State Of Our Schools Dr. Michael Priddy High Expectations To Be Future Focus

On Thursday, Dr. Michael D. Priddy, our Interim Superintendent gave a special press conference on the State of Bertie County's School System covering a "broad overview of general welfare and readiness and recent results in student testing". Two assistants were there to help him cover the many topics; Wayne Mayo, Curriculum Coordinator for Math/Science/Media and Brent Todd, Public Information Officer.

Dr Priddy started his comments by noting that the County Commissioners had recently given the Bertie County schools "more local funds than they had ever provided before" and a "larger percentage increase than at any previous time".

Dr. Priddy expressed the belief that "local efforts" were the determining factor in quality, especially for staffing and was very appreciative of this support.

The press conference covered a great number of areas very quickly, and in the little more than an hour and half there was a lot of detail provided. Much of the material is covered on the new Bertie County Schools Web Site which is linked above on the title to this article. However much of this information was tactical in nature and merely covered the administrative details of running a large institution that is in a state of transition due to the reality of past failures and shortcomings. Many of these areas will be covered in detail in the future, however it was the one strategic topic that came up a couple of times that caught my attention on this day.




That topic was highlighted by Dr. Priddy's inclusion of Wayne Mayo (shown above) in the press conference. At the request of Dr. Priddy, Mr. Mayo addressed the one bright spot in the past year in student achievement. That bright spot was the now closed C.G. White Middle School in Powellsville which was the only school in Bertie County to meet AYP goals. Mr. Mayo was Pricipal at that school. The strategy that led to success started with that school's focus on high expectations for the students.

High Expectations

In almost all discussions about school failures in America one theme keeps coming up. Schools that succeed get parents, teachers and students to believe that they can succeed and that success is expected. A key teacher role in this is to stop saying why students cannot succeed and to start demanding that high expectations are reasonable and attainable. Parents must be encouraged in this until they too focus on the theme of expecting students to excel, not excusing failure. Mr. Mayo gave a short explanation of how he tried to do that at C.G. White. The results indicate he was on the road to success.

The question for our school system is how do we build on this for the future? Bertie County schools cannot continue to fail our children. As Mr. Mayo said in his comments, we must start to intervene BEFORE our children fall behind. He used almost the exact words of a former brilliant business manager I worked for who used them to define the process that succeeds, "people respect what you inspect". Principals and parents must get involved with the recognition that testing is how you measure success. Testing is nothing but the process of inspecting the efforts of our teachers and students to pass along from one generation to the next the knowledge that leads to the American dream. It should not be used to criticize but to refine the efforts that lead to success.

A starting point for this is for all of the adults involved, parents, school administration, Board of Education, and County Commissioners . . to end the arguments of the past and find the common ground of "high expectations" for our children. An example of this noted by Dr. Priddy is the recent pattern that our Board of Education is nearly unanimous on the strategy for the future, as reflected by the number of 5 to 0 votes that are starting to happen. When not unanimous they talk about the problems until they work out a common agenda. They do not just rush to a 3 to 2 vote to shove one groups agenda. We must build on this growing consensus. It is important.

One magnificent element of leadership that Dr. Priddy has provided since he arrived is his willingness to stop being defensive and talk about problems honestly, with the goal to fix them, not deny them. Things are not good yet, but things are finally moving in a great direction. It is a key element in getting the unanimity Dr. Priddy talked about.

We need to continue this move, and I can think of nothing better than to get everyone involved in Bertie County education focused on what Dr. Priddy and Mr. Mayo called "high expectations". Our children CAN succeed in education if we get parents and teachers to join in this goal. I left this press conference very encouraged.

For parents, teachers or taxpayers who have further questions, Dr. Priddy can be contacted by phone at (252) 794-6015 or by email at mpriddy@bertie.k12.nc.us.

Brent Todd, Public Information Officer can be contacted by phone at (252) -794-6032 and by email at btodd@bertie.k12.nc.us.

Wayne Mayo, Curriculum Coordinator for Math/Science/Media can be contacted by phone at (252) 794-6004 or by email at wmayo@bertie.k12.nc.us.