Cañon City thrives through adventurous spirit, dynamic people, innovative schools, and historic charm.
Echoes from Cañon
Our Mission
The Cañon City School District is future-focused, providing innovative educational opportunities to successfully prepare all students to meet any challenge they may face.
The Cañon City School District is future-focused, providing innovative educational opportunities to successfully prepare all students to meet any challenge they may face.
Our Core Beliefs
1. We meet the social-emotional needs of all students, putting Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs before Bloom’s Taxonomy.
2. We believe learning growth matters most, requires risk-taking, and the work we do in our schools has the greatest impact on this.
3. We’re future-focused, believing the development of certain traits and skills will best prepare our students for ever-changing careers.
4. We emphasize what is good for kids over the needs and comfort of adults.
1. We meet the social-emotional needs of all students, putting Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs before Bloom’s Taxonomy.
2. We believe learning growth matters most, requires risk-taking, and the work we do in our schools has the greatest impact on this.
3. We’re future-focused, believing the development of certain traits and skills will best prepare our students for ever-changing careers.
4. We emphasize what is good for kids over the needs and comfort of adults.
Our Core Beliefs in Action
Mason Lenard shares his idea for a Bike Skills Park.
Last week Cañon Exploratory School fifth-grader Mason Lenard made a presentation to the Cañon City Recreation District Board, alongside Brian LeDoux of Fremont Adventure Recreation, on the possibility of creating a Cañon City Bike Skills Park and Flow Trail within the South Cañon Trail System-Schepp Open Space. Mason proposed the idea as part of his quarterly Exploration in Chalea Montoya's class, no doubt exhibiting a little bit of knowledge, innovation, tenacity, agency, agility, civility, and integrity along the way!
This week we received some amazing news from the Gates Family Foundation. Though we only applied for a one year, $50,000 grant, we were actually approved for a two-year, $100,000 award ($50,000 in 2019 and $50,000 in 2020) to support P-TECH program management and teacher stipends. The teacher stipends will be used to pay for content area Masters' Degrees, offering even greater opportunities for our students to take even more concurrent enrollment courses while at Cañon City High School.
Finally, if you wish to see for yourself how our incredible students demonstrate their traits of knowledge, innovation, tenacity, agency, agility, civility, and integrity, come to Cañon City High School’s Fall 2019 SELF Expo. This takes place Monday, December 16th from 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM in the Tiger Dome. While there, you can engage students, who will put their learning on full display, about their capstone projects. I understand there will also be door prizes and refreshments available to all attendees.
This week we received some amazing news from the Gates Family Foundation. Though we only applied for a one year, $50,000 grant, we were actually approved for a two-year, $100,000 award ($50,000 in 2019 and $50,000 in 2020) to support P-TECH program management and teacher stipends. The teacher stipends will be used to pay for content area Masters' Degrees, offering even greater opportunities for our students to take even more concurrent enrollment courses while at Cañon City High School.
Finally, if you wish to see for yourself how our incredible students demonstrate their traits of knowledge, innovation, tenacity, agency, agility, civility, and integrity, come to Cañon City High School’s Fall 2019 SELF Expo. This takes place Monday, December 16th from 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM in the Tiger Dome. While there, you can engage students, who will put their learning on full display, about their capstone projects. I understand there will also be door prizes and refreshments available to all attendees.
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Last year's SELF Expo was well attended!
Our Future Focus
Last Wednesday we had a meeting with our Green Thumb Initiative partners about the progress of our Cañon City High School greenhouse project. Thanks to a FIOG grant and Principal Bill Summers' attraction of other necessary dollars, we're financially viable to move forward with the project. Our plan now is to execute the purchase of the greenhouse in January. This will get us the information we need to complete our design of the foundation. Director of Facilities Jeff Peterson says his crew is committing to coordinating as much of the foundation construction as possible. Cañon City High School students will be involved in all aspects of the project, from design and construction to the actual operation of it. This will afford our students hands on construction trades experience, a deep dive into all the science and technology that goes into the operation of a greenhouse, and a nice dose of mindfulness as well. We expect it to be up and running for the 2020-21 school year.
During this week's Superintendent Advisory Council meeting we reviewed progress made installing new surveillance cameras bought by the school safety grant we received last spring. We also discussed better ways to communicate the process by which many aged Windows-based computers will be removed from our system as circumstances allow.
