Echoes from Cañon
Examples of Excellence
The Cañon City Music and Blossom Festival means carnival rides, crafts, concerts, parades, and great food. Most of all it is an opportunity for high school musicians from all over Colorado to showcase their talent. This year our Cañon City High School musicians shone their brightest during Blossom, earning awards in numerous categories including 1st Place in the Class 2A Concert Band competition, 1st Place in Class 2A Parade, 2nd Place in Class 2A Jazz Band, and adding to this Outstanding Jazz Section-Trumpets, Outstanding Concert Section-Trumpets, Outstanding Soloist-Anna Flynn, Outstanding Color Guard-2A, Outstanding Percussion-2A, Outstanding Drum Major-2A, and 1st Place Jazz Combo-Open Class. The overall result? Yes: our Tiger Pride Band even won the coveted Sweepstakes Award at the 78th annual Cañon City Music and Blossom Festival! I want to thank and congratulate first year instrumental music director Josh Race for his outstanding leadership, as well as the outstanding group of students he has assembled, for their hard work, the way they represent our community, and proving that result of hard work is amazing accomplishments like these
Speaking of pride, the 2016 CCHS Pride’s 2nd Annual Hair Drive will take place this Tuesday ,May 10th, all day long in the choir room at Cañon City High School. All community members are invited to participate, with donations of 8 inches or more of hair being passed on to Children With Hair Loss, a nonprofit organization that supports young men and women age 18 and under who suffer from medical conditions that result in hair loss. This event is mainly directed at our young women who attend CCHS and
Speaking of pride, the 2016 CCHS Pride’s 2nd Annual Hair Drive will take place this Tuesday ,May 10th, all day long in the choir room at Cañon City High School. All community members are invited to participate, with donations of 8 inches or more of hair being passed on to Children With Hair Loss, a nonprofit organization that supports young men and women age 18 and under who suffer from medical conditions that result in hair loss. This event is mainly directed at our young women who attend CCHS and
they have been amazing in their response, with 26 students and 2 staff members already signed up to donate. Meanwhile, CCHS boys are also being encouraged to participate by donating five dollars to get a summer buzz cut. All proceeds on this front will be passed on to Children With Hair Loss as well. Kevin Marushack, The Pride’s faculty sponsor, has been instrumental in organizing this wonderful event, and I would like to thank him for his efforts.
On a final note of excellence this week, though Blossom certainly means music, it has also come to mean outdoor exercise. The wonderful folks at Fremont Adventure Recreation have been sponsoring Run Blossom for a number of years, and the 2016 event must have been their largest yet. As part of this annual event, many of our boys and girls are encouraged to train for and participate in their first organized run, and this year thanks to encouragement by many dedicated CCSD employees 214 of them participated in the event. I can attest to this being a real deal as at least 100 of our little guys and gals must have passed me along the route of this year’s 5K run course! Thank you FAR, for sponsoring such a healthy event. Thanks also to all our CCSD employees who encouraged, and ran along with, our energetic kids!
On a final note of excellence this week, though Blossom certainly means music, it has also come to mean outdoor exercise. The wonderful folks at Fremont Adventure Recreation have been sponsoring Run Blossom for a number of years, and the 2016 event must have been their largest yet. As part of this annual event, many of our boys and girls are encouraged to train for and participate in their first organized run, and this year thanks to encouragement by many dedicated CCSD employees 214 of them participated in the event. I can attest to this being a real deal as at least 100 of our little guys and gals must have passed me along the route of this year’s 5K run course! Thank you FAR, for sponsoring such a healthy event. Thanks also to all our CCSD employees who encouraged, and ran along with, our energetic kids!
The Focus of Our Work
Last week we conducted screening processes to narrow the fields down to a reasonable number of candidates to interview for the key positions of director of special services and Cañon City High School principal. On Monday we will conduct interviews to select a new principal, and next week we will conduct interviews to select our new director of special services.
Cañon City Education Association and Cañon City School District have continued negotiating updated master agreement language. This past week we reviewed and adopted additional suggested clean up language, agreed to recommend a calendar change to the board of education allowing additional district level professional development time to support implementation of our recently awarded $900,000 Early Literacy grant, and approved a Memorandum of Understanding that will guide the process by which future professional development is planned and guided by schools and the district. The recommended calendar change was communicated to staff members ahead of possible board adoption at its Monday May 9th meeting. We also looked at a number of salary schedule options aimed at addressing the problem the district has had awarding experience steps to teachers over the past 6 years. Thankfully, a wonderful home-made Mexican food meal was provided to the negotiating team by staff members from Cañon City Middle School and McKinley Elementary. The team will meet again this Wednesday to continue its important work.
Cañon City Education Association and Cañon City School District have continued negotiating updated master agreement language. This past week we reviewed and adopted additional suggested clean up language, agreed to recommend a calendar change to the board of education allowing additional district level professional development time to support implementation of our recently awarded $900,000 Early Literacy grant, and approved a Memorandum of Understanding that will guide the process by which future professional development is planned and guided by schools and the district. The recommended calendar change was communicated to staff members ahead of possible board adoption at its Monday May 9th meeting. We also looked at a number of salary schedule options aimed at addressing the problem the district has had awarding experience steps to teachers over the past 6 years. Thankfully, a wonderful home-made Mexican food meal was provided to the negotiating team by staff members from Cañon City Middle School and McKinley Elementary. The team will meet again this Wednesday to continue its important work.
Last Week
Early Monday I attended a meeting with director of student services Dominic Carochi and representatives from Lindamood-Bell to plan for implementation of our Early Literacy Grant. Throughout the rest of the day I participated in committees screening applicants for our open director of special services and high school principal positions. That evening I attended a regional health and wellness committee gathering, and the monthly Heartbeat Suicide Awareness support session at St. Thomas More Hospital. On Tuesday I was on KRLN Morning Line, and then worked in my office preparing for high school principal interviews and revising our Counselor Corps grant application as advised by CDE. On Wednesday we had a district administration team meeting first thing in the morning, and master agreement negotiations in the afternoon and evening. On Thursday and Friday I was in the Denver area to attend a statewide pathways education conference in Aurora, and to participate in work being driven by former state treasurer Cary Kennedy related to improving K-12 education in Colorado.
This Week
On Monday I’ll participate in Cañon City High School principal interviews, a board work session, and a regular board meeting. On Tuesday I will attend SAC, district leadership team, and district safety committee meetings. On Wednesday I’ll meet with classified association leaders, work on our annual safe schools report to CDE with director of student support services Paula Buser, and attend another master agreement negotiation session. On Thursday I’ll work on evaluations, attend a regional manager’s meeting, and conduct a quarterly district accountability meeting aimed at finalizing our academic plan for improvement. On Friday I’ll attend the Pikes Peak Area Superintendents Association meeting and a Fremont County Executive Directors luncheon.
Thanks for listening once again!
George S. Welsh
Thanks for listening once again!
George S. Welsh
