Brag Brag
Bullard Middle School building foundations for the future
Bobby Woodruff

"Foundations."

According to the dictionary, this is the part on which the other parts rest for support. Bullard Middle School has recently started its own support foundations. "Foundations" guide school teams through the process of a proactive and positive school in staff development, effective behavior management and behavior support for all students.

The school made application for the program and was accepted to be a part of six campuses in the Regional Vll area to participate in a 3-year in-depth training to be funded by Regional Vll. On July 31st, seven teachers attended a workshop in Kilgore under the direction of Mike Booeher from the Foundations Team in North Carolina.

Region Vll provided the funding which was $43,500 for a 3-year training program. The program accepted 6 schools in the Region. Bullard Middle School was the only Middle school accepted.

The Vision is for the school to become a safe, civil and productive place for all students and staff. In simple terms "We want Bullard Middle School to be a place where all students, staff and parents are treated in a positive, respectful manner and LOVE to be a part of our campus!"

The children of today now love luxury. Some have bad manners. Some show disrespect to adults and love to talk rather than work or exercise. Some contradict their parents, chatter in front of company, gobble down their food at the table and try to intimidate their teachers.

Behavior and discipline have always been a problem. Educators are frustrated as illustrated by the fact that discipline has been consistently ranked as one of the top two leading problems in education since the Gallop polls first started.

Bullard Middle School has adopted the term PAWS. Powered in Unity; Always ready; we can do it; Success for life. The following teachers who represent different grade levels and curriculum depts head the PAWS Team that consists of all the school staff up. The team will meet six times during the year at Kilgore for two-day training program up dates.

The team will meet with all the teachers and share ideas and plans to let other staff members have input into the program. Banners that are positive have been ordered.

For example," Walk and Talk," "Don't stop and Talk." The school has also ordered Tee Shirts with the PAWS name on top of a Panther Paw.

Two of the young students have started a drive to purchase a bulletproof vest for the Bullard Drug Dog. This program is called,"Vest A Dog Program." Shelby Zengerle first came up

with the idea after reading about the need and she researched it. Ashleigh Burton came on board and the girls started putting up posters and raising money for the project that will cost approximately $1,000.

The Foundation Team is made up of Lisa Williams, Assistant Principal; Rita Sprouis, 6th grade reading; Missy Hadjison, special ed. paraprofessional; Lori Kern, 8th grade reading; Sheila Alexander, Sp. Ed. teacher; and Rachel Crain, art teacher.

The Program works toward developing "Guidelines for Success", which are life long character traits the school believe are essential to being successful in life. The school is working toward defining and adopting school wide beliefs relative to behavior management and discipline.

It is important to create positive procedures to meet the needs of all students. Areas to concentrate on are

that no student"falls through the cracks." Plans are set up to respond to crises and emergency situations ranging from natural disasters to medical emergencies to behavioral emergencies.

Bullard Middle School believes that as a campus they can commit the time necessary to facilitate positive, productive involvement of all staff members.

The school can organize the environment in such a way that optimal learning will occur. Students can learn behavior skills for life that will shape their adulthood in a positive way.

Coach Ryan Tomlin teaches a Leadership class at the school that helps young students, seventh grade through twelfth grade to " learn and develop skills they need to be able to function positively in today's society. " One thing that the class focuses on is to show that the Emotional Quotient is just as important as the I.Q. of a student. There are several different

skills each student needs in order to function in today's society. If you don't have a positive attitude and have control of your emotions then you are not going to be successful. It is important to create a good first impression on people. You must be able to meet and greet other people, by learning to introduce your self.

There are times when you will be in an adverse situation and things are looking tough, whether it be death in the family or a problem with other students at school. We need to work at building our self-confidence to live in this society. "We teach students to say good things to other students and adults in a positive way."

The students give speeches in class one day per week to teach them how to communicate. All of the work is done through role-play as in real world situations.

Coach Tomlin is very happy with the results at this time as the students are buying into the program.