On more than one occasion in my career (and personal life) I have been appropriately reminded that periodically, I need to pause a moment to recognize and celebrate our successes and achievements. I am a goal oriented superintendent, so I tend to work toward achieving an objective and upon reaching it – move onto the next challenge as quickly as possible. While this may work for me, most professionals appreciate knowing that their work has been acknowledged.
So I would like to pause a moment to recognize and celebrate a few recent and significant achievements at Lincoln Public Schools.
- We have once again had a near perfect audit of our school district finances. When you think about a more than $400 million budget with many departments, this accomplishment is monumental and demonstrates the incredible level of effective and efficient systems and protocols we have in place to handle public dollars.
- We received a five-year state accreditation report demonstrating that our school improvement system and corresponding academic results were “awesome.” In fact, the leader of the External Visitation Team – with more than 20 educators from across the state – explained their recommendations were designed to move us from “awesome” to “more awesome.” This is a major tribute to our entire team of LPS educators and leaders.
- Just this week we received the 2018 National Champion of Computer Science Award for the work we have done developing a sound Computer Science curriculum, including lessons in coding that begin in kindergarten and continue for all students. This is only the second year of this prestigious award, in fact, San Francisco Public won last year. To think that we have catapulted to the top of the country, once again demonstrates the commitment of our computer science teachers and leaders. We understand this is the future for many of our students.
With 2018 almost behind us, we turn our attention to 2019 in anticipation of another great year for our students, families and community. We’ll launch the new year by convening the Superintendent’s Facilities Advisory Committee, a community task force that will study and analyze facility needs for LPS – then offer suggestions of how to address those needs into the future.
Meanwhile, as we close the 2018 year, I would like to thank you for your support of LPS.
