Triangle Lake Charter Team invited community members to a pizza feed and town hall meeting where they could learn about charter schools, hear from the team and ask questions about what it means to be a charter school.
Guest speaker Mark Jeffrey, former superintendent of Paisley School district, shared with the group what going charter can mean for a school like ours. Some important points were regarding the greater amount of freedom from laws intended for larger school districts, freedom for a school to choose its own focus according to its needs, flexibility, and financial opportunities.
Team member Derek Pennel shared some of the points that had led to the Charter Project Team formation. One important compelling fact for considering charter was that of impending crisis due to declining enrollment, the number of years that the school can hope to sustain itself. He also shared the events that led up to our school receiving a grant and permission from the School Board to research going charter. He also shared a timeline that the project team would like to follow.
With the understanding that going charter means some necessary change, change that fits the needs of the students and capabilities of the school, team member Lisa Wagner shared the Team’s vision and focus for the Triangle Lake Charter School: Three foundational focuses of expanding Information Technology, Natural Resources and Health and Fitness coming together through implementation strategies such as: small classroom sizes, expanded classroom boundaries and community partnerships. Coupled with individualized learning these three focuses can provide educational excellence for each and every student that is given the opportunity to attend our charter school.
Guests were invited to ask questions of Mark Jeffrey and a second Town Hall with topics specific to Triangle Lake and more time for community discussion was planned for the following month.
Team member Lisa Wagner’s Report on the Charter Vision
We’ve seen the facts and numbers showing the declining numbers, we know that we have a need for some kind of change. Guest speaker Mark Jeffrey, former Paisley Superintendent, showed us what going charter can do for a district.
- What can we do here at Triangle Lake?
- We can focus on things that we already do well and then expand on those qualities to make it even better.
- Our central goal: Educational Excellence
- We have a great school but we’ve seen the numbers. How do we keep the students we have now and possibly get others here? What makes us special and what can we do to make our school better?
- When you are outside, look around. We have mountains, lakes, rivers, fields and forests. We are rich in natural resources. How appropriate to build on this as one of our focus areas and what a good fit for our community. Expanding environmental studies, utilizing our environment in our teaching, and tapping into established watershed programs, logging and agriculture industries are some ways that we could use what surrounds us to educate our kids.
- Second, our school and community could become more of a center for health and fitness. We have a great athletics program but more than that we can utilize our current programs and expand upon them by promoting a lifestyle of fitness through nutrition education programs, healthy meals, good habits, and comprehensive annual health screenings. We currently have and we plan to keep 100% participation, no-cut athletics. We’re in the process now of getting a weight room/fitness facility, and want to add community access to that.
- But what else can make us stand out? Can our small school and small community compete with the big cities and their schools? In reality, in this modern age, we have many of the same opportunities as any big city, thanks to current information technology. We are planning to make technology available to every one of our students and we plan to build upon that even more through improved infrastructure, best-in-class tools, and teacher training. We expect to develop a program that is self-sufficient and one that supports every student being able to demonstrate essential technological literacy.
- We not only intend to focus on technology as a skill to equip our students for an ever-changing world, but as a means of accomplishing our goals as well. We will use technology to build up our curriculum and educational choices through the addition of online education services. On-site coursework can be augmented by these programs to expand choices for both vocational and college track students.
- Another tool that we plan to use to accomplish our goals is expanding classroom boundaries. This means that we will both add online coursework, but also provide for more hands-on learning. Leaving the classroom to go “out” into the real world, with field trips such as the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and possibly adding science outings, outdoor education, and community projects, as well as a horticulture program with a greenhouse.
- On one hand we wish to expand the boundaries of the traditional classroom, but on the other, we want to take advantage of our small class sizes. While other schools are dealing with classes of 40 students or more, here at Triangle Lake we currently have a student to teacher ratio of about 10 to 1. Studies have shown the advantages of small classroom sizes. While other schools struggle to artificially recreate this scenario, this is our natural state of our school and community. The advantages of small classrooms are something we are committed to keeping.
- For the third means of implementing our goals, we will look to our surrounding community. We realize that with a charter school we will have certain freedoms unavailable in the past, and one of these is the ability to develop community partnerships. We, therefore, look to you, the community as a resource to support the education of our students, even some of you to educate them. We also hope to form partnerships with local industries and government agencies such as the Soil and Water District, Bureau of Land Management, and Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. Finally we hope that students will be able to give back to their community through service activities.
- These three ways of implementing our three focus areas will come together with our commitment to provide individualized learning for every student. We plan to put into place individualized learning plans for all students. Each student is different. With our low student to teacher ratio, We can take the time to individualize the education of our students. We can be uniquely positioned to know and care for each and every one of them. We can provide the opportunities for a rich and beneficial education.
- We believe that these foundational focuses can come together through these implementation strategies, coupled with individualized learning, to provide educational excellence for each and every student that is given the opportunity to attend our charter school.
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