Happy Summer

Has it really been a year? Although it went by way too quickly, it’s another year in the books for National School District, and my first year as Superintendent. What an incredible year it has been.

I think of how much our team accomplished, and all that is currently underway. Although there is too much to list, I feel compelled to mention a few highlights:

·      With the use of our LCAP funding NSD students benefited from daily use of personal laptops in third through sixth grades, as well as increased access in primary grades. We’re excited to see our students utilize these devices to become more deeply engaged in learning through collaboration, teamwork, creativity, critical thinking, and problem solving.

·      Behind the scenes, we’ve made substantial upgrades to our technology infrastructure to support this new way of learning including new filters, cloud-based servers, and single sign-on capability. For department and site efficiency, we have also updated our phone system to send voice data through the Internet, switched over our email servers, and purchased a more robust call-out system to keep our community informed and updated.

·      We are proud to announce that all ten schools implemented PTAs. We look forward to continue to grow this partnership in support of our NSD students.

·      Twitter has become a growing tool for sharing the wonderful updates of our sites. Follow our hashtag at #NSDnow for exciting news regarding innovative teaching and learning happening daily.

·      Almost all of the construction projects from Bond Measure N have been completed, with a highlight being that all of our schools now have air conditioning. In addition, our community overwhelmingly passed Measure HH, which we will use to continue to upgrade our aging facilities.

·      Half of our schools have built learning gardens, to help us emphasize healthy eating, as well as explore outdoor science education. These are an advantageous complement to existing District wellness efforts of daily salad bars, super salad bars, and growing school-based farmer’s markets.

·      Hydration stations are currently being installed on each of our campuses to provide daily access to filtered drinking water. In coming months, these stations, along with other lead filtering systems, will replace and upgrade all existing systems.

·      We have finished our re-visioning process for the Family Resource Center, and are in the process of planning for an August workshop to re-engage our community partners in serving NSD and Sweetwater families. 

All of this compounded with the ongoing efforts such as K-2 bilingual education and Dual Language options; swim lessons for all third graders; band, orchestra, and Mariachi music programs; enrichment wheel classes; partnerships with Ocean Connectors, Olivewood Gardens, San Diego Youth Symphony, and Stein Farm make National School District a magical place to learn and work.

Heading into summer, I want to personally thank the Governing Board for promoting a culture of excellence, and the staff for striving to achieve that excellence for our students.

Have a wonderful summer break!