Making a MARC

Today I left the MARC for the last time. I will be retiring at the end of the week.  The MARC was the dream of a small group of educators to do something about a large neighborhood in our attendance area. We simply wanted to make a difference in the lives of the children in that under served geographic area.  We met with the administration of the community and worked out an agreement so that they would let us use a room in their Community Center and we would provide some volunteer tutoring.  Their hope was that the tutoring would hold families in a community that could be somewhat transient. As we got into the community of majority second language families, we realized that the needs were much greater than  mere tutoring.

At about the same time in 2010 a family in our larger community lost their precious daughter to a sudden illness, a beautiful blonde teenager with the heart of an angel.  It was devastating for the family but instead of drowning in their sorrow, they decided to create a living memorial to their faithful, spirited and talented daughter, establishing the McKenzie Noelle Wilson Foundation. Their mission was to honor McKenzie by inspiring and helping  young people find their purpose in a world of challenges.  Through church connections some of the teachers who had been volunteering at the MARC were put in touch with the Wilsons (Divine intervention?) Today the Foundation funds many diverse projects that all build on McKenzie's passion and honor her life by helping young people realize their full potential. The MARC (McKenzie Academic Resource Center), which now takes up the entire Community Center in our under served area is only one of the many projects that carries McKenzie's name and is proud to represent her faith and spirit. Because of the Foundation and Chets Creek's involvement,  the MARC today is involved in family life in a variety of ways - a preschool program, middle school and high school tutoring, a  weekly Saturday Sunday School-type program, Blessings in a Backpack and a multitude of other social service-type programs.  The Foundation pays for a full time school-to-Center Liaison.  The model has now been replicated in another school community in another part of town.

This year I have been tutoring on the day 4th-5th graders come. As I walked through the Center today, this is what I observed.

Small group Math turoing

A second language student who speaks no English working on
 a new language-based computer program, Imagine Learning,
also being piloted at the school. 

A computer lab where students can get extra practice in  iReady and Achieve 3000,
programs being offered at the school and for homework for extra practice.

Small reading strategy group

Individual tutoring

This is place that once was hardened soil but today nourishes a rich green garden of possibilities.  Seeds were planted that today have begun to bloom and the beautiful colors of McKenzie's butterflies swoop down to brighten every day.  Dreams have become reality.. and the best is yet to come...

The Night Before Pow Wow

It is the night before Pow Wow and I can't sleep.  Wonder if there are little Native Americans under their covers, just like me,  wide-eyed thinking about all we have done this week and about the big event tomorrow?  We had a wonderful family night on Tuesday where families in each tribe made Native dwellings.  We made longhouses for our Mighty Iroquois tribe, but others made tepees and wigwams and igloos and chickees.   Our families then had an opportunity to go through the hallways and hear presentations about the tribes from fifth graders who completed projects for their fifth grade Social Studies.  Our longhouses sit in the hallway under the gingerbread cut-outs that the families decorated in Native dress.  The knotted ropes hang in our classroom as a reminder of the stories that families told to their children last week as homework to emphasize the oral tradition of storytelling, so much a part of the Native tradition.  We have loved the books and videos we have seen about legends and tales - the Creation story of the Sky Woman, the tale of how rabbit got its tail and how rabbit outsmarted bear in a race.  We learned why the Iroquois make their dolls with no faces.  We learned about the whale who landed on the mountain and how that story was turned into a totem pole - another way some tribes told stories.  So many great stories... 

Are we ready for tomorrow?  The children beaded the shakers this morning (out last costume project), we had our last practice with the entire Kindergarten (over 200 little Natives!), the costumes pieces so lovingly prepared by parents and teachers are in Ziploc bags at each child's seat labeled with each child's Native American name, the special decorated brown paper bags were sent home today for bag lunches tomorrow, we know our songs and dances, and this afternoon as I left school, the mighty teepee was ready to go up around the flag pole. 

The tepee came from the imagination of Media Specialist KK Cherney and the creativity of longtime Creek volunteer JB Boyd and Karen Willet and the help of countless others.  When it is erected it will seat an entire class of 36 with their parents and is one of the most endearing parts of our day.  Our live performance of six individual tribes is presented first thing in the morning but the day is filled with exciting centers to give the children experiences to help them understand the Native culture.  For our class, the visit to the tepee and the talking stick of Peaceful Waters (known as Miss KK) will be the perfect end to our day!

I feel so fortunate to work at a school where the entire faculty comes together to make possible such an impressive event for our children.  The Resource teachers will teach Native songs tomorrow, will host a tasting center, will  let the children paint with natural dyes, will tell stories and will have the children make Native medallions from clay.  The kinder teachers will provide their lunch - such a small payment for such a large contribution.  The Principal and Assistant Principal will be dressed as Native Chiefs and will host our live presentation. I mean - Wow!  No wonder I can't sleep!

