Here is the latest superintendent snapshot regarding air conditioning in certain places in our buildings. Please keep the questions coming and have a nice weekend!
Martin
Sup’s Blog
Thanks
Hello all,
I hope most of you have a chance to read this before you break for the weekend.
This past Wednesday I signed several hundred letters to employees who have been with us for 15, 20, 25, and 30 years. That evening I attended the 25-year recognition – all district employees who had reached 25 years. Thursday during the day I participated in a Rotary Club recognition of a group of teachers and Thursday evening attended the Granite Education Foundation Excel Awards dinner. This morning I was pleased to participate with Karen Huntsman as one of our educators received a Huntsman Award.
In all of these events, I’ve heard dozens of genuinely touching stories. I will share one. A little girl came to school in one of our elementaries with a hat she refused to remove. It turned out that as discipline at home (I’m not clear on the details) the girl’s hair was cut horribly. The teacher made contact with the parent and, upon receiving permission, took the girl to the teacher’s own hair dresser to fix and style her hair. Please don’t get hung up on whether or not teacher supply money could be used to reimburse the teacher of if she had to pay for this herself, but consider with me, the way this teacher feels about her students.
The last three days took me back strongly to my own years teaching, special education at Timpanogas and Wasatch Mental Health and math at Independence High. I’m painfully aware that I’ve been out of the classroom for a long time. But I feel to tell all of you in your various capacities that I honor you and your efforts. I thank you sincerely from my own heart for working as hard as you do in this challenging profession.
I know this school year is winding down. I run marathons and know that when I can finally see the finish line a big part of me wants to walk it in. Let’s finish this one strong and then start training for the next one!
I thank you all again,
Martin
Question – What impact will S.B. 63 have on K-3 reading programs in the Granite District? Will funding be cut for reading specialists next year?
Answer- Great Question. The legislature left the funding for K-3 reading programs unchanged for this year. The district does not expect any changes in our current service pattern.
Have a question for the Superintendent? Ask! Email him at SuperintendentsBlog@GraniteSchools.org. He will respond personally, post the question here or answer it as part of the superintendent snapshot. Keep the questions coming.
Superintendent Snapshot – Pianos?
Here is the latest superintendent snapshot with a music related question. I appreciate the questions so please keep them coming! I am also interested in your comments related to the budget so don’t hesitate to post those as well.
If you have a question…ASK! Email your questions to SuperintendentsBlog@GraniteSchools.org.
Superintendent Snapshot – Budget Input
Welcome to the latest superintendent snapshot. Its budget time again and we are asking our employees and patrons for feedback. I am sending an email to all of our employees, school community council members and PTA leaders asking for their input through a specific feedback process. The budget projections presentation is linked below in a previous post. Feel free to post your budget questions (or any other questions) here, or you can email them to SuperintendentsBlog@graniteschools.org. Thank you in advance for your critical feedback!
Budget Projections presentation
This is the budget presentation that was provided to the board on Tuesday, April 5. We encourage patrons and employees to review this presentation previous to providing input to your school community council or PTA. Feel free to post questions here regarding these projections.
Click here to view the presentation – GSD Budget Projections – FY 2012
Question about RMC survey and assessment
Since I can’t respond to every question I receive via video. I am posting additional questions on the blog for everyone to see. Feel free to follow up with a comment if you have additional questions or you can always email me at superintendentsblog@graniteschools.org. Thanks and keep the questions coming!
Superintendent-I believe it was last year or the year before that an outside company conducted surveys/supervisor evaluations. What happened with that information? How did that benefit the District? How much did it cost the District?
Response-
Granite School District is required by the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act which is also known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) to spend 10% of the Title I-A allocation to help the district achieve Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) standards. Granite School District has participated in two appraisals of the district by RMC Research of Denver, Colorado. The first appraisal occurred from 26-28 February 2008. Because Granite School District participated as a pilot district in this appraisal there was no cost to the district. The second appraisal was conducted from 24-25 March 2009. The results of both appraisals were reported to the Superintendent and to the Board of Education by RMC Research.
Granite School District has adopted a Local Education Agency (LEA) Improvement Plan to implement recommendations from the appraisals. The initiatives identified in this plan include:
a. Instructional audits of all Granite School District schools relying on rubrics developed in consultation with RMC Research.
b. Algebra/Pre-Algebra Institute training for all secondary mathematics teachers of these subjects.
c. Mobility analysis of students in the district.
d. Progress monitoring of school district improvement efforts.
Granite School District has benefited by improving support to students.
Superintendent Snapshot-Take 4
Welcome to the latest “Superintendent Snapshot”- Take 4. We are getting enough questions at this point that I won’t be able to answer them all with the snapshot, but I will post the questions here on my blog with the answer. If your question is site or school specific or dealing with a personnel matter, I will respond privately. I appreciate the questions from teachers, students and patrons so please keep them coming to SuperintendentsBlog@graniteschools.org.
Thanks and have a great weekend!
Superintendent Bates
Welcome Back to the new version of the Superintendent’s Blog
Hello friends, patrons, employees and students. I am relaunching the superintendent’s blog in coordination with my new weekly video series, the “Superintendents Snapshot.” Those videos will be posted here along with other questions and answers that have been asked. You can always send a questions to superintendentsblog@graniteschools.org.
I will also be posting regular updates on various topics that come to us at the district. Feel free to use this blog as a sounding board for your concerns and questions anytime. Don’t forget to also visit our district twitter account (feed is on the left) and our other social networking sites as you are able.
Thanks for all of your support of Granite Schools and the students we serve!
Superintendent Martin Bates
Superintendent announces his retirement
As many of you may already know, after 39 years in public education, I am announcing my retirement. I have especially enjoyed the opportunity to serve these past 14 years as Superintendent of Granite School District. Not only have I loved working with the wonderful students and parents of the district, but my work has placed me among some of the finest professionals I have known during my career.
Although we have experienced several challenging decisions over the years as a district, I believe that we have kept the children as our primary consideration. I appreciate the work all Granite District employees have accomplished on behalf of our students.
Read more about the Superintendent’s retirement in our district newletter, Connections.