2016-17 Year Starts at the Bell

The time is near! The administrative team and summer staff can feel the excitement and energy as new and returning students drop by for student orientation or to pick up their senior schedule. Teaching staff have been working to set up their classrooms, make bulletin boards, prepare lesson plans and sort and stack piles of career tech supplies for students to be issued on the first day. The first official teacher work day is tomorrow, Friday, August 19, but several staff have been working in the month of August to prepare for their incoming students. At 8:23 a.m. on Monday, the bell will ring and (almost magically) every new student finds their way to their first class of the 2016-17 year.

And for me, it's back to "normal" in a daily schedule, meant to be filled with busy hallways and full classrooms, knowledge exploding from teachers, student-led group projects, and the synergy of engaged learners--all anchored by a competent and dedicated staff--from the cafeteria crew to the maintenance crew to the media center staff and the technology crew and all the support staff, teacher aides, counselor and administrators who encourage, guide, and serve students daily.

Our students are the future, and we will give them our best. After all, students and parents deserve no less.

Vantage Career Center will start its 41st year of career-technical and academic instruction for 13 area high schools' juniors and seniors on August 22, 2016. It's something special to watch these students grow in confidence and training, in knowledge and social skills, as well as enthusiasm for their future after high school. But in the first weeks of the school year, students are getting used to a new school setting and students from a dozen other schools in Van Wert and neighboring counties. Juniors beginning their year with us are leaving a school district which many have attended since kindergarten--leaving more than a few good friends and classmates to pursue workforce training. That's a big adjustment in itself for high school students. They'll still be a part of their "home" high school and graduate from that district in May, if they earn the necessary credits while attending Vantage. But their own "normal" routine has changed. Vantage students will form new patterns of contact with friends and home school staff, all while growing in confidence as they pursue a career and/or college training in their workforce field.

Vantage Career Center has nearly 450 juniors and seniors attending this year, each enrolled in one of 17 different career and technical education programs. I wish each of the them the best of luck in meeting their goals this school year. WELCOME, STUDENTS!

Remember, TODAY MATTERS. Make it great.