A Note from the Principal
Year one as the secondary principal seemed to fly by. Not the ideal year for me to be in my first year with all the Covid regulations, but we survived! I am eager to get back and rolling for another great year at Center-Stanton High School. We are continuing to find ways to improve our school and have made changes based on staff, student, and parent feedback. I am confident that these changes will benefit our students tremendously.
The first change is that we added an intervention time during our school day. This is a 27-minute block set aside for students to obtain support in areas of need based on testing scores and their performance in the classroom. We will also be using this time for students to take part in a wide range of enrichment activities. Students will choose an area of interest and proceed to participate in these project based learning opportunities. Upon completion they will present their final product to the rest of the student body. This will take place 3 days a week. The other two days will be designated for Wildcat Advisory Time (WAT) and study hall time for students to get caught up with their work.
The second change is that we were able to receive a grant to add the Sources of Strength program K-12th grade. This program helps students discover positive strategies on how to deal with conflict, stress, anger, and/or depression. It is student led with the involvement of some adult teacher advisors. This program will create more of a positive environment in our school by incorporating different activities that involve the entire student body. In my experience it brings a school closer together and I am anxious to see this program take off in our school!
As some of you may know we have gone a different direction with our testing platform in grades 7th-12th. This year we will utilize Renaissance Star 360 instead of NWEA. After visiting with our staff and gathering information from other schools, it became clear that we needed to make a change. Star 360 aligns closer to our state standards and will provide teachers with specific skills in which students are proficient at and which skills students need to grow in. This will provide data for teachers that will guide our intervention time. We hope through this process that students are able to work on their growth areas which will lead to some nice gains by the end of the year.
We have added three new staff members this year. Mrs. Carrie Bolstad came on board recently as our new AG/FFA teacher. Carrie has a background in AG as she taught in Williston for several years. Our other addition is Mr. Levi Hirschkorn. Levi is our new PE/Health teacher. Levi is in his first year in education and is also coaching football. We also added an assistant librarian Mrs. Sarah Yunker who will also be helping out as a sub as well. Lastly, Mrs. Lindsey Thies has transitioned from elementary into a 7th-12th grade school wide paraprofessional. We are very excited to have these teachers join our Wildcat family!
Andrew Mondry
Principal
Center-Stanton High School