Four East Rockaway teachers honored for receiving tenure

Four teachers in the East Rockaway School District were granted tenure during the board of education meeting on May 29. Each recipient, accompanied by family and friends, received a citation and were recognized by their respective principals.

Kallen McNoble has been a second-grade teacher at Centre Avenue School for the past four years. McNoble was recommended for tenure by Centre Avenue principal Calia Kelly, who praised McNoble’s “kids first” mindset.

“Kallen arrived (at Centre) in the middle of the year and immediately hit the ground running,” Kelly said. “She got to know her students and did not let anything stop her, especially the pandemic. She knew the importance of relationships and ensured that no matter what, her classroom would be a place where students would feel comfortable.”

East Rockaway Jr./Sr. High School principal Richard Schafer recommended two educators for tenure at the meeting. Gianna Horvath joined the East Rockaway High School faculty in the winter of 2020 to teach business. Horvath is well-known for her annual “Shark Tank” competition where students pitch a food truck idea with a marketing plan and advertising strategy.

Horvath was in the first cohort of East Rockaway teachers trained in project-based learning and has implemented many real-world projects into her curriculum. Her innovation in the classroom has led to a surge of business course requests over the last few years.

Horvath was instrumental in introducing a dual enrollment finance class with Syracuse University in which students earn college credit. She is also adviser for the East Rockaway High School yearbook.

Dame Forbes joined East Rockaway High School in the fall of 2021 as the first dedicated chairperson of science. She has worked hard preparing for the upcoming changes to the New York State curriculum and assessments, and next generation science standards are already being implemented into the classrooms.

Forbes emphasizes the importance of hands-on inquiry and discovery-based learning activities — including virtual ones that cannot be performed in a high school lab setting. She is responsible for the school’s partnership with NASA and “Day in the Life of a River” program.

Forbes has been integral to the growth of the district’s STEM fair, she was the district’s first teacher accepted into New York’s Master Teacher Program, she is co-advisor of East Rockaway High School National Honor Society, acts as summer school principal and in her spare time, and has begun a doctoral program at Long Island University.

Robert Kennedy, assistant director of Pupil Personnel Services, recommended Andrew Kell for tenure. Kell has been a social studies teacher in East Rockaway’s special education department for four years.

Kell comes from a long line of East Rockaway alumni, including both his parents, who are graduates of the Class of 1973. In addition to teaching, Kell is also the coach for the boys JV basketball team.