Blog
Atlanta Public Schools kicked off the football season in huge fashion on Saturday as our Department of Athletics played host to the 2015 High School Classic at Lakewood Stadium. As superintendent and a football fan myself, it has been a great thrill for me over the past few weeks to meet with the student athletes,…
→I have not only enjoyed practicing with APS student athletes including football players, cross-country runners and cheerleaders, but I have embarked on a training regimen in preparation for the East Atlanta Village (EAV) Runfest. About 100 of my fellow APS co-workers responded to a training challenge earlier this month. Now we generally meet every Monday…
→Whenever I find a school, program, or any place where things seem to be working well in APS, I want to immerse myself in their process so that I can glean how we can apply that lift and success to other schools in our district. As a part of my back-to-school tour, I decided to…
→I popped in recently for a quick visit with our friends at Fickett Elementary. Principal Twyman is always bursting with new ideas and she was excited to show me one of the newest additions to the school, a learning garden! Fickett is the recipient of a Captain Planet Learning Garden grant as well as a…
→Tuesday, after school, I was able to have my first cross country training experience at Jackson High School with the Jaguars! Let me tell you, these kids work hard! Our run started at the school’s athletic field, wound through the historic Grant Park neighborhood and over into Grant Park, near the Atlanta Zoo. There were…
→Last week, my back-to-school drop in visit with the ladies of Coretta Scott King Young Women’s Leadership Academy (CSKYWLA) was so much fun! At the helm of the recently merged, all girls’ middle and high school is new principal Erin Barksdale. She and her team gifted me with a super smart looking t-shirt that was…
→Amid the public dialogue surrounding the state’s proposed Opportunity School District (OSD), I’ve received some questions and concerns about the strategies and tactics the Atlanta Public Schools district is taking to turnaround under-achieving schools and keep them under local control. I want everyone to understand that we are developing an aggressive and targeted course of…
→Principal Frederico Rowe over at Continental Colony is doing a great job. He’s leading the school for the third year – with a new assistant principal by his side, APS veteran Dr. Sarah Haynes. And he’s embraced cluster planning in the district, which will help him to continue to build strong schools. I’ve blogged before…
→It is so important that when our students leave APS that they are be able to not only graduate college and career ready, but also ready to compete globally when they enter the workforce. Learning a second or third language, I believe, is the key to a young adult becoming invaluable in the global marktetplace.…
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