Exploring a century of education

The following is a guest post from Amanda Rogers, Managing Editor of the Mansfield News-Mirror. It first appeared as an article in the October 23, 2009 issue of the Mansfield News-Mirror's Mansfield Life section.
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The world can change in 100 years, particularly the past century.

World wars can be fought, man can walk on the moon, fatal diseases can be conquered, telephones can become commonplace and carried in our pockets and communication can progress from telegrams to the Internet.

The Mansfield school district has been through it all, celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.

Growing from a few students in a leftover building to more than 30,000 on 39 campuses (as soon as Annette Perry Elementary opens), the district has survived recessions, depressions, war, racial conflict and unprecedented growth to become a respected name throughout the Metroplex and the state.

This fall school officials formed a committee to decide how to celebrate a century of education. Because I love history and I’m incredibly nosy, they put me on the committee. Our first task was to figure out what to do. Most of us don’t know any centenarians, at least not ones as vital as the Mansfield school district. Do we hold a party, send a card?

We decided to start by looking back at where the district had started and documenting its life and the times that it had seen, sort of a "This Is Your Life, MISD."

This turned out to be a lot more involved than we thought, and we’re only through the first decade. First, we explored the school board minutes, starting with the first trustee election May 22, 1909, and the creation of the school district – the handwritten school board minutes. Just so we’re clear, penmanship was a lot better 100 years ago, but that doesn’t mean that all those flourishes are easy to read.

We also discovered that the same people kept getting elected.

Then we found the same names on the city elections when we dug into the City Council’s (again handwritten) minutes from the same period. Not only were they all the same people, but they were hiring family members and making payments for goods and services to their own businesses. At first we thought this was a big scam, something today’s ethics seriously frown on. Then we figured out with only a few people living in town, there were only a few business people in Mansfield and most of them were on the school board.

Teachers and principals who have survived opening a new campus know how much work it is to get a school up and running, everything from hiring employees, setting up classrooms, lunchrooms and libraries to choosing a mascot and ordering textbooks. Imagine starting with nothing, not even chalk.

The first thing the school board did was start hiring teachers, then find a place to hold classes. The Mansfield Academy, a private school (pictured at right) that closed in the summer of 1909, sold the new district its buildings at the corner of what is now North Walnut Creek Drive and East Broad Street, where the school administration buildings are today. [PHOTO credit: Mansfield Historical Museum]

Then there was setting policies — like no student dating — making repairs on the building, setting tax rates, installing lights, hiring a superintendent and even what to do when the water in the well goes bad.

Exploring what was going on around these people while they were making all these decisions was just as interesting, with a war in Europe that Americans soon became a part of to states entering the union. (New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska and Hawaii weren’t even states when the Mansfield school district opened.)

To fully explore the century of the Mansfield school district is a big undertaking, one that the committee plans to take in small decade-size bites. Once a month in Mansfield Life, we will document a different decade, following the district’s growth and progress with a 100-year timeline. The first decade, 1909-1919, is featured in this section on Pages 8B-9B.

[View PDF versions of 1909-1919 Page 1 and Page 2.]

A lot of work and exploration has gone into this historical detective work. I hope you enjoy it and learn as much as we did.

Site location for Performing Arts Auditorium and Professional Development Center

At the October 27 Regular School Board meeting, the MISD School Trustees moved to "put the MISD Performing Arts Auditorium and Professional Development Center at The Shops at Broad pending the final resolution of a tri-party agreement between MISD, City of Mansfield and Forest City Developers at the November 17th Board Meeting."

What does this mean?
The Board, along with district administrators, are committing to building the now approved facility at The Shops at Broad (Highway 287 and Broad Street) location as long as a mutually beneficial agreement can be made.

Currently under consideration is an agreement that has the district trading 12 acres it owns near Mary Orr Intermediate School for 12 acres inside the development that the city owns.

District Superintendent Dr. Bob Morrison remains committed to keeping MISD from incurring any additional construction costs related to building at The Shops at Broad site.

Over the next three weeks leading up to the November 17 Regular School Board meeting, negotiations will continue to take place. The District has set the November 17 deadline in order to begin construction as soon as possible so they are able to take full advantage of the comparatively low construction costs.

The plans now are to have the Performing Arts Auditorium and Professional Development Center construction completed Spring 2012 in time for graduations.

