Rafferty: District 54’s Top 10 accomplishments this year

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Top 10 lists have become a standard part of American culture since they were introduced on late night TV. The news media, entertainment industry and many other groups have found the Top 10 List to be an effective way to communicate.

At the end of the year, these lists become even more popular and are used to quickly recap what has been accomplished. Looking back on this past year in School District 54, there is much to celebrate. Coming up with only 10 accomplishments worthy of celebration was not an easy task.

District 54’s Top 10 List for the 2010-2011 school year is as follows:

10. Ten schools were recognized by the Illinois State Board of Education for successfully implementing Positive Behavior Interventions & Supports. PBIS is a comprehensive system of support that has been found to decrease negative behaviors, reduce bullying and increase school safety.

9. District 54 was one of only 73 school districts in Illinois that received the Bright Red Apple Award. This award is given to districts that provide students with an outstanding educational environment.

8. Seven staff and community members received Those Who Excel awards from the Illinois State Board of Education, adding to an already impressive list of 55 recipients in the last 10 years. Additional honors including the Hanover Park Mayor’s Choice Award for Educator of the Year, the Distinguished Music Educator Award and the Illinois Distinguished Communicator Award were received by our staff members.

7. District 54 is fortunate to have many incredible partnerships. For example, the Schaumburg Township Council of PTAs awarded 53 scholarships to students to help cover part of the cost to participate in summer enrichment activities and 12 college scholarships to former District 54 students. The Schaumburg Township Elementary School Foundation also awarded its largest number of grants to teachers to help fund innovative classroom projects and to students in need to help offset the cost of summer enrichment classes.

6. Students from every school participated in a variety of academic competitions and brought home honors in the National Fluid Power Challenge, the Math Olympiad, You Be the Chemist, the All American Scholars Pop Warner Program for academically accomplished football players and cheerleaders, the National History Fair, the Japanese Speech Contest and the Spanish Language Competition.

5. Our students also received recognition at the Sonata-Sonatina music festival, the American Heart Association’s Billboard Contest, the National PTA Reflections Competition, the Cook County Court Anti-bullying Slogan Contest, and many instrumental music and other fine arts competitions.

4. District 54’s athletes who compete in Special Olympics continued to bring home a record-breaking number of trophies and medals in all 15 of the sports in which they competed.

3. Two schools, out of only 16 statewide, were nominated by the Illinois State Board of Education to receive the National Blue Ribbon Award from the U.S. Department of Education. The winners have not yet been announced. In addition, one of our elementary schools placed third in a national competition sponsored by the Ministry of Education of Spain for the Spanish School of the Year Award, honoring the school’s long-term commitment to providing a high quality dual language program.

2. Twelve schools made the Illinois Honor Roll and received the Academic Excellence Award in recognition of their high student performance. Nine schools were ranked in the top 100 elementary and junior high schools in the state.

1. All 27 schools showed steady gains in reading, mathematics and science. Performance of every subgroup of students is at an all-time high with 16 of our schools meeting the Board Goal of at least 90 percent of their students meeting or exceeding standards. Three schools raised the bar even higher with 95 percent of their students meeting or exceeding state standards.

We are anxiously awaiting the results of the most recent round of state assessments and are predicting even greater gains in student performance. Our staff has plans well under way to make next year’s list of accomplishments even more impressive.

Thanks to our staff, parents, community and students for making 2010-2011 District 54’s best year ever!