Luke Janka
Achievement Coach
The Urban Assembly
Panelist, General Session: The Last Word
Wednesday, June 8
4:00 - 5:00 pm
Luke Janka is a Senior Achievement Coach with The Urban Assembly, a nonprofit school support organization partnered with the New York City Department of Education. Luke works in close collaboration with the principals in The Urban Assembly’s network of 21 non-charter public schools to create and implement professional development programs. Luke took the lead launching and developing a network-wide professional development program for principals based on Richard Elmore’s Instructional Rounds model. He has also partnered with ATLAS Learning Communities and Harvard’s Project Zero to design professional learning opportunities for teachers and principals within The Urban Assembly network.
Prior to joining The Urban Assembly, Luke was a high school English teacher in the New York City public school system for seven years—five at Humanities Preparatory Academy, a small alternative transfer school in Manhattan belonging to the New York Performance Standards Consortium. While at Humanities Prep, Luke was actively involved in the Consortium's successful effort to reform New York State’s standardized testing system. As a trained Critical Friends Group coach, he also facilitated a bi-weekly professional learning community with his colleagues designed to study and improve teachers’ instruction and student performance.
Luke received his B.S. in Secondary English Education from New York University’s School of Education and his Ed.M. in School Development from Harvard Graduate School of Education’s School Leadership program. Luke is a National Board Certified Teacher.