At our District Leadership Team meeting on Tuesday, we discussed the role of our School Resource Officers when dealing with physically aggressive special education students, how the Text to 911 program works, potential legislation related to school finance, and Compass Committee progress. During our Principals Only portion of the agenda, we shared updates on the Youth Connections grant, held discussions around a Comprehensive Sex Health grant we received, and learned about a cool technology-based professional development opportunity we are able to offer staff.
During this week's Superintendent Advisory Council meeting we reviewed progress made installing new surveillance cameras bought by the school safety grant we received last spring. We also discussed better ways to communicate the process by which many aged Windows-based computers will be removed from our system as circumstances allow.
At our District Leadership Team meeting on Tuesday, we discussed the role of our School Resource Officers when dealing with physically aggressive special education students, how the Text to 911 program works, potential legislation related to school finance, and Compass Committee progress. During our Principals Only portion of the agenda, we shared updates on the Youth Connections grant, held discussions around a Comprehensive Sex Health grant we received, and learned about a cool technology-based professional development opportunity we are able to offer staff.
Override and Bond Progress
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These are early renderings of how Washington Elementary's new playground might look.
Kudos are due our construction partners at GE Johnson, and Washington elementary Principal Brian Zamarripa's playground grant writing team as it was announced last week they will be receiving an award of $352,000 from the Colorado Health Foundation. This effort will be tied into the school construction project and will allow us to provide much more quality in the actual building.
On Tuesday, December 10th our GE Johnson construction partners offered a construction progress tour to the Cañon City Middle School staff. While on the site we were able to visualize where the new office complex will be situated, where the School-Based Health Center will be erected, and we were able to actually take a walk in new commons, life skills, and eighth-grade instructional spaces.
At a meeting last Monday the Board of Education did its duty by approving mill levies for the 2020 calendar year. Our board has no control over this process, as there are many state constitutional mechanisms that establish them. Of interest to taxpayers, our total program mill will once again be the state's maximum for a school district, 27.63. However, as a result of new properties added to tax roles, our override mill dropped from 5.769 to 5.211 and out bond mill dropped from 12.317 to 12.11. This will offer a little relief on our 2020 property tax bills.
On Tuesday, December 10th our GE Johnson construction partners offered a construction progress tour to the Cañon City Middle School staff. While on the site we were able to visualize where the new office complex will be situated, where the School-Based Health Center will be erected, and we were able to actually take a walk in new commons, life skills, and eighth-grade instructional spaces.
At a meeting last Monday the Board of Education did its duty by approving mill levies for the 2020 calendar year. Our board has no control over this process, as there are many state constitutional mechanisms that establish them. Of interest to taxpayers, our total program mill will once again be the state's maximum for a school district, 27.63. However, as a result of new properties added to tax roles, our override mill dropped from 5.769 to 5.211 and out bond mill dropped from 12.317 to 12.11. This will offer a little relief on our 2020 property tax bills.
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District level and Cañon City Middle School staff got to walk through the CCMS construction site on Tuesday.
Last Week
On Monday I attended a conference call with representatives from several other districts applying for a local accountability pilot grant. I also wrote another installment of Echoes, then spent the rest of the day with our newly constituted Board of Education in a retreat, work session, and regular meeting. On Tuesday I met with Director of Student Support Services Paula Buser, local law enforcement partners, conducted a Superintendent Advisory Council meeting, participated in a District Leadership Team gathering, then attended the annual Fine Art of Christmas performance at Cañon City High School. On Wednesday I attended a series of routine meetings and caught up on important correspondence. On Thursday I participated as a member of the interview committee for the next PCC-Fremont Campus Executive Dean. On Friday morning I attended a regional superintendent gathering and ended my day celebrating the holidays with our central administrative office staff.
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Fine Art of Christmas involves nearly one-third of all Cañon City High School students in visual and performing arts.
This Week
On Monday I'll write another installment of Echoes from Cañon, attend meetings about staff and students, and attend the Cañon City High School SELF Expo. On Tuesday I have an administrative building safety committee meeting, Superintendent Advisory Council, an Instructional Leader PLC, and a Facilities Corporation Meeting. On Wednesday I'll attend a Fremont Economic Development Corporation meeting, a CCEOE meeting, and our annual Classified Staff Christmas Party. On Thursday I travel to Denver to attend an Early Childhood Leadership Commission meeting and then a mill equity legislative team meeting. So far the only thing I have on my calendar for Friday is a Youth Connections grant commitment.
Thanks for listening to me once again!
George S. Welsh
Thanks for listening to me once again!
George S. Welsh
