You might have heard her name somewhere. Whether it was on the school announcements, from a teacher, or even from a student, Ms. Getto isn’t only physically moving from place to place, but verbally as well. If you haven’t seen her before, there’s a good chance she was in her office making important phone calls. That was certainly the case when The Nest greeted her for an interview on January 18th. The team was honored when a time was arranged to get to know her a bit better.

Ms. Getto is the School Improvement Manager (SIM)  working with the Building Leadership Team (BLT). Before coming to Albany High, she worked at Giffen Elementary School and Albany School of Humanities (ASH) for ten years as a Special Education teacher. She then became the assistant principal at Hackett Middle School, and finally went on to serve as principal at North Albany Academy. After Albany High School was identified as  a persistently low achieving school, she wanted to find ways to help students and increase the graduation rate.  After a successful interview, she was hired as the SIM and ready for action.

Because the school was listed as persistently low achieving, they were given a 7.5 million dollar grant from New York State to establish four academies and incorporate meaning and a career pathway in each academy. When asked whether she believed the academy concept was working, she responded with, “I think we will be successful but that would take time.” Ms. Getto mentioned how yes, people can paint stuff on the wall, but it’s the meaning behind it all that’s crucial. The colors indicate the academies and each academy stands for a general career path.

Ms. Getto also pointed out that when students aren’t given any sort of motivation, it’s hard for them to maintain the good work that they’re acquiring. Due to this reason, big bulletin boards were scattered around the school honoring students for their academic performances. Students’ drawings, tests, essays, and other accomplishments are hung up as well. Motivational quotes were placed in a variety of places to keep students’ chins up. Ms. Getto strongly believes that a happier, livelier, and more welcoming student environment will have a greater impact on overall performance.

Ms. Getto is also concerned with attendance and office referrals. She keeps close watch on every student’s history and tries to understand what went wrong, why it went wrong, and how it should be fixed. The data is reviewed on a regular basis. Her goal was to decrease office referrals, absences, and yellow cards by 30%. With great success, that goal was achieved with 33%.

The BLT is also responsible for APEX, a program that helps students boost up a failing grade by averaging the original grade and the new one and helps recover absences. In addition to this, the BLT brought the idea of snacks and school prizes to engage students in afterschool activity.

Lastly, Ms. Getto is strongly focusing on the special needs students to help them get where they need to be. With a master’s degree as a special educator, she firmly believes that she, along with the BLT’s assistance, will greatly help the students in need both academically and socially.

The BLT meets once every month to discuss, analyze, and initiate action toward issues that occur in the school building. To make all ideas and opinions fair and diverse and remove bias, individuals from the administrative, teacher, and TA associations are welcomed. Of course, what’s just as important are the students themselves. Although there are many effective members, there aren’t any students on the team–not yet anyways. Ms. Getto encourages any students who would like to put forth their ideas to help the school and join the BLT. Contact Ms. Getto if you are interested in getting involved in the BLT.