Rock Hill Schools Graduation Attendance Expectations

The three Rock Hill Schools will have graduation on Saturday, June 6, 2009. Attendance expectations will be as they have been since 1999, the first year I participated as a member of the Board of Trustees. These are posted on the district web site ( Graduation Expectations ), are printed on each ticket required for entry (Rock Hill High and South Pointe tickets are on the left), and will be read at the beginning of the graduation ceremony. Never-the-less, there will always be a few who prove they are descended from a lower form of life. Since 1999, I'd say about 0.1% of those attending have disrespected the decorum (pretty good by today's standards). There was negative publicity when we first implemented these expectations and then again last year when radio entertainer Rush Limbaugh took up the cause for the "rebel rousers" (click here for those comments: Rush Comments). I hope Rush didn't have all the facts - Civil disobediance has never been one of my conservative values.

Northwestern High School Jazz Band Entertains Glencairn Garden Crowd

The Northwestern High School Jazz Band entertained guests to the 50th anniversary event of Glencairn Gardens - a newly renovated and expanded Glencairn Garden. The video has a clip of; the band; a shot of the Rock Hill Herald's award winning photographer, Any Burris with Gary Williams and; Harold Peeples, Lynn Young, and Judy Tuttle selling hotdogs and cokes ($0.25 and $0.10) at 50 year ago prices.

School Folders

I'm passing this along as a possible resource for PTO's. You can find the School Folders site by clicking here.

Ricardo Garbanzo, BOYS' SOCCER PLAYER OF THE WEEK

ESPN Rise has named Northwestern High School's Ricardo Garbanzo (soph., forward) as their National Player of the week.

"Garbanzo's two goals propelled Northwestern past Irmo (Columbia, S.C.) for the Class 4A state title and the FAB 50 No. 1 ranking. The talented sophomore is considered a Division I prospect for the Class of 2011."

Rock Hill Foreign Language Program Makes National Magazine

Lynn Fulton sends in this information: "In it’s April edition, The Language Educator (a national language magazine published by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages) highlighted unique programs schools and districts around the country have created and use to promote language learning and inform their communities about the importance a second language plays in each of our daily lives. Rock Hill ’s Mailbox Banner Campaign was among the four programs highlighted. This campaign is one of the ways we celebrate Discover Languages month each February.

With a subscription base of more than 12,000 educators, I am proud that a program now in it’s third year, has been recognized as innovative and shared with so many people around the country and the world. I hope you will take the time to read the article below – visit The Language Educator website at http://www.actfl.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=4114 "

How do you inform a community about the importance of language learning quickly and easily? Through a “Mailbox Banner” Campaign!

The cornerstone activity during Discover Languages Month in Rock Hill School District in Rock Hill, SC is such a campaign. It began last year when the number of schools implementing the district FLES [Foreign Language in the Elementary Schools] program grew from five to 12. We saw a need to show the community just how many students were studying another language at school since the program expansion had happened quietly and without much promotion in the community. Remembering a photo in the 2005: The Year of Languages photo gallery of other students highlighting the languages they were learning was the inspiration—and we thought it was the perfect vehicle to spread the word about the elementary language program.

This year, with the program established in all 17 elementary schools, more than 5,000 third, fourth, and fifth grade students took home brightly colored banners and hung them on their mailboxes, front doors, or front windows. The banners proclaim that “A student learning [French/German/Spanish] lives here!” We approached an office supply store and were successful in getting them to donate the paper for the banners, then we used another source to copy the banners.

The students pictured here, fifth graders from Richmond Drive Elementary School, have been hanging up these banners for three years now and are excited when the banners go home each year. While designed to only stay up through the month of February, many students continue to display them as the school year continues.

But the campaign was not limited to just students. Faculty and staff at all the elementary schools also received banners to take home and post as well, telling the community that students in their schools are learning another language. We anticipate that next year the program will also expand to involve all middle and high school language students—further emphasizing the importance of language learning in the district.

Lynn Fulton-Archer is president of the Southern Conference on Language Teaching (SCOLT) and world language specialist at Richmond Drive Elementary School in Rock Hill, SC.

National Champions - Northwestern High School Boys Soccer

ESPNRise has a good recap of Saturday's Championship game between Northwestern High School and Irmo High School. You can read the report by clicking here.

A lot has been written about this year's Northwestern team - I'll not attempt to do justice to it here - but to say - this team has all the makings of a Disney Movie - what a great story and collection of individuals - and representatives of Rock Hill.

For those soccer want-a-bees, I found this video of the Martinez brothers on youtube. It should give you something to work toward.

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