The New Year promises to be full of wonderful opportunities for our students and families.  January and February have long been hailed as the true learning months as we hunker down to design work that causes our children to learn at high levels and persist even when it is difficult.  Look for exciting things happening in our classrooms and please stop by to visit, we’d love to make you a fan of Canton Local Schools!

With the start of a new year, many fitness/wellness goals will be set; some will build on goals achieved, some will be new initiatives, and others will be revived.  Regardless of where you are, set the goal, make the plan to accomplish your goal then DO IT!  Here are a few stories I have either seen or been told that have happened since August:

• An elementary teacher has lost over 25 pounds while practicing Nifty Fifty!
• An administrator reduced his pounds by 24 and his BMI by 6.0!
• A community member emailed to let me know while he was out of town staying at a hotel he passed by the fitness room, Nifty Fifty ran through his head and then he proceeded to work out after reading for a bit!
• A special education teacher, her parapro and students practice Nifty Fifty every day and the students have lost weight, reduced their body fat and BMI!!
• A staff member indicated to me that her cholesterol, weight, and blood pressure are now within normal as a result of Nifty Fifty.

What are your goals or what is your story in relation to Nifty Fifty?  Email me and let me know, I’d love to hear!  WE are a step closer to being the Healthiest Community in Ohio!

Last wee the 4^th Community Chat was held at the North Industry Christian Church and it was our largest turnout ever!  Michael Bichsel discussed our financial forecast and our intentions to seek a renewal levy on May 3.  We broke into small groups and asked three questions:

• Passing our RENEWAL levy this May 3^rd  is critically important.  What do we need to do or NOT do to make sure our levy is successful?
• What information do you need or do you think is important for us to share with the community regarding our finances and or our need for this renewal levy?
• How do you prefer to get information?  (Newsletter, brochure, text, web site, etc)

The response from over 90 people was overwhelmingly positive. We had many staff members present which I greatly appreciated and I left that evening with the confirmation once again that we live, work and play in a wonderful, caring community!  Stay tuned…

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope that each of you finds time to enjoy

family and friends and have some time to

reflect on how fortunate we all are. As I count

my blessings I include my gratitude to work

with wonderful people...adults and students

every day.

It truly is the Power of US!

~Kim Redmond

As I reflect on my first 9 weeks, I cannot believe how quickly it went and how much has been accomplished by staff and students.  Here’s just a few of the celebrations:

• At Walker students and staff are taking the Nifty Fifty seriously as students are moving through Tai Chi, yoga, dance, and fitness exercises to start their day off right!  If you get the opportunity, stop in and see the bulletin board entitled Nifty Fifty. Fun Fruit Friday’s encourages our youngest students to try new fruits such as kiwi, honeydew melon, and papaya!
• Learning at Walker is kicked into full gear as staff are doing multiple book clubs to kick up adult learning a notch; students are immersed in art, reading, math, science and social studies.  There is such energy at Walker around the excitement of learning!
• FMMS just wrapped up a wonderful Fall Festival where students were involved in the design, development and participated in a great community/student event.  One parent said to me, “I am so appreciative of the after school activities that my child is invited to be a part of and she is just in the 5^th grade!”
• Learning at FMMS includes making connections between subjects such as language arts/social studies units on Greek Mythology, partnering with Aultman College to create life science/physics units for students, using cell phones to answer questions in class, and gearing up for our Veteran’s Day celebration through figurines in art.
• Canton South has so many great things happening that I will be limited by space but here’s a few highlights:  stellar seasons for volleyball, tennis, and soccer and we are transitioning into our “winter” sports.  9^th and 10^th graders are in teams where teachers get to know them well and connect the curriculum with projects, our CTE programs offer diverse programs and have students from several districts.  We have over 100 students who participate in online classes and service to the community through the National Honor Society, JOGS, student leadership and our high school of business means students understand their civic duty to contribute to their community.
• At the District level we are on target to get our student’s BMI in key grades, teachers are immersed in learning the new standards, every teacher has their own website to communicate with parents and students, and conversations around student engagement are key as we strive to prepare every student to graduate college/career ready.
• Our bus drivers have adjusted to new routes and students, our cafeteria is striving to have healthier choices, and our custodians/maintenance amaze me with our buildings looking the best they can.

