News

PHS Business Students Ready to Excel

Palatka High School senior Tedra Cooper smiles in her Digital Design class Tuesday afternoon. Cooper, who wants to become an architect, scored a 1,000 on her Microsoft Word Certification test in the class taught by Suzanne Seitz, who has been a business teacher for 21 years in the district, 16 at the home of the Panthers.

"I had not seen a score that high," Seitz said of Cooper's mark. "We thought the cap was 980."

Seitz praises all her seniors, including Zachary Nettles, who has passed the three Microsoft tests: Word, Excel and Powerpoint and is studying to become a Microsoft Master.

Seitz said the designation, and the Florida Ready to Work certification many graduates earn, gives the kids an edge in a competitive job environment.

Palatka High School seniors pose with their business teacher Suzanne Seitz Tuesday outside their classroom. Her students study to become proficient in aspects of Microsoft and can earn state Ready to Work certificates that facilitate careers after graduation.

Azalea City Kiwanis Honors Elite Middle Schoolers

Photos By Melissa McDaniel

Putnam County middle school students who earned all A's through sixth, seventh and eighth grade pose with savings bonds last week at the annual All A's event sponsored by each year by Azalea City Kiwanis.

Sixth-graders who earned all A's this year are recognized at a event last week sponsored by the Azalea City Kiwanis club and held at the National Guard Armory.

Seventh graders earning all A's this year pose at the National Guard Armory last week at the annual event sponsored by Azalea City Kiwanis.

Eighth graders pose at the annual All A's event honoring elite middle school students each year at the National Guard Armory.

State Education Chancellor Speaks with Local Teachers

Tom Townsend, Superintendent of Putnam County Schools, speaks Tuesday with Pam Stewart, the Chancellor of Public Schools for the Florida Department of Education.

The two conferred during a Teacher Incentive Fund Session at the PCSD Training Center, then went into to an office with PCSD team members to hear Tuesday's State Board of Education emergency call held on the impact on statewide scores of new FCAT writing standards.

The meeting featured teachers in an interactive session led by PCSD Assistant Superintendent Mary Beth Hedstrom. State and local Value Added Models were discussed, and Stewart spoke to teachers about the great strides Putnam has made implementing teaching methods driven by targeted data and advancing core curriculum.

Putnam teachers workshop Tuesday at a Teacher Incentive Fund session at PCSD's Training Center. The event was attended by Pam Stewart, the Chancellor of Public Schools for the Florida Department of Education.

Stewart and Superintendent Tom Townsend spoke to teachers, asking for questions among the large group.

One of the questions came from a local teacher on the fear that the trend toward intense data collection and review in modern education is a tool to fire teachers. The Chancellor and the Superintendent assured the group the data is collected with the opposite intent.

Beasley Teachers Get Red Carpet Treatment

Beasley Middle School band director and teacher Stanley Figaro is led by a student down a red carpet aisle in the Beasley auditorium last week. Beasley students helped organize the event to recognize their teachers during Teacher Appreciation Week.

Interlachen Elementary Kids, Teachers Celebrate Mother's Day

Photos By Pat Clark

Interlachen Elementary School students sing a song for their mothers, family and friends Friday at the school's annual Mother's Day celebration organized by the school's first-grade teachers.

Palatka High's Kristen Hund Putnam's Top Scholar

Putnam County's 2012 Robert W. Webb Award of Excellence winner Kristen Hund smiles at her friend and fellow Top 51 scholar Jared MacGibbon after winning the annual award at the ceremony hosted Monday night at her own Palatka High School.

Surrounded by family and friends before Monday night's ceremony honoring the top 51 scholars in Putnam high schools, recent surgery removing her wisdom teeth had Kristen Hund reluctant to be captured on film.

By the end of the ceremony, she had little choice.

Hund, the Palatka High School senior who earned eight varsity letters, volunteered at football games and painted the Panther mural in the school gym, is PCSD's top scholar, winning the Robert W. Webb Award of Excellence at the event.

She heads to college with her 4.58 GPA to become a physical therapist, a pharmacist, or, judges, friends and family said Monday, whatever in her ability that her community most needs.

An elite group of 51 seniors helped fill the PHS commons for the ceremony.

Uncompromising

Just before Christmas 2008, Interlachen High School's Cassie Martin was in a car accident. Air-lifted to a trauma center with grave and numerous injuries to her brain and body, doctors told her parents she would never return to excelling in school.

Today, the Top 51 scholar has 37 college credits, works 30 hours a week and heads to the University of North Florida on her way to being a doctor specializing in traumatic brain injury.

Martin's classmate Donald Johnson Jr. changed an entire school culture, IHS teacher Liz Middleton said.

Renewing a LGBT group at the school and inspiring peers to grow and mature, Middleton said Johnson is an inspiration to a school and community. He will study music, playing his favorite instrument -- the trumpet -- at one of two colleges, he said Monday night.

