Author: Emily Johnson

At Columbia Explorers, Mentoring Keeps Excellence Consistent

For Principal Eileen Considine, leading Columbia Explorers has been a chance to come full circle. The story starts all the way back in 1994, when she taught at nearby Shields Elementary with a colleague, Jose Barrera, who was working as the bilingual coordinator. The two educators forged a deep friendship and working partnership. In 2001, when Barrera opened the brand-new…

Webster Elementary’s Khalid Oluewu

Chicago Public Schools graduate Khalid Oluewu, now principal of Webster Elementary in North Lawndale, likes to offer his own story as living proof of what is possible for his own students. Growing up in a low-income, Nigerian-American, single-parent home in Uptown, Oluewu learned responsibility very young. As a student at Arai Middle School (now Uplift High School), Oluewu got his…