Program for February 6
Posted by Jerry Venters
on Feb 03, 2015
This Week: Dean Johnson, Crossroads Academy: "Educating Students in
Downtown Kansas City"
Downtown Kansas City"
In August 2011, Dean Johnson and Tysie McDowell-Ray teamed up to launch Crossroads Academy in downtown Kansas City, designed to preparestudents to excel in high school by providing an academically rigorous K-8 education. It is their vision to be the premier urban school serving Kansas City's youth and that the Academy will become a destination for educators seeking inspiration and best practices. Johnson, a Kansas City native, brings a wealth of international experience to his work as an executive team leader at Crossroads Academy. He began his teaching career at a high school in Micronesia, after graduation from Loyola University in Chicago in 1993. In 2005, he was working in an internship with Catholic Relief Services in Zimbabwe when the government began burning and bulldozing many urban poor neighborhoods; Johnson organized emergency food relief for several of those communities. For three years, he worked with Catholic Relief Services in Aceh province in Indonesia, one of the provinces most heavily damaged by the 2004 tsunami. Again, he organized relief efforts, managing a $25 million humanitarian program that included reconstruction and redevelopment projects. He returned to Kansas City in 2009 and was executive director of Gordon Parks Elementary School before starting Crossroads Academy.