Dec 22
It is hard to imagine that we are about to start Christmas vacation. Although, given the excitement of our students and probably some staff (me included), this last week has seemed to drag on! But it is here! The first four months of the school year have flown by and when we meet again in …
Dec 11
I grew up with a friend who was absolutely brilliant and he had a vocabulary to match. You almost needed a dictionary to understand the words he used on a fairly regular basis. When I did understand his vocabulary (which was usually rare), I would often tease him by rephrasing his statement in common and …
Dec 01
November has come and gone and now we enter the Advent season. On Monday at our opening prayer at St. Basil Catholic Education Centre, I began with this message from Creighton University Online Ministries: As we begin Advent, we light one candle in the midst of all the darkness in our lives and in the …
Nov 30
The following blog post was published in the Lethbridge Herald on November 30, 2016. Alberta Education is undergoing the aggressive task of updating the curriculum currently being taught in our schools. While it may seem that curriculum changes are always occurring, the truth is that Alberta’s curriculum actually ranges in age from eight to thirty …
Nov 27
Last week, my good friend and colleague Michael Chechile, Director General for Lester B. Pearson School Board sent out a tweet that asked Michael Fullan to summarize his day/ presentation/ approach/ strategy/ deep learning/ in one word to make it happen. It really should come as no surprise that Fullan’s one word was TRUST. One word, …
Nov 12
This week our senior administration completed our school continuous improvement plan reviews with all of our school leaders. The process is fairly simple in that each school administration team comes into the board office and shares their plan with our senior education leaders. While I understand that it can a little intimidating for our newer leaders, it is meant …
Nov 06
The following message will be read at all parishes within the boundary of Holy Spirit Catholic School Division. during the weekend of November 5 and 6 to celebrate Catholic Education Sunday! Holy Spirit is a regional division that serves students in Bow Island, Coaldale, Lethbridge, Picture Butte, Pincher Creek, Taber, and surrounding communities. Today, we …
Oct 31
Two months into the school year already and what an eventful two months! I want to begin with a bit of a reflection on our Division Wide Professional Day. Our school leaders would be the first to admit that I “got” literacy and numeracy at the elementary level, but was less confident about how they …
Oct 23
The following article was published in the Lethbridge Herald on October 19, 2016. Last week I attended the Education Research Development and Innovation (ERDI) Conference in Banff. ERDI, on a semi-annual basis, brings together 50 Canadian superintendents to discuss educational trends with corporate partners from across North America. As part of the conference, a plenary …
Oct 21
Good Morning. I’m always grateful for our Division PD days where we all come together as one Catholic School Division to learn. But I know that we don’t have days like this without some tremendous work in the background. And so I would like to thank our Director Learning, Lorelie Lenaour and her support at …