Crescent City Jr./Sr. High School's Kayshia Brady, star volleyball player, Career Superstar and tutor to younger Raider students, will work in the health field.

Palatka's Hena Patel plans a career in microbiology and cell science.

"I'll miss the high school because I feel like I've grown up with everybody here," Patel said before the ceremony. "It's going to be so sad."

Interlachen senior scholar Tyler Peterson heads for two years of mission work before a career in computer programming.

Classmate Kaylyn Bruce, the Ram's slugging first baseman, heads to the University of Central Florida to study psychology.

Alexandra Alvarez raises money to fight polio, is a Bible Bowl coach and will graduate with 46 college credits. She wants to be a teacher.

Panther classmates Tyler Hill Pickens and Taylor Aldrich plan to be lawyers. Kristen Stone-Erdman, with her 4.71 GPA, will finish her last year at St. Johns River State College, then head to the University of Florida to study elementary education. She said her sister, former top scholar Jessica Stone-Erdman inspired her to achieve in high school.

Robert W. Webb

The Palatka Daily News sponsored the event. Webb, the longtime Putnam County business man and civic leader was represented by his son Doug Webb.

PCSD Assistant Superintendent Mary Beth Hedstrom was the event's emcee and honored the parents, teachers and community surrounding the scholars.

Superintendent Tom Townsend asked the students to reflect on the teachers who helped them occupy their seats of honor Monday, and told them more than one generation awaits their leadership.

"You need to know that you are our inspiration," Townsend told the students.

PCSD Associate Superintendent Sam Foerster, once PCSD's top scholar, encouraged the students to be true to their dreams and find their life's work.

Patel said Hund was a great choice as the school district's top scholar.

"She's so deserving," Patel said. "She's kind and giving. They couldn't have picked a better person."

Kristen's father Robert Hund said he knew at one point when the winner's biography was being read, it must have been his daughter.

Every year, the winner's biography is read slowly, revealing detail by detail small clues of the winner, a method that produces anticipation even among 51 of some of the state's most accomplished scholars, many of whom have a multitude of accomplishments in common.

"When they said her GPA was 4.58, I figured, how many kids have that exact GPA?" he said.

Putnam's top scholar wasn't as quick to the realization.

"I was doubting it," Kristen said. "But more than halfway through the biography, it kind of clicked."

Among PCSD's Top 51 scholars, Tyler Hill Pickens receives his award Monday night at PHS.

PHS senior and one of PCSD's top 51 scholars Taylor Aldrich (left) smiles with PHS Guidance Counselor Becci Motes Monday night.

One of Putnam Schools' top scholars Meagon LeMelle stands with fellow honorees as the crowd assembled at Palatka High School for the annual ceremony applauds the outstanding seniors Monday night. LeMelle leaves high school with more than 500 hours of community service.

 

 

 

Beasley Students, Two Teachers Surprise Tiger Staff

Amy Getchell, left and Dawn Busey stand in front of Getchell's Science classroom door at Beasley Middle School. This past weekend Busey, a Beasley substitute teacher and president of the PTO, and Getchell, the Beasley sixth-grade Science teacher and PTO vice president, spent about 15 hours decorating the door of each teacher and staff member.

Students collaborated by writing messages that were posted by Getchell and Busey over the weekend, and by keeping the Teacher Appreciation Week project a surprise that employees walked into Monday morning.

Getchell said she has taught at other Putnam schools with positive experiences, but Beasley, she said, needs people eager to stand up for its students; and it's where she knows she belongs.

"This year has been hard on Beasley," Getchell said. "The whole thing was to get them to know the kids do care."

Beasley Principal Sandra Gilyard shows a staff member a message from a student to Beasley Middle School Teacher of the Year Stanley Figaro. For a couple of weeks, Beasley kids wrote notes to their teachers and staff, then Amy Getchell and Dawn Busey spent nearly their entire weekend creating each unique door for the start of Teacher Appreciation Week.

"The kids participation, and keeping it as quiet as they did, shows they care," Gilyard said. "And I think it will bring our teachers and students closer together. Beasley students are now seeing teachers -- rather than the enemy -- as people who care about them."

Beasley math teacher Jacob Massey smiles in front of his classroom door at the middle school. Beasley teachers and PTO leaders Amy Getchell and Dawn Busey spent most of last weekend tailoring each door to its teacher's personality, teaching style and subject. Students spent about two weeks creating messages for the doors in general secret, preparing for Monday's surprise.

Longtime Beasley staff member Kathy Garrett looks at her door, created by Amy Getchell and Dawn Busey and the students of Beasley Middle School to honor teachers and staff during Teacher Appreciation Week.

Beasley Middle School teacher Erika Wilson's classroom door features messages from her Beasley students. Two Beasley educators and students collaborated on a project to decorate the doors of the Beasley family for about 15 hours this past weekend.