MARC Opens for 2013

In the name of McKenzie Wilson the MARC is open in the Portside community for another amazing year.  Volunteers from Chets Creek and other teens and adults from the community and from local churches come to tutor at the MARC in the afternoons. The MARC offers an array of other services to the community.  Our Kindergartners are welcome to come on Monday afternoon from 4:00 to 6:00!  What we try to do is simply to level the playing field for our youngsters by giving them those extra few minutes of instruction that we are not able to give them in a class 36-38. Many are second language learners.  I am really privileged to work with a couple of super dedicated Chets Creek Kindergarten teachers who have come faithfully every single week.  This is truly a labor of love.

 

The Master Teacher

There is nothing that I enjoy more than watching a master teacher at work! I had that chance today. We have a kinder teacher whose mom retired this year. Mrs. Jackson was a longtime kindergarten teacher, turned Counselor, and boy, can she read a story! She volunteers in her daughter's classroom and once a month does a Guidance lesson for all kinder and 1st classes- going to each of the 16 rooms! Amazing, right?

The kids applaud and jump up and down when they see Mrs. Jackson enter the room. While she would be fine if I took a break while she did her lesson, I always find a reason to hang around just because I so enjoy listening to her stories. Today she told a story about Princess Phillips who lives in the castle called Chet's Creek! I was hanging onto her every word!

But it's what she did with a little munchkin that sits right at my feet that helped me know I was watching a master at work.  This child normally sits at the foot of my rocking chair (absent from the picture below).  She raises her hand to answer every single question and then at least another dozen times when I'm not asking a question!  Have you ever had that child?  When you do call on her, at least 90% of the time her comment is nothing close to an answer to the question or even on topic to the conversation.  I usually just ignore her hand at inappropriate times and try to always call on her when I think she might really know the answer, but the hand keeps going up - ALL of the time!  Obviously what I am doing is not working.   As I watched Mrs. Jackson, I notice the hand go straight up as soon as Mrs. Jackson started the first story and without missing a beat, Mrs. Jackson very gently took the child's hand and placed it down by the child's side.  She never even looked at the child or lost a moment's focus with the rest of the class - just gently put the child's hand down.  For the rest of the story, to my amazement, the child sat intently listening to the story without raising her hand a single time. One time, I noticed she started to raise her hand and then just put it right back down.   Now that's a master teacher - one who just knows what to do from experience or just innate instinct - so simply, so easily, so effortlessly.  She didn't think about a strategy to keep the child on her bottom with her hand down.  She just knew what to do. 

 

Some people have referred to working at Chets Creek as being in Camelot and I think they are right.  It is all about Princess Phillips in a castle named Chets Creek where they care so much about a little girl named Kate that they tried to raise money to find a cure and where they plant a garden to feed children that are hungry... and where we have volunteers like Mrs. Jackson who amaze us every day!

The Chets Creek Academic Resource Center

Sometimes dreams come true and today was one of those days. Today we opened the Chets Creek Academic Resource Center at Portside. Portside is a 1000 mobile home community in our attendance zone. With over 1200 students at Chets Creek, about 250-300 of our students come from that community. While some of our most gifted students live there, so do a large percentage of our at-risk students and our families on free and reduced lunch. We have long talked about targeting this underserved community for some type of academic intervention. However, we are not a Title 1 school and while we have a substantial at-risk population, as many students as many small schools, we don't qualify for the type of money that would allow us to pay tutors outside of the school day.

Regardless of that reality, earlier this year our Leadership Team went to Portside to meet with their Management group to compare our visions of what could be done. The first project happened at Christmas time as our faculty poured out their love for the families in the community. We spent a "service Saturday" giving out gently used clothes, groceries, blankets and toys, playing games and making holiday ornaments with the kids in the community as they visited with Santa, and pressure washing and stapling plastic inside homes before winter cold leaked in. It was a great day, but the outpouring by the faculty just made us want to do more so... Liz Duncan , our Behaviorist who deals with discipline and KK Cherney, our Energizer Bunny who is is also our Media Specialist continued conversation with the Portside leadership. The Portside leadership, the Management Group ARC, knew that if they could offer academic support to their families that they would be giving their families more reason to stay. We knew if we could offer academic support, we might reduce the mobility in our school and raise the test scores of our children. But the commitment of both groups was so much more than that surface level of "what can this do for us." It has been obvious from the beginning that this is about making a real difference. As Liz and KK continued to work with ARC, they worked out a location within the community and ARC agreed to refurbish several rooms in a building for our use. They painted and carpeted two rooms while the Chets Creek artists got together to frame children's art work from the community and our art teachers painted a beautiful mural of a beach scene where we could hold story times. Book companies came through with bookcases and a load of new books for check out. ARC donated computers and their upkeep! We still have no money, but look what you can do with a load of care instead! The Chets Creek faculty has offered to man the Center throughout the Summer to offer academic support. We know that our students that do not read over the summer come back to school and have taken a step backwards - but not this year. This summer all of our children will read. I can only imagine the difference it will make! I don't know if all schools have a Liz or KK on their faculty or if they have Leadership that will set them free to dream and make their dreams come true, but I feel so fortunate to work in a place where people care so much. And don't tell me that businesses are all about money! ARC has given much and today book companies provided give aways to the children while Chick-fil-A provided food for the kids and Starbucks provided for the adults. Over 200 people showed up for the official ribbon cutting, -many of them Management officials from the parent ARC who flew in from all over the country, many of the faculty from Chets but mostly families from the community. Also there were our long time volunteers from Landstar who are interested in going to the community during their lunch times this summer to tutor children! Isn't it just amazing?!!

