Theodore Roosevelt Senior High School

Roosevelt is an urban public high school that serves approximately 600 students in Washington, DC.

Why Global Education?

“Global studies changes the lives of young people. Students are thinking beyond themselves. Students now own their actions. For example, students came up with a service project to serve the community: a drive to collect toys for kids in the Children’s Hospital. Students are internalizing what they are learning, and are able to relate to challenging issues and extend the conversation beyond the classroom.”

– Mr. Julian Hipkins, Global Studies Coordinator

Key Practices

Shared Mission and Vision

  • Seeks to understand and communicate to school leaders, staff, and students what being a global studies school means for the school community. 
  • Prioritizes learning alongside staff and students. 
  • Works with the school community to define the school’s identity as a global studies school and reimagine the school’s vision by meeting with all staff, community members, parents, and student focus groups. 
  • Regularly checks in to see how global vision and mission is enacted, met, and evolving at staff meetings and through “step backs” with staff and students.

Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment

  • Offers foreign language courses in multiple languages, including Spanish, French, and Chinese, and allows all students to take a foreign language all four years of high school. 
  • Provides support for all educators to intentionally teach global competence within the context of their curriculum by implementing global thinking routines. 
  • Requires all 11th-grade students to research a capstone project where they take action on an issue of local and global importance.

Collaborative Professional Community 

  • Tapped a small cohort of teachers to join a monthly PLC focused on implementing Project Zero’s Global Thinking Routines, as well as monthly seminars with teachers across DCPS’s global studies schools.
  • Dedicates time and space for all staff to share ideas and innovations for integrating a global focus into their lessons during faculty and staff meetings, summer professional development programs, and morning collaboratives.

Global Connections and Collaboration

  • Utilizes the global connections within the nation’s capital by forming partnerships with the U.S. State Department and various embassies. 
  • Provides students opportunities to interact with school visitors from all over the world, including through a partnership with a high school in France.

Advocacy and Community Engagement

  • Partners with organizations to support global learning, including local universities, the U.S. State Department for visits with foreign ambassadors and dignitaries, and the Pulitzer Center for Journalism, which identifies journalists to speak to students about the international locations and stories they cover.

Equity and Inclusivity

  • Emphasizes restorative justice to give students a safe space to share their feelings with one another. 
  • Supports the school’s International Academy for newcomer students in merger with the dual language program so that native Spanish-speaking students can take AP classes and cultural heritage courses in their native language, and, at their request, integrated the academy’s students into the school’s social-emotional learning curriculum advisory period.
  • Encourages 11th graders to participate in the DC Public Schools’ Study Abroad program, which is free of charge so all students can attend.

Operations and Management

  • Petitioned the district to hire a global studies coordinator who supports all teachers in maintaining a global perspective and schedules and welcomes international guests to the school.