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[
Transcript
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Dr. Joseph Tafoya, Director, DoDEA: Hello.
Welcome back to another year at our DoDDS and DDESS schools.
The news from last year is still very, very good. Our
scores and our test achievements are still very high
and in fact improving. We continue to have an all time
high in terms of command sponsorship and their approval
of what we're doing. That's all a credit to you and the
things you do every day to make our schools a wonderful,
safe, and conducive learning environment.
This year we have learned from recent research in education
that you need to do staff development and training and
curricular improvement over a long period of time. Therefore
there will not be any new educational initiatives. But
instead, we will be focusing on our math and science
implementation that we started last year. This will give
us extra time to learn in depth what we need to do to
be able to instruct better in those areas. In addition
we will continue to work on our middle and elementary
task force and come up with ideas and recommendations
to align our resources and improve our school offerings
in those areas.
Last year, at the end of the year, I had a wonderful
the opportunity to visit Alconbury , England . In addition
to visiting the classrooms and walking around the school,
and having a reception with teachers the day before,
I had an opportunity to attend the kindergarten promotion
activity at the school. And to see the parents that were
there and the kids singing their songs and they had a
wonderful video tape of the kids and the activities they
were doing in their classroom and in that video at the
end there was a quote that struck me – and that quote
was “Education is not a bucket waiting to be filled – it
is a light waiting to be lit”. That quote inspired me
so much that that night at the graduation of the Alconbury
High School class of 2005 we had the opportunity to use
that quote.
The graduation took place at the Peterborough Cathedral
there in Peterborough - just a magnificent church with
a long history. And I used that quote to say to graduates
that they needed to go out and find their destinies.
Likewise I want to say to you as we start this school
year with all the challenges and opportunities we face
this year - “Education is not a bucket waiting to be
filled – it is a light waiting to be lit”. So I challenge
you and I challenge myself to light as many lights this
year as we can. Thank you and have a great school year.
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