[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 6]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 8264]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        HONORING GLORIA MENDOZA

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. ELIOT L. ENGEL

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, March 23, 2009

  Mr. ENGEL. Madam Speaker, Gloria Mendoza has dedicated her life to 
education, starting as a kindergarten teacher and advancing to 
administrator, all the time an advocate for students and staff. She has 
had a consistent commitment to quality education for all students, in 
the process becoming a role model for students.
  She worked in New York City public schools for ten years as a teacher 
and administrator and in 1987 started her career with the Yonkers 
Public Schools as an Assistant Principal at Enrico Fermi School for the 
Performing Arts.
  In 1991, she was appointed Principal of School 17, and served as 
Principal of Museum Middle School prior to her current assignment as 
Principal of Enrico Fermi School for the Performing Arts.
  She has built partnerships with community organizations to create 
initiatives for her schools, including the Groundworks Gardening 
Project, the Parents-as-Partners Family Resource Center, the Healthy 
Eating Program, sponsored by St. John's Hospital and the Gorton High 
School Medical Magnet, the Westchester County Grandparent Volunteer 
Program, Yonkers Police Department's DARE Program, and St. Joseph's 
Hospital Yonkers Spectrum Clinic.
  She has demonstrated that civic involvement and community service are 
important to her students' success and has encouraged staff, parents 
and students to reach out to the sick and the elderly, as well as to 
members of the United States Military in Iraq.
  One of her passions, the Yonkers Pathways to Success, is a program to 
help adults learn to speak English and earn their high school diploma.
  For her dedication to education she is being honored by the Yonkers 
YWCA with its Pacesetter Award, and I congratulate her and thank her 
for her great work in educating our children.

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