With all of these accomplishments, there is still work to be done and room for improvements and I know that everyone is working every day to make sure our students are challenged, engaged, and learning at high levels.  

This week we celebrate Bus Driver Appreciation.  We have several neat things going on to show our bus drivers that they are not only an important part of our district, they make a difference in the lives of our children. We know that they are the first person to greet our students in the morning and the last in the evening and that can set the stage for a great day at school!

As part of our celebration, we asked students to write their drivers a note and as you can imagine, we read ones that made us smile, cry, and just plain laugh out loud!  Here are a few I thought I would share with you:

You are very nice when you say have a good day, hello, bye and you kill bugs that are treacherous.

You are a mearcle a bus driver that is nice and lets us read.  I’ve been on busses that were ok

Thanks a lot for stoping at rail road tracks.  If you didn’t we would be dead!

It is a huge help to my mom and dad so they do not have to wast gas.  And my mom does not like to get up in the morning.

Maybe when I’m older I will be a bus drive and keep kids safe on the way to school.  I want to be just like you when I’m older because your job looks fun!

You are an awesome at your job.  You sang the sponge bob intro.  You have some grumpy days, but I always know I’ll brighten up your day.  I really don’t mind you being grumpy.

Your driving is great and I was wondering if I dobe good if I can sit any-where.

Thank you for stopping the bus when we throw up.

Thank you for taking such good care of my trombone.  You treat it like a piece of fine gold, and I thank you for that.

Thanks to you I get to school safely and home safely.  Sometimes kids can be a pain. I, know, I have six brothers and one sister.  But sometimes we can be pretty nice and calm.

I have a few questions to ask.  What is your least favorite thing about being a bus driver?  Have you ever have to kick someone off the bus?  Do you have to pay for gas?

Yes, kids do say the funniest things but it comes from the heart.  Thank you Canton Local Bus Drivers for all that you do!

It’s an acronym for Body Mass Index, which is measured by using a formula with your height and weight plugged in. Based on your number, you are given a rating (see below)

Classifications - The BMI Equation

BMI is a useful tool to check body mass index for a population-wide "snapshot" measure of fatness or thinness, but the BMI equation may not apply directly to you, especially if you are already athletic and more muscular than average, or if you're not of European background.  If you would like to find out your BMI, go to:

www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi

So, I have two numbers to share with you….my BMI is 24.1 which puts me at the upper end of Optimal (I think I would rather be on the lower end of Optimal!).  Again, this is just ONE measure and should not be thought of as the end all answer.  Think about it, only two numbers go into the calculation (height and weight) and we can only control one of those.  The second number is the average of the Canton Local Administrative team…a whopping 33.5 that puts us, as a team, in the obese category.  We have set a goal to lower it by at least 2 points by February.

As part of new legislation, we will be reporting the BMI of students in K, 3, 5, and 9 as an average, not individual scores, to the health department.  Parents will be notified of their child’s number but individual student information will not be used in any other way.  BMI was not designed or intended for children but it can begin to red flag issues to explore further or perhaps be a way to change eating and exercise habits.

I’d like to think of this as another way to promote our Nifty Fifty (Move 30 minutes, Read 20 minutes).  I bet if our administrative team does this we can lower enough to get us to the “overweight” category and that is improvement!

Next post, “Kids Say the Funniest Things”

There’s nothing like showcasing your talent.  The Wildcat Band practices and practices all summer and I am sure many times they are bored to tears with just one more run though of a routine BUT they do all this for the performances they have in front of a Friday night audience.  For the DWTS contestants, they know they must work their hardest because come the end of the week, they must perform before an audience of perhaps millions!