Mansfield Legacy Bronco Band heading to state

Updated Wednesday, November 4, 2009: The LHS Bronco Band finished 7th overall in the state after an exhausting day at the UIL state marching band competition. From a report in the fort Worth Star-Telegram, "The 180-member band was up at 4 a.m. to make a 6 a.m. practice. They performed in the preliminaries about 9:15 a.m. and returned to Alamodome’s field at 7:15 p.m. to perform in the state 4A UIL marching band finals."

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On Saturday, October 24, the Mansfield Legacy High School Bronco Band advanced out of the Area UIL Marching Band competition and is heading to the state contest. This accomplishment represents the first such UIL state marching band advancement for the Mansfield ISD.

The 186-member Bronco Band takes its show entitled “Signal to Noise,” which according to Director Mr. Glenn Fugett, is about the use of electronics and the evolution of the orchestra.

“The band had two terrific performances,” said Fugett. “I am especially pleased with how well they are playing. The students have so much determination. They love what they are doing and they believe in the show.”

The LHS band advanced to the UIL Area competition following a great effort along with a select group of fellow 4A schools including the Mansfield Timberview Wolf Band which also competed over the weekend. (Watch the Wolf Band's show from the UIL Area Competition.)

Congratulations to these bands and supporters on jobs well done.

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Updated 10/27/09 - Below is a video produced by the LHS Rider Online student newspaper about the Bronco Band's UIL Area win:

State UIL marching band contest - Nov. 3: Class 4A competition

Place: Alamodome, San Antonio

Cost: $10 for students, $15 for adults for a single session. An adult one-day pass to the preliminaries and finals is $25.

Schedules will be posted on the University Interscholastic League Web site

Legacy Bronco Band
Timberview Wolf Band

Poverty Simulation an Eye-opening Experience

While the students enjoyed a day off of school, staff members from Linda Jobe Middle School participated in an exercise designed to give them a glimpse into the lives of some of their students who live at or below the poverty line.

The Jobe Middle School staff took part in a poverty simulation experience based on a program by the Missouri Association for Community Action where "participants role-play the lives of low-income families, from single parents trying to care for their children to senior citizens trying to maintain their self sufficiency on Social Security."

The task of each family is to provide food, shelter and other basic necessities during the course of four 15-minute "weeks" while interacting with various community resources.

The community resource volunteers in this simulation included Mansfield ISD administrators and support staff. Resource volunteer roles included a police officer, utility collector, pawnbroker, grocer, mortgage/rent collector, Quick Cash manager, social service caseworker, Community Action worker, employer, child care worker, schoolteacher (played by school namesake, Linda Jobe), faith-based agency staffer, and a bank/loan officer.

The experience
After the simulation, the staff "families" held a debriefing period during which participants shared amongst themselves and the larger group their thoughts about what they learned and specific impressions on the exercise.

A few of the insights shared by the staff included:

• Most of us were doing what we could just to make it.
• Many people are victims of circumstance.
• I was scared to death of losing my job.
• It was a rough experience.
• We didn't know what to do, but we wanted to do the right thing.
• Thinking about the children in class and their families, it became apparent how challenging it must be.
• This was such a learning experience.
• Children with no food will have a difficult time just sitting quietly at home or learning in school.
  
• Unexpected circumstances can have a directly negative impact on the classroom experience.
  
• Feelings of helplessness are a reality for many.

The facilitator stressed how this program was a simulation and not a game. It was a simulation tool used to help participants view poverty from different angles in an experiential setting. The object was to sensitize the staff to the realities that are faced by low-income students and their families. Linda Jobe Middle School teachers had a small taste of the frustration and challenges that are everyday experiences for some students.

Linda Jobe Middle School staff members are invited to provide any additional feedback from the poverty simulation via comments.

Related information

• National Center for Children in Poverty
• Tarrant County Services for children & families
• Mansfield Cares
• City of Arlington Community Services
  

Where's my kindergartner's report card?

There seems to be some confusion as to why report cards did not go home this first six weeks period with kindergarten students. To the parents of kindergarten students, you are not alone. It's the same for first graders too.

Why?

Kindergarten and first grade are a little different from the upper grades in that the report card is very complex and teachers will take the first 12 weeks (the first two six-weeks grading periods) to evaluate the students.

The teachers spend time observing the students during their time in centers, using manipulatives, and interacting with other students. The teachers record observations and ultimately share them with parents during conferences as well as later in the year through the regular six-weeks reporting period.

The first kindergarten and first grade report cards are scheduled to go home on Thursday, November 19. If you have any additional questions, please contact your teacher.