Redding School District

Partnership Educators, Bevin Strickland of High Point North Carolina was comfortably watching the news showing the hospitals in New York City becoming overwhelmed when a switch flipped inside her. "I was like, wait a minute, why am I sitting here?" Bevin, a nurse, had just contracted a serious case

Partnership Educators, May 18-22 is Classified School Employee Appreciation Week and the New Millenium Partnership Districts of Redding, Shasta, and Igo Ono would like to take this opportunity to thank our classified employees for their dedication, adaptability, professionalism, and resiliency during this unprecedented time. Classified employees work side-by-side with administrators, teachers, and staff, making it possible for our district to maintain operations and to continue serving our students and families.

Partnership Educators, Responding to complaints from his wife about how difficult it is to iron clothes on uneven surfaces, Elijah J. McCoy invented the easy set up and fold up Ironing Table. Elijah was a prolific inventor in the 1800's and received patents for other things like lawn sprinklers and many devices that self lubricated machinery.

Partnership Educators, What a glorious week of celebration. Thanks to all the certificated staff who have been working with our students during this unusual time of Distance Learning. I know that we are all working to help our students continue

Partnership Educators, In 1984 a group three young men were holed up in a room at Albright College, Pennsylvania. The snow storm was raging outside and so they literally couldn't leave the building. Bored and waiting for the snow to stop they were watching TV, as you might do at that age when you are snowed in. "Footloose"

Partnership Educators, I am often asked about our three district's and what factors make them unique. For me, it always comes down to the people and the willingness to put aside our personnel needs and just figure out how to support kids. We are caring, committed, competent individuals that work as a team to make a difference in our community by helping our students and families.

Partnership Educators, The opening lines of our United States Constitution help us to understand our part in the current situation. "We the People of the United States, in Order

Partnership Educators, One of the top-ranked archers in the United States is 36-year-old Matt Stutzman of Fairfield, Iowa. There aren't a lot of people making a living in this sport but Matt does. "The last time we looked at it, 1% of archers in the world make a living shooting a bow," he says.

Partnership Educators, Wednesday, Governor Newsom and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond suggested that all California schools might remain closed to students and the public through the end of the 2019-2020 school year as a result of increased COVID-19 cases throughout the state.

Partnership Educators, In our work, we are predisposed to action. Within these days of sitting and waiting we are brought to think of ideas and plans for what can be in the future. Know that we appreciate all that people are doing in this regard and appreciate the work that you are doing. We directly seek to sit close to difficult problems and seek to understand those issues so that we can help ourselves and others come to the place of intersection like that in a Venn diagram where new learning begets agreement on action. We believe in public education.

Partnership Educators, I wanted to share with you a status update in relation to COVID-19, our school closures, and enrichment opportunities. I will continue to send out updates as new and relevant information comes out.

Partnership Educators, As we all walk together in these unclear moments, we become more aware of our profound roles in the lives of those students that we serve every day. We have had many conversations around the stories that our children are telling each day and how the stories that we are telling in our actions impact the children around us.

Partnership Educators, During the fall of 1982, Chicago experienced seven mysterious deaths by cyanide poisoning that originally couldn’t be explained. The discovery came later that all seven had taken Extra Strength Tylenol Capsules just before they had died. Upon further investigation, the police had found cyanide in the medicine bottles in the victim’s home.

Partnership Educators, Robbie Gay loves an underdog. The eight-year-old looks for the oldest, least-adoptable mutt in the shelter and that’s the dog he wants. “There’s something about old dogs that I just like,” he says.

Partnership Educators, Educators, at least the ones that I know, have always held the premise that educational attainment is the great equalizer. People from all walks of life can get where they want to go by using learning as the vehicle to get them there.

Partnership Educators, The young man and his wife to be, sat in the empty room waiting on the next step to marital paradise. They talk about the tasks yet to be accomplished and about the relatives or friends who were or weren't coming to the gathering in a few months. Awkward pauses and the forced laughter tell the outward story of the anxiousness building inside of them both. Ticking sounds fill the room as the ancient clock continues the march of time.

Hello Partnership Educators, Aristotle in his writings about momentum claimed that something that is tossed is "kept moving by something in the air." Most scholars at that time and for some time after used his theory for describing why momentum happened to an object. It was John Philoponus, Byzantine philosopher, who said that this doesn't really make sense. He pointed out the absurdity of Aristotle's' claim by the sheer fact that air can't be helping with motion and resisting it at the same time.

Partnership Educators, When researchers go back through the patent records looking for something of interest, something of value, or overlooked technology they often come across something of a complete surprise. Malcolm McCulloch is just such a researcher and he did find something of interest and more. He is an electrical engineer at Oxford University and he found this design, a simply brilliant plan for an environmentally friendly refrigerator.

Partnership Educators, Standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, a monument to the president who a century earlier had brought down the institution of slavery in the United States, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. shared his vision of a future in which "this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'"

Partnership Educators, Welcome back educators after that short time off. Wonderful seeing most of you on Monday. Great visiting many of the schools this week and seeing the kids running around. It is always refreshing and inspiring at the beginning of a new year. This is the time when we all revisit or renew goals and look to make another effort to achieve things that maybe we haven't been able to in the past.

Partnership Educators, Happy Holidays to everyone in the partnership. I wish you a restful and joyous time with your friends and families. Stories can be powerful because they take serious, confusing, and threatening subjects and make them clear and approachable. Stories can be memorable, unlike so much of the information that bombards us today and is forgotten tomorrow. They can stimulate thought, teach important lessons, and can motivate, young or old, to use those lessons. In our modern, high-tech world, we can easily forget this simple yet profound truth.