Students, if they know and understand the importance of why they must learn something (even if it is boring or tedious), will do so if they know that the work means something or has a performance attached to it.  We need to work harder to make student work more public so that others can honor their work.

The DWTS contestants are judged by the judges AND the voting audience from all over the world.  With such a wide variety, do you think the votes are subjective?  Any kind of judgment is subjective.  The judges are professional dancers or choreographers and they are looking for technique.  The average audience member certainly does not have the technical skills to judge the dancers but certainly they vote on the entertainment factor.

In school, our assessments should be varied as well.  Sometimes just the classroom teacher grades the student, sometimes they do performances in front of classmates and sometimes, they perform in front of many people (the Band, Choir, Art Show).  I think we need to try to find other, more public ways to showcase student work.  I believe that students will persist longer if they know that their work will be public, I believe they will strive for perfection from their standpoint and I believe that if they know their work will be judged by someone other than their teacher, it has more meaning.  What if every student in Canton Local had to submit his or her best work at the end of the year? What if we showcased it for the entire community to see?  I think students would learn more and our community would see the great challenges of our staff and the great work of our students.

Who knew that there would be so much in common between schools and Dancing with the Stars?

Dancing with the Stars can be quite the topic of conversation at the water fountain.  My second parallel between DWTS and schools is the learning of new material.  I am amazed how each week, along with their professional coach, the celebrities have to learn at least two new dance routines.  New music, new steps, and performance at the end of the week…wow!  I am sure that some people could get better at the routine if they had more time but the timeline is the timeline.  In school, each grade, each course has it’s own standards and timeline for testing…some students get it the first time, some need longer and some need to have accommodations.  Watching DWTS the professional coach figures out ways to get the celebrity to improve, sometimes not by dancing but doing something fun/outside the box.  Teachers face this challenge as well. As teachers think about lesson design, they must take into account the interests and strengths of their students and design the work accordingly.  Students are in a fast paced learning era.  In my day as a student I had to memorize the 50 states and capitals, memorize a poem or multiplication facts.  Today students don’t need to cram all the facts in their brains, they need to know how to access information.  Teachers need to think about how they can hook their students into learning important information.  Fortunately, in school, students typically have longer than a week to learn and get many opportunities to practice it.

Regardless, the celebrities on DWTS learn a tremendous amount in just a week and our students are learning at a fast pace as well.

What does Dancing with the Stars and school have in common?  As I sat there watching the start of the new season, a few parallels occurred to me.  Over the next few weeks I’d like to write about three ways DWTS and Schools are similar:

1. Different skill levels
2. Learning new Material
3. Judging/Assessment

  Come with me as I take you down this path!

I love the start of the season just like the start of the school year.  Everyone is excited, believing that they can learn, nervous about what if they don’t, and working with their new partner. The skill levels of the stars vary from very skilled in dance/music to little or no skills.  It used to drive me crazy when stars such as Kristy Yamaguchi and Nicole Scherzinger competed against those with no skills. But think about it, isn’t that what we have in school?  We have students who enter Kdg/First grade ranging from not knowing how to use scissors to proficient in early reading.  We have high schoolers that vary from basic math to college level mathematics.  That is the challenge of teachers and the challenge for the judges on DWTS and the voting audience: somehow judging the different skill levels effectively and using that information for improvement.  With this challenge comes the design of work that will allow each student to learn more than they currently do no matter where they start. In DWTS, my favorites are usually the ones who come with no skill and watching how they grow, but if I really think about it, I can see how those that come in with skills grow as well.

Stay tuned for the next post and my second parallel of schools and DWTS!

