Inside Dallas ISD

Special contribution by Lennon Formaggini, Student Activities. The auditorium erupted into cheers with every click of the controllers as the final two players started their showdown match at the Dallas ISD Elementary Esports Tournament. Then it happened. The screen flashed: Player 1 Wins, and Martin Weiss Elementary School was crowned the Smash Bros. champion again. “I felt like it was a shared win,” said Antonio Barnes, Weiss Elementary School esports coach. “My heart was racing, adrenaline pumping as if I were competing myself while rooting him on from the audience.” The Student Activities Department sponsors tournaments each year for the…

Rachel Rogerson, art teacher at W.W. Samuell High School, is impacting both her school and the global art community as she takes students through women’s art history, teaching them cultural art traditions. In her leadership role as an art curator, Rogerson engages the community in historical narratives, celebrating customs and traditions that can be preserved through art. Previously, as the executive director at McKinney Avenue Contemporary in Dallas, she led the gallery in advocating for creative freedom and presenting visual art in all forms. Rogerson studied fine and studio art at the University of North Texas where she earned a…

Fifth graders in Vimari Khiat’s class at Ronald E. McNair Elementary School couldn’t help talking over each other in their eagerness to share what they had just learned about Native American history.  And that excitement is just what Khiat was looking for when she designed the projects for her class to learn about and commemorate Native American History Month. “We usually celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month and African American History Month, so why not Native American Heritage Month? As Hispanics we have a great amount of Native American in our DNA,” said Khiat, a bilingual teacher who is from Puerto Rico…

A mentor is someone who allows you to see potential and restore the hope inside yourself. That is what led Gerardo Gonzalez Gomez, an instructional specialist in the Dual Language Department, and Isaac Nkurunziza, once his student, to collaborate in an organization that is making an impact on many lives. Nkurunziza, who was in Gonzalez Gomez’s ESL class at Bryan Adams High School Leadership Academy, is studying to become a mechanical engineer, but he is not your typical college student. At 23-years-old, he launched the Dream Nziza Foundation, whose mission is dedicated to empower children living in rural areas of…