I cannot believe we are already in Week 8 of our school year. We started the year off with State Rep. Mike Dobrinski and State Rep. Anthony Moore coming to our first day of in-service and talking about issues affecting education and offering their support to our teachers and school district! We also worked with our local police department and sheriff's office on school safety and our reactions to different situations we might have at school. They are all true partners of Watonga Public Schools.
There are many exciting things still happening at our schools. The elementary cafeteria is set to be complete shortly after fall break. When it is complete, we will have a new pickup and drop off area. We are currently working with the local police department to come up with a safe plan that will benefit this process. We will also begin renovation of the old cafeteria into our new STEM Lab as soon as we move into our new cafeteria. At the high school, we are almost complete with Phase 1 of our steel elevation. You will soon see the work crews going over to the east side of the football field to start on our new concession stand/endzone facility which will include restrooms, weight room, softball and baseball lockers, and new football locker room. The old weight room will be remodeled into the new wrestling locker room after completion of the endzone facility. The gym is on pace to be ready for the 20242025 basketball/wrestling season.
In our extracurriculars these first eight weeks, we have had many accomplishments including our pride of Watonga Marching Band marching in the State Fair of Oklahoma, cross country team picking up goals at meets, and softball girls winning a regional game. We have also had good attendance at our home football games. We have had alumni come back and support our team at our first games, a night of fun with our mini cheer (over 70 girls), and beautiful coronation of our homecoming royalty. Our cheerleaders have fought hard cheering on our team with several halftime performances. We also had a parade on Main Street with local businesses letting our entire school district stand and cheer on the class floats. It was quite a sight to see our students, parents, and teachers stand together at the pep rally as our band played our school fight song at the homecoming pep rally. Last, our school ag program has represented us well across the state including at the State Fair where many students were recognized for their achievements. Our esports team in its second year will be competing this weekend in an online tournament where they will participate from our state of the art esports room. I also want to wish the quiz bowl team good luck in their competitions this week.
Our main goal at our school is to help students learn. We believe ALL students can learn and believe it is our responsibility to give our best effort to ensure this happens. We do this by giving students multiple opportunities to learn through our response to intervention time. We also have academic goals for each of our schools and school districts. Over the last two years we have seen significant improvement in the majority of our tested subject areas where we set our goals. Our elementary school and middle school both improved one letter grade on the school report card to a B, while the high school was above state average in English, U.S. history, science, and saw growth in four out the five categories for ACT. We also have many of our students attending CTTC. Our goal for when kids graduate is to make sure they go to college, get additional career tech training, or go directly into the workforce.
I want you to know that we realize there are hard times out there for parents/ guardians and families. The social emotional needs of students and communities are at an alltime high. Our federal government and political system give us little hope at times. What we can do is help who is in front of us. We can work together as citizens of Watonga and make our school and town the best they can be. We should be proud of who we are and celebrate our kids as our parents did for us in the past. It should be a fun time for all and that is our hope. If you need help with a problem, please reach out to me or your building principal. We cannot help you unless we know that there is a problem. There is so much negativity on social media that we encourage you to check your facts before posting negativity and to check your children's social media for negative interactions. I challenge us all to be better today than we were yesterday. I can promise you that when I wake up each day, I will give my best to help our kids be the best they can be and will work tirelessly to make sure that the support they need is there. Remember, we are Watonga! We are Eagles! We will win!