BOE Recognition Week...

-


The week of October 17, 2022 is dedicated in New York State as Board of Education Recognition Week. On behalf of the entire school community, I say thank you to the Rome City School District Board of Education members, including all past members, who have given their time, energy, and passion to help the students, staff, and families of the Rome community.  It takes strong schools to build a strong community, and the women and men of our board devote countless hours to making sure our schools are helping every child learn at a higher level. They help with supporting administrators through tough decisions every month and spend many hours studying education issues and regulations in order to provide the kind of accountability our citizens expect. The key work of school boards is to raise student achievement by creating a shared vision for the future of education, setting the direction of the school district to achieve the highest student performance, providing accountability for student achievement results, developing a budget that aligns district resources to improve achievement, supporting a healthy school district culture in which to work and to learn, and much more!! Despite popular belief, the responsibility thrust onto a person who volunteers to serve the school community brings with it a tremendous amount of pressure. There is a myriad of laws to wade through, levels of bureaucracy with both federal and state government that has to be accounted for, and the pressures of constituents to push certain agendas that make the job of a board member ever more challenging. Beyond all of that, maintaining the ability to focus on ALL students within a community is vital to their efforts. The vast majority of board members throughout our communities in New York State have little to no educational systems experience prior to becoming community servants. The patience, understanding, perseverance, and effort of all board members everywhere are unmatched and for that, we are grateful for your service. Once again, on behalf of the entire District staff and community, thank you to our Board of Education members who devote many hours to our children each week!!

RFA Football Breast Cancer Awareness Game

On Friday, October 21, RFA football will be hosting a breast cancer awareness game as they play their final home game of the 2022 season. The team will be wearing pink in recognition of the event and 50/50 funds from the Touchdown Club will be donated toward breast cancer awareness. The team is asking any person who is a breast cancer survivor and/or currently fighting breast cancer to join them in being recognized between the first and second quarters of the game. If you are in attendance and would like to join others in being recognized, please join us on the track at the south end of the stadium toward the end of the first quarter.

Trunk or Treat Event

Trunk or Treat is all about safe, family fun, and oh, lots of candy! It's a holiday-themed community tailgate party and it's completely free. Expect bouncy castles, games, prize giveaways, and candy. Plan on dropping by Redeemer Rome between 6:00 and 7:30 p.m. on October 31 for this event. For more information, please view the event flyer here: https://app.peachjar.com/flyers/2353646/districts/32521.

Chromebook Insurance Program

As a reminder, the Rome City School District has a partnership with Worth Avenue Group to provide insurance to families for Chromebooks if desired. This optional program for families will provide coverage to repair/replace a device if something were to go wrong for a fraction of the cost of out-of-pocket repairs/replacements. This program would be a direct agreement between the family and the insurance carrier, the district has no involvement with the policy. For more information and/or to purchase insurance coverage, please review this document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/16AL81Hc1PQFjSYS5OxUjgFXFS01xz3pYfpWH--r-rr0/edit.


Popular posts from this blog

It Takes A Village...

-
Image
 We all know the old phrase, "it takes a village to raise a child." One can reflect on the phrase and find a few different ways to interpret its meaning, however, it cannot be argued that when groups of people work together to help their children grow, success is more likely. To me, I view this phrase as referencing that there is someone within every community that a child can connect with to help them feel a part of their school and/or community. It may not be their classroom teacher or their principal. It may be a bus driver, a coach, a teaching assistant, secretary, custodian, food service worker, music teacher, art teacher, computer specialist, monitor, etc. The list can go on and on. Why mention this? Well, currently, one of the largest and most important educational research projects in our nation's history is occurring with some of the leading educational experts researching what education needs to be by the year 2025. Education 2025 is producing information that m...
Read more

When One Door Opens, Many More Follow...

-
Image
One of the hardest things to do in life is to deal with change. There is that old saying, "When one door closes, another door opens." I wonder though, why does a door have to close for another to open. Why can't many doors open when someone decides to go through a new door? I am about to embark on a new professional journey in the coming weeks and I refuse to think that the building that I have helped to lead over the past 3 years is going to be a closed door. Instead, I can think of thousands of opportunities that have been opened because of my decision to walk through a new door. I think of all of the people that have touched my life (students, staff, and parents) and I honestly don't see why a door has to close. Instead of that thinking, I choose to think that thousands of doors are opened now with all of the amazing people that I have had the opportunity to lead. The lessons that have been learned, the friendships that have developed, and the opportunities tha...
Read more

I Had A Dream...

-
Image
Once upon a time, when we all began our careers or started a new position/school, we had dreams. Dreams of what we wanted to accomplish, dreams we wanted to see our students accomplish, dreams we wanted to see our school communities achieve. Throughout my travels though, I have seen more adults tell students that should lower their expectations and downsize their dreams. Unfortunately, I would say that the ratio of adults encouraging students and adults discouraging students is close to 1:1 in my career. I ask, would you be where you are today without someone throughout your educational life encouraging you to pursue your dreams? As with many things in our schools, we need to focus on the positives that are happening and capitalize on them. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream for our country, and while his dream was related to equal rights and oppression, his intended message of having a dream and working tirelessly to achieve it can be applied universally in society. Recently, ...
Read more