Dear parents, teachers, parishioners, and friends of SSP School,

Happy Friday! I hope you have some great plans and activities ahead of you for this weekend. Mrs. Sturgill and I, who celebrated our 37th anniversary yesterday, will be a B&B for the Fayette Sturgills this weekend, and we are tickled pink!

*spoiler alert (yep, one of those cover letters!)*

As we are finishing this round of Parent-Teacher Conferences, my mind wandered off to October 1975, when I was an 8th grader getting ready to apply at Rockhurst HS (KCMO). My teacher told my parents if I even qualified for acceptance into Rockhurst, they’d be wasting their money! My parents came home from those conferences to inform me that I had to pay for it myself if I wanted to go to Rockhurst. So that’s what I did; thanks to the generosity of the Jesuits and work-study and A & P Tea Company, believing I was 16 for three consecutive years, I achieved a dream.

Long story short (too late!) I achieved academic success despite a teacher’s evaluation. Today, education (and educators) have a much more challenging role.  Besides educating our children and bringing them closer to Christ, teachers today are advocates, cheerleaders, mentors, etc. Teachers should have ownership of the fact that if a child succeeds, they succeed!   If students don’t master concepts, teachers don’t just push through; we reteach and rethink our approach. Thank you to the parent educators who shared their visions with me lately. We all do our best on any given day as students, teachers, parents, and human beings! Sometimes, we need to step back, reevaluate where we are, and be the best version of ourselves today and an even better version tomorrow.   Thank you for the opportunity to help your children succeed and grow. Thank you for your partnership as educators of your children. This isn’t the 1970’s; if I can ever be an advocate, I am willing, able, and honored for the opportunity!