Atlanta Public Schools has the most “No Excuses” schools in the state – nine out of a total of 35 schools from 19 districts – as announced today by the Georgia Public Policy Foundation. APS schools that attained the “No Excuses” designation for 2010 are: Blalock, Burgess-Peterson Academy, C.W. Hill, Capitol View, East Lake, Garden Hills, Gideons, Whitefoord and KIPP West Atlanta Young Scholars Academy charter school. Capitol View received a double recognition for having two grade levels that qualified for the award. Blalock closed prior to the last school year.
We continue our look at the Atlanta Families’ Awards for Excellence in Education winners with a profile of Dr. Anthony Dorsey, principal at R.N. Fickett Elementary School for the past three years. During his tenure, Fickett has received several awards. In 2008, APS Superintendent Dr. Beverly L. Hall recognized Fickett for achieving 70 percent of the district’s assigned instructional targets. That same year, Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue awarded Fickett the Platinum Award for Greatest Gains, which recognizes students whose achievement ranks in the 98th percentile of greatest gains. Fickett was named a 2009 “No Excuses School” by the Georgia Public Policy Foundation. In addition, Fickett received a KaBOOM! playground in 2009.
Prior to Fickett, Dr. Dorsey served as a teacher and assistant principal at Ralph J. Bunche Middle, and assistant principal at Cleveland Avenue Elementary. Before moving to Atlanta, Dr. Dorsey taught in Englewood, N.J., and has been a public school educator for 18 years.
It’s become a habit of Travis Payne, APS alumnus and famed former choreographer to the late Michael Jackson, to return to not only Atlanta but his educational roots. But the timing on this occasion could not have been more bittersweet. Payne took time out to visit two elementary schools today as he continued to celebrate the commemorative film This Is It, which he co-produced and in which he is featured as Jackson’s long-time choreographer. The movie comes quickly on the heels of Jackson’s untimely death a few months ago as he was preparing for a series of London concerts. The film’s footage comes from that preparation.
But Payne’s Atlanta visit to F.L. Stanton Elementary School on Friday was a positive one, as he introduced some video segments of himself promoting the film on the Ellen DeGeneres show and on local Atlanta TV in front of a packed Stanton auditorium. (This marks the second visit to Stanton in three years for Payne, whose cousin, Arthurline Taylor, is Stanton’s instructional specialist.) Payne is a proud graduate of then Northside High (now North Atlanta) who studied under the tutelage of musical theater instructor William Densmore and dance instructor Gary Harrison. (Both has since passed away.)