Top Eighth Graders Honored Monday Night

Madison Wright (left) smiles with her mother Renee Wright at Monday night's Georgia-Pacific 8th Grade Honors Program. Wright, a student at Jenkins Middle School, was one of more than 60 eighth-graders honored for keeping GPAs at 3.7 or higher throughout middle school.

Donald Barber said school work comes easily to his son D.J.

D.J. Barber, a student at C.H. Price Middle School, was among more than 60 students recognized at Monday night's annual Georgia-Pacific 8th Grade Honors Program.

"It just comes natural to him," his dad said. "He also plays baseball and he's the only eighth-grader on the IHS soccer team."

Every child honored Monday sounded like a multi-tasker in biographies from their teachers read by the event's emcee, PCSD Assistant Superintendent Mary Beth Hedstrom.

Fellow Price eighth-grader Geneva Harsey sings, and wants to pursue a career as a pediatric plastic surgeon.

Jenkins Middle School's Emily McKinney is a gifted writer and speaker. Her schoolmate Michelle McCann wants a career in technology.

Gary Frost, Vice President of Operations at the GP Palatka Plant, told kids to be vigilant in keeping up with the world speeding around them.

"I guarantee in a few years we'll be thanking you for what you do for us," Frost said, calling the students before him the leaders of tomorrow.

Putnam Schools Superintendent Tom Townsend told the students the District will open every door of opportunity for them through their next four years of high school.

"The opportunity before you now, to stay focused on whatever it is you want to do ... is greater than ever," Townsend said.

Hedstrom thanked the classroom teachers who helped get the students to their seats of honor Monday night.

"Please know you are appreciated for all the work you do with our students," she said.

Eighth-graders and family members who work at program sponsor Georgia-Pacific pose after Monday night's eighth-grade awards ceremony that packed the commons at Palatka High School.

Jenkins Middle School's Molly Williams, who earned all A's in middle school, stands among a large crowd at PHS before Monday's eighth-grade honors ceremony recognizing the top incoming freshmen this fall in Putnam County.

Taylor Houk, a student at C.H. Price Middle School, receives her plaque at Monday's annual eighth-grade honors ceremony sponsored by Georgia-Pacific.

Beasley Middle School's La'Diamond Hightower smiles as she is honored as one of PCSD's top eighth-graders at Monday's annual ceremony sponsored by Georgia-Pacific.

Pig Kissing Raises Money at Browning-Pearce

Photos by Gary Nilsson

Browning-Pearce Elementary School Assistant Principal Matt Bergen less than an inch from kissing a pig at the school Friday. The school's fifth-graders held a fund-raiser for an upcoming Sea World trip and Bergen was among the lucky few to kiss the pig, who escaped the pen and spent almost a day on the lam before being corralled by school staff for the kissing.

Cindy David celebrates at a pig-kissing Sea World fundraiser at Browning-Pearce Friday.

Browning-Pearce kids gather to watch their teachers and administrators kiss pigs and raise money for a field trip to Sea World. Kids and parents raised $229 at the event.

Area Leaders Meet Tuesday at SJRSC

By Adam Azula

State Sen. John Thrasher speaks with Superintendent Tom Townsend Tuesday at St. Johns River State College. During his talk, Thrasher stressed the importance of promoting science and technology degrees at all state universities. Townsend shared with Sen. Thrasher Putnam schools' involvement with launching the new STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) high school.

Business owners, community leaders, and elected officials from all facets of Putnam County met with State Sen. John Thrasher Tuesday at St. Johns River State College. Thrasher briefly spoke about his career as an elected official and his outlook on a number of state and local projects. 

At the event hosted by SJRSC President Joe Pickens, who was also at the table, Thrasher took questions and comments from the audience concerning the state and future of Putnam County.

Above from left are: Putnam County Commissioner Ed Taylor, Thrasher, PCSD Superintendent Tom Townsend and St. Johns River State College Executive Vice President Melissa Miller.

Youth Success Day Rocks Ravines

A group of Putnam students, all members of the Superintendent's Student Advisory Council, celebrate at Youth Success Day, which packed Ravine Gardens Tuesday with students receiving awards for myriad accomplishments in their schools and communities.

Putnam Schools Superintendent Tom Townsend speaks to a Ravine Gardens crowd of students and community members at Tuesday's Youth Success Day, by far the largest drawn at the now annual event hosted at the state park. Townsend told the students that watching them grow into proactive, mature leaders has been one of the biggest honors of his life.

A student advisory council member laughs with The Rev. Karl Flagg at Tuesday's Youth Success Day. Flagg inspired students in one of the event's workshops, encouraging them to make the apex of their dreams the floor from which they reach for the stars.

Read more on the event -- featuring Beasley's drum line and organized collaboratively with the Putnam County Anti-Drug Coalition -- in an upcoming issue of Insight.