Reflection: School Board Workshop

Over the course of this semester, I have spent an ample amount of time serving as a mentor with Gonzaga’s Center for Community Engagement Youth Program, Campus Kids. In Campus Kids, we develop one-on-one relationships with mentees between the 4th-6th grades to assist them in succeeding academically, socially, and emotionally. Every Thursday afternoon at 3:10 PM, each of the Campus Kids mentors in our group meet up in the Center for Community Engagement in the basement of the Hemmingson Center. We spend this time doing icebreaker activities with the other mentors to get to know each other while we wait for our mentees to arrive in their school bus from the local Garfield Elementary in Spokane, WA. From 3:30-5:00 PM, we spend one-on-one time with our mentees where we engage in a variety of different activities such as playing educational games, working on homework together, sharing a healthy snack, talking about the activities we have done the past week, and exercising outside. In addition to meeting with my mentee every Thursday, I also ride in a carpool with 3 other mentors to Garfield Elementary every Friday from 11:00 AM-12:00 PM for a school visit where I get to sit in on my mentees’ PE class and provide support and encouragement for him as he works on developing his physical education. In this class, I help him out if he’s having difficulty understanding what his teachers are asking him to do, or I will help count the number of push-ups or sit-ups he has trying to reach

Every school district has board meetings throughout the school year. Unfortunately, many parents, community members, & school personnel do not attend such important meetings because they don’t realize or understand the importance of such board meetings or how informative they can be. According to Kankakee School District (2017), the Kankakee School District Board of Education is composed of seven elected members, who were elected by the citizens of Kankakee to serve a four-year term that do not receive no salary for they services, are committed to ensuring a quality of educational excellence that will enhance the opportunities and challenges facing today’s student and additional responsibilities that board members include are selection of the District superintendent, developing general polices according to wishes of the community and requirements of law, hiring school personnel based upon recommendation of the Superintendent and the Assistant Superintendent of Personnel, adopts salary schedules, approves funds to finance school operations, must adopt and review the annual operating budget for the District, and setting the property tax levy to produce adequate funds to meet the District’s financial needs ranks among the responsibilities of the Board of Education (Retrieved from https://www.ksd111.org/domain/68). For this paper, the Kankakee School District board meeting will be used, information learned from board meeting, use of

My time spent in the Clinical setting, so far, has been extremely inciteful as to how to become a better educator in a classroom setting. Through the data I collected I was able to connect Borich’s Seven Variables of learning to the students. By being in the clinical setting for nearly two months, I have been exposed to new ways of thinking when it comes to structuring a classroom and instructing a classroom. Within this reflection you will find out how I would better plan an effective lesson for the pupils in my future classroom. You will also discover what I will do about certain issues in the classroom and how I will address/fix them.

Reflection, I couldn’t go to a school board meeting, but I watch a video post it on (youtube.com, 2015) about the RSD State of schools meeting. The school board main goal is to give what a student’s need to achieve their academic success in the future. The School Board phrase “one vision, all students, one reading” summarize that the school board purpose is to make every student in Reading district to get the necessary education they need to achieve their goal. The school board made a decision based on data that can prove that every school is doing what they supposed to do to reach an excellent level of performance. Principle#7: The teacher plans instruction based upon knowledge of subject matter, students, the community, and curriculum goals.

Due to the fact that I am currently majoring in Elementary Education I thought it would be interesting and relevant to my major to attend a school board meeting for Clark County School District. General school board meetings are held regularly two times per month and the public is encouraged to attend and can even sign up to speak on any issue scheduled for the night. Attending this meeting was a little confusing at the beginning because some of the items on the agenda were issues that had been previously discussed at earlier meetings and were just being reviewed or quickly affirmed by the board members. Though most of the agenda issues were unfamiliar to me as a member of the public, there was printed information and background packets available before entering the meeting that helped give some idea of what the meeting would consist of and the research and information behind each agenda item. Overall, the meeting was very orderly and generous time was given to any person that signed up to speak on an item.