Partnership Educator, It was a cool April morning when the seventeen-year-old boy ran on the school bus and was horrified about what just occurred. With his head in his hands not knowing what to do or where to go, he began to look for an escape. His eyes were beginning to well up with tears and it wouldn’t be long until uncontrollable sobbing would occur. If only it could have been an April, 1st gag because,

Partnership Educators, It was a beautiful spring morning at Sequoia. Since I was at school early, as usual, I left my office and decided to walk about to see what was happening. I grabbed my large Shell gas station coffee and headed out of my office towards the building door. I had just strolled outside when I was joined by the morning patrol person that I hadn’t met.

Partnership Educators, I believe gratitude doesn’t come in the front door all dressed up and bearing holiday gifts and cheer but rather it slips in through the garage door like the plumber did when our water heater went out. You do not know what gratitude is until you have the feeling of a warm shower running over your body after a week without one. Real gratitude comes from a deep appreciation of how each story we are living could have ended differently and sometimes does.

Partnership Educators, As hard as he tried, he could not get the hang of the medical profession. Ordinarily,when someone is not suited to be a doctor, he or she will not make it through medical school. Arthur however, had a great mind and did quite well with the academic side of medicine. It was after he completed his education when his difficulties began. For example, in October of 1890 he traveled to Berlin because he had heard of a doctor who discovered a cure for pulmonary tuberculosis.

Partnership Educators, I have decided to bring back a story that I wrote two years ago. This means a lot to our family. It was just another fall cross-country meet in Vacaville’s Lagoon Valley Park. A meet with larger much more powerful teams from across the region. Many who had run in this meet said that the park should have been named “Pain Park,” at least from the runner’s perspective because of the very big hills one must run to finish the course.

Partnership Educators, Baseball season comes to an end and what an end it was. The Washington Nationals won the World Series by beating the Houston Astros 6 to 2. This was the first year that all games were won by the team that was on the road. All seven games were won by the away team. So much for home-field advantage. The larger story is the Washington Nationals.

You’re looking over the fence at a schoolyard in Cleveland, Ohio and here is what you see. It is recess and kids are dancing about playing the music in their heads of fun and exhaustion. The first-grade students are playing together but one youngster stands out because he stands alone.

Partnership Educators, What a great group we had last night at the first Portrait of a Graduate event. There were seventy-plus community members discussing and talking about twelve trends as presented by our moderator Mike Nicholson from Battelle for Kids. I was personally fascinated by the pace of change compared with life span. It explained how the rate or amount of change in our lifetimes is far greater from any previous generation. That blew my mind. It was a great discussion at every table and I really enjoyed the time. I can't wait for the next meetings on our way to developing the Portrait of a Graduate profile.

Partnership Educators, Next week is dedicated to Administrative Appreciation Week and so I would like to personally thank all administrators, administrative assistants, and classified management for their untiring commitment to our school community. Maya Angelou, Poet, and Author said it best, "We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty."

Partnership Educators, Nineteen-year-old JR was a proud American soldier who had signed up to serve after the 9-11 attacks. His mother had brought him from El Salvador and this Arkansas man wanted to give back to the country that had given him so much.

Partnership Educators, Growing up in rural, Virginia in the forties and fifties had its challenges for Leroy. His loving Grandparents were sharecroppers and were hard-pressed to make ends meet for the eight mouths in the small home they occupied. He was thankful for the electricity but having no running water was at times difficult to overcome.

Partnership Educators, In Hagerstown, Indiana, population 914, young Ralph’s earliest memories were of the bicycle shop working alongside his patient father and uncles repairing bicycles. At age nine he envisioned one with four wheels. Do you know those railroad inspection cars that are large enough to carry a work crew of four men but light enough to lift on and off the tracks when a train is coming? The first one was pedal-powered and the brainchild of Ralph. By 1901 he hand made an engine to propel. In fact, Ralph had made a working automobile when he was just twelve.

Partnership Educators, This week is a solemn occasion because of the events eighteen years ago. We are reminded of the memories of those who lost their lives in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. In honor of those heroic rescue workers and the pride, we have in our country; we remember those events and that day. That day reminds us of the work that these brave individuals in our police and fire have always done for us. I wish for us to continue to honor those individuals who have served or continue to serve in our military, police, and fire organizations.

Partnership Educators, James stood on his factory floor in Sheffield, England, wondering what to do to stay in business. It was just a few short years earlier when he perfected a heat-treating process that made the flat wire stronger which allowed for easier, continuous, unbroken, lengths of the wire. The wire was for hoop skirts, and during the previous years, his wire was in high demand. Nevertheless, fashions changed and so his wire sits unused.

Partnership Educators, The story last week about Ricky Ray had a great response. Apparently Ricky attended our partner school Shasta Elementary and currently is a parent at Manzanita with a third-grade daughter. Pam DeOliviera responded, " He truly is humble. His daughter attends Manzanita and is in third grade. I still remember the day he and his wife came in to enroll Chloe in Kindergarten. They walked into the office and I looked up and I saw Ricky Ray.

Partnership Educators, Rick left the practice field and started the long walk to the coaches’ office. He knew what it was about and dreaded the moment. As he walked down the long hallways, he exchanged pleasantries with those that he met. This was a long shot anyway, he thought. He wasn’t drafted out of college and he was delivering chips for Frito-Lay just a few months earlier. Quarterbacking at the professional level has always been tough to get.

Yeah, you could be the greatest You can be the best You can be the King Kong banging on your chest You could beat the world You could beat the war You could talk to God, go banging on his door