The Column

Places for collaboration, community outreach and development, and inspiration are more important than ever. For what will be a year this coming March, the world has been wracked by the effects of a pandemic no one saw coming, and thus, one for which none of us were prepared. However, one could say the pandemic showed us quite a bit about what humans are capable of when it comes to supporting one another, and the work done at the Bushwick Generator is a perfect example of humans helping one another through trying times.  In this Wednesday’s WHSAD Makerspace session, students heard inspirational narratives from community leaders as to the work done before, during, and will continue after Covid-19. Jay Solly,  Cofounder of Sustainable … [Read more...]

Matthias Hollwich is a German-born architect who lives in New York and is the creator of the thought perspective “New Aging”. New Aging focuses on how people determine what ‘old’ means and looks like, and how being old is represented and needs to change. The passing of his grandmother transformed him “into an unlikely, passionate advocate of architecture and planning for the aging” and inspired him for New Aging, which Hollwich has written a book about. At 48 years old, he has conducted workshops on this project at the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation in Germany, and the University of Pennsylvania (where he works on occasion) and is the co-founder of the architectural social networking site Architizer. Matthias Hollwich’s book “New Aging” has … [Read more...]

Ms. Moos and Mr. O'Brien had a very interesting project for their junior students in the Building and Design class. Students were asked to use their creativity and imagination to make a stop motion animation movie. A few students in the junior class, as well as the teachers, were interviewed about their thoughts and experience with the whole thing. Read below to see the interviews. Ms. Moos What do you hope students will gain from this experience? "I think it would be an understanding of how much it takes to create moving images. I think that we are constantly consuming videos, moving images and it's hard to actually wrap our mind around what it takes to create something like this. So, I hope that students develop an idea of what … [Read more...]

I've decided to attend Co-Op Tech because I was interested in the Advertising and Design Program. After all, Graphic Designing is one of my career paths. So, I felt like it was an opportunity I should be taking advantage of because I was doing so well academically. At first, I thought it was a lot of work, but now that I'm progressing and learning what is to be expected in these projects, the work doesn't take as long as before. I'm currently going for my certification in Adobe InDesign. By the end of the year, I should be getting certifications in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. InDesign is for making posters, postcards, flyers, any other type of advertisements. Illustrator is for drawing pictures, and Photoshop is for editing … [Read more...]

Ms. Heather Butts is a true hidden gem. For almost a decade, she's been working with WHSAD. Even though she's been with us for so long, many of us still don't know much about her. Impressively, Ms. Butts received her BA from Princeton University, her JD from St. John's University School of Law, her MPH from Harvard University, and her MA in teaching from Teachers College Columbia University. She is Co-Founder and Executive Director of H.E.A.L.T.H for Youths, a nonprofit organization formed for the charitable and educational purposes of assisting youth. Ms. Butts is a Regulatory Specialist at Columbia University Medical Center; adjunct professor at Columbia University School of Public Health; Board member of several nonprofits that focus on … [Read more...]

WHSAD's Makerspace students have the opportunity to engage in projects that are real-world oriented, learning and developing key skills that provide them with a head-start in their work after high school. One of the key components of our after school program is the guest speakers who share their insights regarding their place in the field, what their careers have been like, and how students should proceed in their work. This Wednesday, Mr. Richard Bearak, who currently works for Brooklyn Borough President, Eric Adams, thoroughly answered questions from WHSAD students. Below is Richard's presentation as well as some takeaways from our students. In the presentation of Richard Bearak he was answering lots of questions and one of … [Read more...]

It has been announced that the NYC Public High School applications will open on the MySchools portal on 1/18/21 and will close on 2/22/18. In order to help you decide if WHSAD is the best fir for for you, we invite you to sign up to attend one (or more) of our weekly remote open house sessions. We will be offering an open house session on Google Meet every Wednesday from 1/13/20 to 2/17/20. Please Click Here to sign up for an open house session. You can find the Google Meet link for each open house session in the PDF below. If the PDF does not load, you can download the file to open locally on your computer/device. … [Read more...]

Our team of student journalist just published the print edition of Volume 3, Issue 1 of The Column. You can read The Column here or download it as a PDF. If the document takes too long to load on your device, please select “open in new tab”. … [Read more...]

Written by Sheena Luke and Silas Rodriguez Robert Moses, an American public official, was one of the most powerful people in New York during the mid-twentieth century. He is responsible for multiple architectural projects in the city. The legacy his structures left is one that often completely disrupted the surrounding community and people. One of his projects is the Brooklyn-Queen Expressway which was designed to cut a trench between the low-income neighborhood of South Brooklyn. This specific project caused a disconnect in the community and the neighborhood of Williamsburg. The community became territorial as violence and drug use within neighborhoods increased.     To counter the effects of the BQE, … [Read more...]

This is my second year working with Work Learn Grow, and this year’s experience is just as good as last year’s. Although it does not feel the same due to the pandemic, this program has allowed a sense of familiarity to come into my life. I am familiar with how the program works, and this helps bring me an ease in light of all the uncertainty the country is facing right now. Last year, I was used to attending my CUNY course every Thursday from 3-5:30 pm in Ms. Connors’ room. There I learned about college readiness as well as growing into the person I want to become. The assignments were fair as well as manageable. After passing the CUNY course with flying colors, I was given the privilege to intern at the NYC Department of Buildings. For … [Read more...]