Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Whole Grade Sharing – Part II


We are North Fayette Valley!  Now what?  Since the two school boards signed the agreement, we have been off and running.  In the seven days since that January 21, we have held four half-day meetings with teachers in the core content areas working on course content and alignment for middle and high school.  We have had a meeting pulling together administrators and AEA personnel to assess special education needs for both districts.  We attempted to have a meeting with business teachers, but due to weather conditions, that was postponed, as was an ad hoc meeting for the extracurricular folks.  Oh yeah, the morning after the agreement we spent a couple of hours with 54 students working to resolve the school colors!  In addition to all of that, I have had numerous meetings face-to-face with Mr. Willhite, Mr. Imoehl. Mr. Clark, and Mr. Nuss about matters relative to the sharing program.  I have spent countless hours working in collaboration with Mr. Clark in preparation for course selection and registration, as well as time on the phone and via email with staff at Valley arranging for meetings with students and putting a transition plan in place.  We have created a calendar for all of the meetings and activities that we anticipate needing over the course of the next four months to transition students, orient parents, and to make certain we get every thing done.  We have come up with question after question, and I anticipate there will be more!  And, I have attempted to do all of the other parts of my job!

So, where are we?  Headed in the right direction!  We knew it was going to be busy, but thankfully we started on this effort way back at the start of the school year.  I am tremendously excited about the new opportunities that are going to be created for our students.  A new structure to our Language Arts and Social Studies programs will be implemented that I think is great!  We will roll out more details on that in the near future.  I also recognize that there are going to be bumps in the road, and there will be some things that happen that will be upsetting to some.  Change always brings with it some pros and some cons.  Productive and positive change sometimes takes a little while to bear fruit.  With that said, the students at North Fayette Valley are going to find themselves in a much more comprehensive academic environment, starting next year.  And, it will continue to grow.  School reform has been discussed at great length for the better part of my 16 years as a principal.  Now, with the Iowa Core, our focus on technology, and the attention we are giving to this opportunity, I can start to see some of this shift.  It will be great for kids!  Did I say I was excited?  I’m excited!

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