Brian M. Stack's School Leadership Blog

This article appeared in two national blogs this week: www.competencyworks.org www.connectedprincipals.com  Carter’s Story This past week I had the privilege of attending an IEP meeting for Carter, a student that I have come to know quite well over the past three years. Carter has a learning disability and was diagnosed with ADHD back in fifth grade. School has always been a struggle for him, particularly the parts of school that require him to be focused and attentive in class and to meet assignment deadlines for his teachers in a timely manner. When he is focused, school comes relatively easy to him. With the help of his case manager and the support of his parents over the last two years, Carter has managed to earn all of his freshman credits and sophomore credits. The final course grades that appear on his transcript aren’t stellar, but regardless no one can argue with the fact that he reached proficiency for each of his course competencies and thus received credit f...

This article will appear in the January 2013 student newspaper the Sanborn Voice : At the end of this month, your guidance counselor will begin the course selection process with you. Thinking back to my own high school days at Timberlane in the mid-1990’s, I know this can be a somewhat daunting task. The process usually starts with an adult asking you an innocent question like “what classes do you want to take next year?” but it quickly morphs into a broader discussion on future college and career planning. I always thought that if I just had a crystal ball I could look ten years into the future and see what jobs would be most popular. The problem is, we don’t always know what the future will hold or what our needs will be in two years, much less five or ten years. Luckily, there are lots of organizations and statisticians that make a living trying to analyze data and trends to predict what the future might look like. Their work today can help you as you begin to make some imp...

Tonight, for the first time, we will welcome 8th grade students and parents  (our Class of 2017) to come and learn more about our school. Before I pass the baton to Assistant Principal Ann Hadwen who will lead the group in an introduction to our Freshman Learning Community, I want to use this video to frame my opening remarks. My goal is to use it to get the point across that the video represents the future that we are preparing Sanborn kids for today because in 2020, our in-coming ninth graders will be juniors in college and preparing to enter the world of work and address all of the issues and problems this video raises as well as the countless others that we don't even know are problems yet. In a future blog post I will get into more details about the jobs and career fields that will be most popular in 202 and how they link to current SRHS programs and initiatives.

Sanborn Regional High School administrators collect data on all discipline and safety referrals that are made by staff and students. The chart below gives a five year summary of that end-of-year referral data which is reported to the State of New Hampshire as part of the school’s annual safety survey. Infraction Type 07-08 08-09 09-10 10-11 11-12 Electronic Equipment 45 50 41 169 93 Left Class w/o Permission or Tardy 136 93 76 126 43 Dress Code Violation 7 12 9 77 11 Cut Class/Advisory 397 304 180 445 151 Cut Teacher or Office Detention 297 33 15 41 13 Other Misbehavior 567 366 296 454 570 Off School Grounds 101 129 75 76 94 Profanity/Rudeness/Disrespect 95 74 108 76 94 ...