I love it when someone asks me about this!  I always have a quick response for the 30 (movement) though I sometimes struggle with GOOD 20 (reading).  I recently asked our administrative team what they did that day for their Nifty Fifty and here’s what they said:

• 30 minutes walk/jog, 20 minutes journal reading
• walk 2 miles, read newspaper
• 45 minute workout, walk halls nonstop read Farmer’s Almanac at night
• 35 minutes bike. 20 minutes bloglines
• 30 minutes various exercises, 20 min reading Drive
• ran 6 miles read 10 new IEP’s
• Treadmill and listen to Eat, Pray, Love
• Bootcamp for 1 hour, professional reading 1 hour
• 30 minutes treadmill run, 30 min strength training, 30 minutes Court Case
• Walked to Mom’s, 2 books on tape
• Book on tape (rive), ab roller and weights
• Read 30 min, trampoline 15 min, exercises, 30 minutes

We have a busy team that is taking this seriously!  Remember, this group has busy jobs, busy family and still makes time to FIT IT IN!

Have you started to incorporate Nifty Fifty in your day?  I hope so.  The hardest part is just starting.  I guarantee you if you start and TELL someone, you’ll stay on the path to making this a habit.

I just set another goal for myself.  I ordered 1000 stickers with our new logo (designed by Chris Bergert and Keith Slish in our Graphic Arts program (THANK YOU GUYS!!) and my goal will be to pass out all 1000 by June.  You’ll get one if you tell me what you did that day for Nifty Fifty!  So, get started!

So, I’ll end how I started, What are you doing for Nifty Fifty?  Let me know!

On August 27 it was announced that Canton Local’s Report Card would be rated “Excellent”!  This is certainly a cause for celebration as we recognize that this comes from many people working to make sure our students learn the things they will be tested on.  For me, it can be bittersweet in that it does not mean our students or our staff worked extra hard this year.  It simply means we met the state criteria in just the right way, to give us the designation of excellent. It doesn’t necessarily mean that we worked any harder or learned any more than in years past. I know that every year our teachers and administrators work hard to prepare our students for this test, but they also prepare our students to be successful in the real 21^st Century world as well. 

As I go from school to school and classroom to classroom, I see teachers who design work for a wide variety of students who come from many backgrounds, cultures, and interests.  I see principals who strive to make sure the learning environment is not only safe, but welcoming to parents and students.  I see all staff working to make sure more students find success within school (and many times outside of school). 

I know that every staff member realizes that our work is more than one test in one week of the year and I hope that our community and students realize this also.  Our purpose is about teaching and modeling respect, responsibility, wellness, collaboration, innovation and creativity. It is about seeing a student light up when the learning clicks, it is about resilient students who have challenges outside of school, and yes, it is even about those days that challenge us to improve.

I say CONGRATULATIONS Canton Local Schools for our Excellent Report Card!  Keep up the work that each of you know will help our students be successful in their next steps and will make our community proud to be our partners.

This week, an educator friend from out of state sent a picture from their local newspaper. This picture captures a moment in time of a student on his first day of school:

I see a young man waiting, bored but seemingly ready to start the new school year with his new backpack.  I wonder what could have been going on to have to make a young learner “wait” to get started. Sometimes I think we are in such a hurry to be organized that we lose sight of our customer and how to capture their engagement and keep it!

Again, I am thankful to be in Canton Local.

As we put the first week of school to bed I am holding a picture of a first grader on his first day of school at our Walker Elementary.  This young child’s face exudes excitement, engagement and anticipation of the school year! Take a look:

Every picture tells a story they say and if I had my wish all students would look like our Walker student and no student would have the look of utter boredom! 

How can we capture that feeling, that anticipation?  How can we make sure that if we took a picture of a student through all the grades that we would detect that excitement of learning?  I will be on the lookout this year to find more pictures of students who have the look that says…..learning new and important things is EXCITING!

Pardon my excitement as I share with you the electricity that is circling in our district the last two days!  The buzz you heard in the district on Monday, particularly as all the staff gathered at FMMS at 7 am, was everyone greeting each other and talking about their summer, their plans for the year and just catching up.  Our convocation where we kicked off with the POWER OF US was everything I imagined it to be and I was so proud to be sitting in the room as the Superintendent. 

