insight Education’s AP STEM and English program.
“The teachers Mass Insight supports in AP partnerships across the state are the backbone of the schools’ role preparing students for college success,” says William Guenther, president CEO and founder of Mass Insight Education. “We’re very pleased to recognize the AP teacher partners who have produced especially outstanding results with their high school students.”
Mass Insight Education’s content directors selected the teachers based on their ability to increase their students’ access to AP classes, their students’ improved performance on the AP Exams, and their students’ resulting college readiness.
The award recipients will be honored at Mass Insight Education’s Partners in Excellence Award Celebration on April 5 from 6:30 to 9:00 p.m. at the Seaport Hotel in Boston. Eric Waldo, the executive director of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Reach Higher initiative, will be the keynote speaker. Each award winner will be recognized for his or her achievement and will receive a check for $1,000.
Mass Insight Education is a national nonprofit dedicated to improving student achievement and increasing college success through bold district restructuring and rigorous academic programs. This is particularly important within the urban “gateway” communities in which MIE operates, as youth from economically challenged communities are not as typically afforded the personalized, high caliber instruction that is provided in the AP environment.
Mass Insight Education’s AP STEM and English Program encourages more students to take AP classes in an effort to increase their confidence while providing them with the academic skills they need to succeed in post-secondary education. The AP Stem and English program is a key part of Mass Insight Education’s innovative College Success Campaign.
Annually, more than 10,000 students at more than 75 Mass Insight Education partner schools take part in the program. These schools quickly double or triple their enrollment in AP classes. They also double the number of students earning qualifying scores of three or higher on the AP exam.
