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Eagle Update: Recognizing excellence

It is always a privilege and honor to recognize students for their achievements. This past school board meeting, several students were honored for their positive work ethic, for being a great classmate and assisting other students in class, and for their academic achievements. Our district mission statement is: New Ulm Public Schools will provide experiences and opportunities that support all learners. This statement drives all that we do to reach and support all students. Recognizing their efforts is an important part of supporting their work.

Building capacity in our school, community and region requires collaboration with many public and private partners. We are all aware of the shortage of skilled workers in our region, meaning a cost to businesses to maintain or grow their business. As a school, we are a willing partner in working together to help fill this skills gap through job placements, internships and providing experiences in our Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses that mirror what occurs in industry today. Through these partnerships and experiences, our students are better prepared to make informed decisions about their futures. We continue to work together with our partners to design and build a CTE Center that will be a regional asset for years to come.

The week of Jan. 27-31 is Paraprofessional Week. Paraprofessionals provide our students and teachers with the support to enable students to grow as individuals. We can’t do our jobs without them. I would like to thank each and every one of them for the work that they do everyday. Paraprofessionals make great connections with our students that last a lifetime.

As we head into February, we focus our work on plans for the next school year. This includes the following: finalizing next year’s school calendar, reviewing financial information of our many budgets, reviewing current programs against outcome measures to see if the programs are meeting our expectations, staffing recommendations for next year, finalizing summer building projects to maintain what we have, and a review of student data to measure growth and achievement.

The mild weather has been a great relief and we only hope it continues. Getting students outside, whether for recess or outdoor learning activities, allows students to burn off extra energy and to learn through shared experiences with their classmates. I even watched elementary students using shovels this week to make snow piles to climb. An unintended outcome of this is that parents know students can help shovel the sidewalk at home!

Go Eagles!

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