Cultivating a World-Class Education

Dear Parents:

Beginning this school year, the district has a new slogan:  Cultivating a world-class education!  What exactly do these words mean? 

• According to Webster’s New Third International Dictionary, Cultivating means causing to grow by special attention or studying.  It suggests preparation and encouragement to improve; adding culture or refinement. 
• World-Class suggests something that is first-rate, renowned throughout the world; a world-competitor. 
• Education is the totality of knowledge, skills, competence, and qualities of character acquired through a process; the act of conditioning, strengthening, or disciplining of the mind or will.    

In Winton Woods City Schools, we are growing graduates who will be able to compete anywhere in the world because of the knowledge, skills, competence, and qualities of character that they acquire through a Winton Woods education.  The district’s initiatives are based on tenets espoused by Thomas Friedman in The World is Flat:  rigorous math and science; technology and communications; foreign language and economics; and the arts.  To ensure that our students are prepared to succeed in a global society, they must have early access to these 21st century skills:  the ability to access information, evaluate it, and apply it in new ways.     

2007-2008 is a year of opportunities.  At grades kindergarten through second grade, instruction will focus on literacy and number sense.  Students in grades will 3-6 will study technology and foreign language in addition to art, music, physical education, and the academic core.  Based on achievement data and interest, students can participate in daily enrichment, including gifted education, accelerated math and science, gifted art, Chinese or Spanish.  At grades 5-6, students will be able to begin the district’s signature programs in band, orchestra, or chorus.  At all grade levels, teachers are being trained in Ohio’s Integrated Systems Model (OISM) to analyze and use data to support struggling students in meeting high academic standards.  

Due to restructuring the elementary grades, our students will be prepared to take more high school credit courses in their middle school years.  These will include Chinese, Geometry, Technology, American Sign Language, and French, in addition to Spanish and Algebra.  We are looking at revamping the high school curriculum to include a full complement of AP classes, Biotechnology, the arts, as well as Cisco technology training.  In addition to sponsoring student trips to Spain or France each year, the district is establishing a sister-school relationship with a school in China and raising funds to send the Varsity Ensemble to “The Choral Salute to the 2008 Beijing Olympics” in March. 

Winton Woods City Schools is ready to move from good to great by restructuring its elementary schools, embarking on secondary school reform, and increasing parent, university, and community partnerships.  We are building upon Character Counts in the elementary years with a Character Education Grant at the middle and high school, enabling us to develop qualities of character in each of our graduates.  These steps will help us to meet the three district goals established by the Winton Woods Board of Education.  They are: 1) Assure fiscal stability; 2) Increase academic achievement, and 3) Improve the culture of our schools.  This is the school year in which we begin the development of a new strategic plan with our community, designed to “cultivate a world-class education”.  Won’t you join us and do your part to make this vision a reality?

Sincerely,

Camille A. Nasbe, Ed.D.
Superintendent