By being part of the Proposition for the topic of, “Schools All Year Round” was a challenging experience which allowed me to learn lots of new things, and improve on some other. In this reflection, I will be stating skills that I learned by doing this debate, skills that I improved upon, and some skills that I wasn’t able to change. Although, in the future, I hope to progress in the ones I did poor on.

I attended the Jefferson Public School Board Meeting on June 7, 2018. The items that were discussed at this meeting were the Superintendent’s and Board Members’ monthly reports and the request to adopt the 2018-2019 budget and appropriation of funds. In Superintendent Jason Glass’s report he spoke of the various schools that he met with at the end of the school and how he spoke with some of the area graduates at the graduations he attended. Dr. Glass spoke of the Executive Leadership Council meeting he is involved in and they recently just met in Washington D.C. This council allows other superintendents from across the country to meet and collaborate on how their districts are doing and what they are doing in their districts that are or are

Educating the public on mental health is necessary be teach community members the importance of mental health and to remove the stigma and stereotypical image of weakness or extreme violent behavior as the only manifestation of mental illness. Respectively it is necessary for health care providers to become more knowledgeable in the assessment and management of psychiatric conditions to meet the needs of the community and deliver appropriate early identification of concerns and provide referrals for continuing care. This need for training and additional education does not stop short at the medical field, but extends in to the area of educational field, more directly schools. The mental health status of children in the school setting has also been overlooked. In spite of the understanding that student illness can result in difficulty learning in class, mental health symptoms go unaddressed. Failing to address mental health issues in children may result in impairments that will extend beyond academic struggles and continue well into adulthood. School personnel need additional training in making appropriate referrals for mental health evaluations to avoid a continuous cycle of identifying concerns without seeking

I attended the Sarasota County School Board Meeting in on Tuesday, October 4, 2016. The School Board holds meetings on the 1st Tuesday and 3rd Tuesday of each month, with the exception of one meeting in July and December (Sarasota County Schools, 2016). After any special presentations and the Superintendent’s report, citizens are welcomed to speak during the “Hearing of the Citizens” (Sarasota County Schools, 2016). The citizens are limited to three-minute speeches to get their topic across (Sarasota County Schools, 2016). This means that speakers need to be prepared because three-minute to get a point across is not very long.

On Tuesday, June 16, 2015, I attended Jefferson County Public School District board meeting. All of the board members were in attendance as well as the superintendent and building level principals. The agenda items were Mississippi Department of Education new graduation option, dropout prevention restructuring plan, summer school, and school status for the 2014-2015 school year. In my opinion, the board meeting was very informative and quite productive. The first item on the agenda was the new graduation option from MDE. All of the board members agreed that the new graduation option was beneficial to our students both past and present. They expressed excited and relief because as one put it “the state is finally stepping up to help our children.”

This semester was very informative as far better understanding some important and major events that took place in the United States in regards to education. One of the subjects that really got me thinking was when we talked about how privatization is taking over democratic public education. I truly bothers me to think that we are starting to go into path where all that is valued is scores/standardized test results. I truly believe we teach to help children to help them not only learn basic skills but also to give them opportunities to be curious and want to explore different topics in different content areas. This also is essential to help them better understand what they want for their future as far as possible career. But when the focus are test

I attended the board of education meeting on Monday, May 1st 2017 with Emma Raabe and Sarah wing. I chose to attend this meeting because I have always been curious about school board meetings and they board make decisions on certain issues. I was quite shocked with the number of people at this meeting, there was about 80 people present.

Visiting a school counselor or psychologist is one great way to combat mental health problems. While this might seem like an easy solution, and it is when available but the problem is when it comes to public schools they are struggling to handle a large number of students facing mental health problems.

Running Head: JOURNAL REFLECTION 1: A CASE STUDY OF A HIGHLY EFFECTIVE, INCLUSIVE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Teaching can be a challenge, you never know what to expect and each classroom will be unique. However, you will always have to be prepare for teaching in a situation you may not be comfertable with. Educating students and practicing proper knowledge on subjects such as race, class, gender, sexual orientation and disability are vital in creating a safe and respectful classroom for all. School is often looked upon as a place of security for students and it is our job as teachers to help maintain that status.