Meet our Volunteer of the Year!

Nine years ago Nancy Whitaker had a dream and believed that she was being called to teach children to read. Rather than just tucking the dream away, she decided to take action. Nancy works at Landstar and decided to reach out to her nearest public school, Chets Creek Elementary, and volunteer some time during lunch. Before long it was obvious to Nancy that Chets Creek had many, many students that she could help but it was too many for her to help alone. She enlisted her colleague Sandy Adams and they in turn enlisted the colleagues in their office to join them during their lunch time at the school.

Nine years later, Nancy, with Sandy's most capable assistance, heads the Landstar Tutoring program that has touched hundreds of first graders over the years. They bring 30-40 tutors each year who come for a half hour during lunch and read one-on-one with a specific student. During lunch on Tuesdays - Wednesdays - Thursdays you can see them in the hallways in children-sized chairs or in the Media Center sitting side by side quiety talking and laughing and reading together. More recently we have even been able to match some of our Second Language Learners with native speaking tutors from Landstar! Over the years the program has grown to include chess tutors who come to teach our gifted students to play chess and offer them challenging chess matches. We also have a large group of mentors, many of them men, who mentor some of our 4th and 5th grade students under the direction of Liz Duncan, our Behavior Therapist. All of this - because one woman had a dream and acted on it.

A couple of years ago a parent called me to complain that her 1st grader needed a Landstar tutor. She explained that her older child had had a tutor and that had made all the difference. I explained to her that we just didn't have enough tutors to include her 1st grader. She was quite frustrated with me and said, "Well, where can I buy that Landstar program. I'll just buy it and teach it to my child myself!" But that's the whole point, you can't buy this program - there's not enough money in the world - because it's about relationships. It's about service.

This year our PTA selected Nancy Whitaker as our PTA Volunteer of the Year. I can't think of a better choice. Nancy has never had a child at Chets Creek. She gives because she is called - servant leadership. Oh, that we all could follow her example...

Caring About Each Other

Supporting Betsy McCall

Taking care of each other is part of our culture. This week was a perfect example of how that attitude is infused into everything that we do. When we discovered that one in our midst had been diagnosed with breast cancer we rallied around by designing special pink shirts to wear every Friday while she was having radiation. Even the men in our school joined in with a "real men wear pink" attitude!

Practical jokes are a part of daily life!

Humor and practical jokes are also a part of how we deal with each other. When our new Assistant Principal, Moena Perry, missed a message that was written on a stickie note by PE teacher Wes Timmons, he decided to poll every member of the school and have each of them tell him something they "needed!" He wrote every need on a stickie note. When Moena walked into her office, she found her office papered with stickie notes! You'd have to read each of the "needs" to thoroughly enjoy the humor.

Being thankful is a Chets Creek tradition that we model for our children often. For instance, Resource teachers (PE, Music, Art, Media, Science, Character Education) are a part of so many of the incredible things that we are able to do. They take the children of a grade level for an entire day every Wednesday so that a grade level of teachers can meet with their PLC. For each grade level they also spend a day running Centers around a grade level theme. In Kindergarten that themed day is Pow Wow. After the Kinder teachers spend their time making costumes and presenting a live performance, its the Resource teachers who take over the rest of the day to provide appropriate theme-related activities. To say thank you, Kindergarten teachers prepared lunch for the Resource Team this week and invited the children to write thanks you notes during Writers' Workshop. They wanted these very special teachers to know that they are so-o-o-o appreciated.

Appreciation is also expressed to volunteers this time of year. JB is one of those very special volunteers. He hasn't had a child at Chets Creek for years but he continues to hang out, being our go-to-guy for everything. He was the architect for our life-sized tepee! We sometimes forget that he's not part of the paid faculty! One of his holiday gifts to the school is to put up our giant holiday tree in the Lobby. It's one of those older designs where you have to put each branch into the center individually and it takes him an entire day to get it just perfect! Then he spends another day up on a ladder hanging the ornaments that represent every single child in the school. As a way to thank him for years or service, each class brought him something special when they brought their ornaments to hang this year. Some gave the gift of a song or poem and some gave a more monetary gift and some even brought his favorite, Almond Joys! By the end of the day he was decked in a special tee-shirt, a banner reading JB Day '07! and a crown! In typical JB style, he serenaded each class with a holiday song. We officially declared it "All About JB Day."

All of this is to say that in large, high performing schools, it really does take a village and much of the academic achievement has at its base - relationships. No matter how much we care about good test scores, education is about so much more than that. The culture at our school is to educate the whole child by showing them by example how to care about each other, to celebrate with a sense of humor, to always remember to appreciate all that we have, and to say thank you often.