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Catherine Wong’s work week can find her meeting with government relations officials, mentoring graduate students, hosting high schoolers on campus, long-range planning with a local principal or in a Boston Public Schools classroom full of fourth graders.
As director of urban outreach initiatives for the Lynch School of Education, Wong is the point person guiding a slate of university-school partnerships focused on helping principals, teachers and students in Boston schools, as well as providing teaching and research opportunities for BC students.
Wong, whose teaching, research and consulting projects have taken her to Northern Ireland, Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, likes to be where the action is.
Central to her approach is listening carefully to principals, teachers and parents and then finding ways to channel Lynch School resources to address critical needs.
“I see urban outreach as developing strong relationships between BC, community-based organizations and the Boston Public Schools,” said Wong, who holds a graduate degree in cross-cultural counseling from Boston University. “I want to work closely with schools to uncover and share their most urgent needs so we can help them based on what they need, not based on what we say they need.”
Wong directs the initiatives College Bound, a pre-college program for local high school students; the Donovan Urban Teaching Scholars, an intensive one-year master’s degree program for aspiring urban educators; and Step UP, an initiative that pairs area universities with BPS schools to raise student achievement. Wong has also served as the interim director for the Lynch Leadership Academy, a professional development program for a select group of principals from BPS, Catholic and charter schools.
“These are very different programs serving very different constituencies and for me that is the highlight,” said Wong. “The exciting part is you’re doing all of this simultaneously so you begin to see the relationships between these programs and how they are inter-related. What ties them together is being responsive to the Lynch School’s mission of working on behalf of social justice and creating opportunities for children to work to their potential.”
Wong took a non-traditional route to higher education. She worked for 19 years as a school counselor in the Brookline Public Schools before she was tapped by University of Massachusetts-Boston’s Graduate College of Education to direct its school counseling program and teach graduate courses. After working as an independent consultant for several years, Wong joined BC in 2007.
Wong has also worked with colleagues at the University of the Middle East Project and BC’s Irish Institute, leading summer institutes for teachers and principals from the Middle East and North Africa regions focused on developing cross-cultural curricula and differentiated instruction, particularly for schools in crisis zones.
Traversing across cultures is something Wong has done all her life. A third generation Chinese-American, Wong was born and raised in Honolulu, where native Hawaiian, Japanese, Chinese, Filipino and US mainland cultures intersect.
“Growing up with my parents and grandparents in Hawaii, I understood what it meant to be both Hawaiian and Chinese,” Wong said. “There were different cultures that I learned to navigate. Teaching, particularly in urban schools, is much the same way. A lot of the work I do with educators, both in Boston and overseas, has involved helping them to be understanding of different cultures, but at the same time to retain their own voices.”
Zina Knox M.Ed. ’12 met Wong at a conference in 2010. Today she’s a Lynch School Donovan Scholar.
“Catherine’s passion for reaching young people is relentless and unique,” Knox said. “She has a calm, firm manner that inspires me to be a better teacher, mentor and leader.”
As coordinator of the Lynch School’s work in the Step UP initiative, Wong collaborates with the principals of the Russell and Winthrop elementary schools in Dorchester. Walter Henderson, the former principal of Winthrop and currently a Lynch Leadership Academy fellow, said one of Wong’s key strengths is connecting with both adults and children.
“Catherine has the unique ability to teach students and adults simultaneously,” said Henderson, now the principal of the P.J. Kennedy Elementary School in East Boston. “She helps educators to reflect, rethink and reinvigorate their core beliefs of putting the needs of children first.”
BC’s Urban Outreach Initiatives have been making an impact with students. In 2010, two Winthrop school fifth-graders, aided by a Step UP writing workshop, received $10,000 scholarships through the Red Sox Scholars essay competition. Last year, two College Bound students were named Gates Millennium Scholars and received full college scholarships.
Lynch School Interim Dean Maureen Kenny said the school’s work in the Boston community has benefitted from the respect Wong’s extensive experience earns from school leaders and teachers.
“Catherine has really nurtured deep and rich relationships with our partners in Boston Public Schools, as well as Catholic and charter schools,” said Kenny. “She has great energy, passion and creativity and the programs she directs provide vital links between our work here at the Lynch School and our urban partners.”