The Buzz TODAY…and the reason we exist, was our students arriving to school ready for their new adventures.  The smiles as they saw their old teachers, the big eyes as they walked into a new school, or their pride in new outfits and book bags made me remember the days of smelling new crayon boxes when I was in grade school.  I could have watched this all day.

For me, this signifies the HOPE of a new year, the HOPE that every teacher has that they will make a difference with every student they touch.  The HOPE of every student, that this will be a special year of learning and discovering their talents.  I wish we could bottle the feeling of hope to use throughout the year! 

I am truly a lucky person to be able to witness this first hand.

Our first Community Chat on Thursday brought over 20 people (I would have been happy with 5!) to learn a little more about me in person. It was a great evening!  As I listened to the questions asked, it was clear we are fortunate to have a community that so clearly cares about our district and children and want to be a part of the solution to the future. While everyone had the opportunity to ask me questions, I also asked one, “What do you want Canton South graduates to know and do that would make you most proud?”  As folks started listing things like:  respect, finding their passion, critical thinkers, open to diversity, strong positive character, work ethic I secretly smiled to myself.  Who could argue that each are of the utmost importance for all of our children?  I couldn’t have scripted it any better!  These are exactly the characteristics that will help our children be successful in the new global economy and NONE of these skills are tested and reported by the state! There is something wrong with this picture!  If our Canton Local community believes these skills are important we must make sure that we design work so that our students engage in, practice and apply these important keys to success.  As a district we must work to incorporate more of what the local community values in education.

I began this post about our first Chat, I thank all who attended and I hope that I will have the opportunity to see you again on September 30 (7:00 pm FMMS).  Each Chat will have a different focus.  Next month will focus on the changing world and how our students learn.  Don’t forget to bring a friend!

Last week I had the honor of meeting with three former Canton Local Superintendents, Dr. Harold Walker, Dr. Bowman, and Mr. Bill Hayden.  From 1955 to 2002 they helped shape where we are today.  All three are kind, intelligent, humorous, talkative and willing to share the history that many who have been in the district a long time do not even know.  I felt humbled to be in their presence and secretly wished I had a video camera to capture the words of wisdom they were willing to share with me, the Rookie.

I invited them to speak at our opening day Convocation on August 23.  I want them to share changes that occurred under their leadership that, today, still endure to set the stage for my vision of the future. While each knew right away what happened on their watch, they were quick to acknowledge the community, the Board of Education, and staff’s role.  I realized right away they exemplify what every book on leadership tells us; relationships, recognition of others, and a passion for children.

At the end of our meeting, one wise leader said to me, “ Be yourself, keep children first, and lead Canton Local to the next level…we are counting on you”.  I felt both relief and pressure to uphold their fine tradition.

Today begins my first official day as Superintendent of Canton Local Schools and my first post on my blog, A Day in the Life of the Superintendent. While the Superintendent's Message on our website will contain the happenings of the district and be a more general message, my blog will be a more frequent message and more personal in nature. (The Wikipedia definition of a blog is stated below)

I have set a goal to post once a week and reflect in a more informal way what it is like to be the Superintendent.  When I started as a teacher in Orlando, Florida over 30 years ago I didn’t know my Superintendent. As I moved to Canton, I did not really know the Superintendent until I became an administrator.  I know that in Canton Local the community knows their Superintendent. I hope this blog gives you an up close and personal look at our students and community through my eyes.
 
The first thought I want to share with you is what I woke up thinking this morning. Last night I went to bed as Kim Redmond and this morning I woke up as the Superintendent of Canton Local Schools. I realized in the span of a few hours, my role in the district and community has changed, giving me one of the greatest opportunities imaginable. I promise to be the best I can be and to remember that we work with the greatest resource for our future, the children of the Canton Local Community. 

Remember my promise is to write on this blog at least once a week. You can comment on my blog anytime you want. Keep in mind that everyone, students, parents, teachers, administrators are able to both read and comment at any time.
 
Our school doors open in just 22 more days!
 
* A type of website <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Website>  or part of a website <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Website> . Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.