New Beginnings and Winning Streaks
Late summer in Saskatchewan brings two important seasons together. While our schools prepare to welcome students and staff for a new year, farm families across the province are preparing for harvest.
Having grown up working on our family farm near Canora, I understand the long hours, changing weather and hard work that harvest demands. I also remember learning that machinery rarely breaks down at a convenient time, and that Saskatchewan mosquitoes apparently consider evening repairs a catered event.
To everyone involved in harvest, I wish you a safe, productive, and rewarding season.
The beginning of a new school year is about more than returning to classrooms. It is a new beginning filled with opportunities to learn, grow, and connect. For me, this year also marks the beginning of new relationships with Prairie Valley’s students, staff, families, Board members, and communities. I look forward to listening, learning and building relationships grounded in trust, respect and our shared commitment to the success and well-being of every student.
Educator and author Todd Whitaker describes one of the gifts of education as the opportunity to begin each school year “undefeated.” Students and staff return with a fresh start. The new year gives us an opportunity to establish positive expectations, build meaningful relationships and create the conditions in which everyone can learn and thrive.
As we begin this year together, I hope we recognize the influence we have through our daily actions. A word of encouragement, an invitation to participate, a patient response or a moment spent listening can have a lasting effect. When we approach one another with hope, curiosity and a belief in what is possible, we help create places where people feel valued, supported and ready to learn.
Rick Stiggins encourages educators to help every student experience enough success to begin a “winning streak”. A winning streak can be defined as one in which progress builds confidence, confidence encourages effort, and effort opens the door to further success. That process energizes students and the adults who work alongside them.
These winning streaks are created through excellent learning experiences in our classrooms, but they can also begin on an athletic field, on a stage, in a music room, through a cultural activity, in a leadership role, or as part of a club. The many additional opportunities provided by our staff give students different places to discover their strengths, experience belonging, and recognize that they are capable of achieving something meaningful and excellent.
A student’s winning streak may begin with solving a difficult problem, performing for an audience, contributing to a team, creating something original or simply discovering a place where they feel they belong. We may not always know which experience will provide that first spark, which is why every opportunity, and every relationship, matters in great ways.
As I begin my own new chapter with Prairie Valley, I am grateful for the opportunity to become part of this learning community. Outside of my professional life, I enjoy spending time with my wife, Darlene, and our two daughters, travelling, gardening, playing the occasional video game, and exploring scenic places across Western Canada by motorcycle. Gardening, incidentally, continues to provide me with regular lessons in hope, perseverance and accepting outcomes that were not part of the original plan.
I look forward to meeting the people of Prairie Valley, learning about our schools and communities, and working together to create opportunities for every student to begin, and continue, their own winning streak.
Here’s to a safe harvest, a hopeful beginning, and a rewarding school year ahead.
Cory