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GIS: WE LEAD
The GIS Staff is proud to introduce a new student centered initiative that will have a very positive effect on our young learners and their futures. This initiative, GIS: We Lead - First we lead ourselves, then we lead others, focuses students on a set of leadership life skills that promote success in school, the community and their career or college aspirations. The goal is to create primary greatness in all learners, including communication skills, honesty and integrity, teamwork skills, self-motivation and goal setting practices, strong work ethic, analytical skills, organizational practices, creative and growth mindsets, and the ability to cope with and learn from change and disappointments. In brief, the focus is intended to empower our young people to make positive, effective, and responsible choices that support their own growth and will positively affect those around them.
Your student may have told you about the universal leadership lessons in their classes. This introductory lesson asked students to discover what being a leader means. The students were given many actions and characteristics that a leader would do and/or illustrate, which offered the learners ideas of ways to show their own leadership skills. The students not only grasped that the characteristics were those of a leader, they added other characteristics that a positive leader would possess. Please see the attached list of characteristics discussed during our lessons. The leadership conversations in the classrooms were powerful, proving that all of our students are leaders, they simply need to receive positive reinforcement when they show their positive qualities in order to promote the consistency in their leadership actions.
As always, working in partnership with families is one of our primary goals, as the support from the home and community ensures that our learners continue to grow. You will receive updates from the school via email, the GIS ebulletin, and hopefully your students. Please join us in reinforcing the leadership mission - a school-wide effort to have all GIS students show growth in leadership to empower the whole child. This mission starts with students leading themselves by taking responsibility to problem-solve, choosing their own actions, attitudes and moods and taking ownership for their mistakes in order to learn from them. The mission continues with goal setting and recognizing that as individuals they have control over their own futures. They are a part of something much bigger than themselves, such as their class, community, family, country and the world. Students will learn to prioritize and plan for themselves, and then follow through with their plan and reflect on their growth. They will also focus on recognizing that when they succeed, others succeed as well. Finally, learners will discover that they have to understand others’ points of view and thoughts before reacting. They will work on eye contact, communicating without interrupting and using others’ names when speaking to them, while learning from others and respecting all people’s differences and strengths.
This initiative has many facets, but most importantly, students will become the best leaders of themselves, which will directly affect and strengthen their performances in all areas of life: to improve academic engagement, comprehension, and performance by strengthening individual work habits and improving social interactions. The staff at Glenwood Intermediate School has made the commitment to model and implement the GIS: We Lead initiative in order to provide a supporting, caring and nurturing learning environment for our students. Teaching students and developing leaders is what we do.
Thank you for all that you do to support your student’s successes. We will continue to work with families and the community to help all students see the leaders in themselves and to help them create successes. Do not hesitate to contact Principal Gregurich at egregurich@bcsd5.org with any questions or comments. We welcome your input and appreciate your continued support.