Join the Building Relationships and Partnerships to Support Student Achievement program on Tuesday March 15, 2022. The program is hosted by District 186 Family and Community Engagement and will run from 5:50 – 7:30 p.m.
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Local Educator Award Recipient at the 92nd Illinois Association for Career and Technical Education Annual Meeting and Conference
Patricia Krummrich, Springfield District 186 was recently named the recipient of the “IACTE New Teacher of the Year Award” during the Illinois Association for Career and Technical Education annual conference. The conference was held at the Bloomington Normal Marriott Hotel and Conference Center in Normal, IL, February 17-18, 2022.
The New Teacher of the Year Award goes to a classroom/laboratory CTE teacher at the middle, secondary or post-secondary school level with three to five years’ experience of teaching. This award is given to an individual for making significant contributions toward innovative and unique career and technical education programs and showing a professional commitment early in his or her career.”
Krummrich brought over 10 years of experience in the field of culinary arts to her classroom. Recognitions include, Horace Mann’s Rising Star and IFACSTA’s New Teacher of the Year. During the last two years, her accomplishments made it possible for over 150 students to get their food handlers license for free. To make learning more interactive and fun, she designed her own line of Bitmoji classrooms and interactive slides for her students. She received funding for a Donors Choice project, which enabled her to establish a greenhouse in her room where students could plant and then cook with spices and herbs.
The Illinois Association for Career and Technical Education is made up of eight affiliates representing all areas of career and technical education. The organization’s goals include provisions for quality career and technical education, in-service opportunities and program improvement for Illinois’ career and technical educators, administrators and guidance counselors.
For more information, contact: Cindy Stover, IACTE Executive Director/Consultant, (217) 737-3595
A gap in representation? District 186 partners with UIS to hire more teachers of color (SJ-R.com, 2/28/2022)
By Tiffani Jackson
The State Journal-Register
As a single mother of four, pursuing the goal of becoming a teacher was always a struggle for Tonika Palmer.
She had already gained a bachelor’s degree in political science and wanted to further her education, but finances and other responsibilities got in the way.
Palmer became a paraprofessional at Laketown Elementary School so she could still make a difference in the lives of the next generation even if she didn’t have her teaching license. But that plan recently changed as she’s now back in the classroom due to a Springfield program intended to help solve the teacher shortage and diversify the teaching ranks.
“I needed money to go back to school because I had already used my money. As a mother there was always conflict with work and finding an opportunity to finance school so when I found out this program would be willing to pay for me to go while being a teacher assistant, I was definitely interested,” Palmer said.
The Diverse Workforce Pipeline program, a joint effort of Springfield School District 186 and University of Illinois Springfield, launched in January to help candidates of color earn licenses to teach in local schools.
District 186 chief equity and school improvement officer Jamar Scott said the conversation about the program started when his team debated how to spend its Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds. Turning its attention to Springfield’s 1976 desegregation order, the team agreed that the district has not been in compliance.
“The order says we should work to get our teaching staff to reflect the diversity of our community, so we looked at data from the most recent census. Each racial demographic and our school teaching population should mirror that, yet we have not been anywhere close,” he said.
Based on the 2020 census, 87.8% of District 186 teachers are white while only 12.2% are minorities. Scott and Interim Director of the UIS School of Education Christie Magoulias believe the issue stems from recruiting.
“If you rarely see people that look like you doing this, you never think this is something you can do. You also have a lot of options when you graduate from college so getting people to come to Springfield when they have a Chicago or a larger urban area is often difficult unless you have candidates who are from areas similar to here,“ Scott said.
“We haven’t done a great job of recruiting people of color into education or looking into experiences and going where they are to ask how they can bring their culture, knowledge, and experience to our profession,” Magoulias said.
“Times have changed and now we’re really focused on not only increasing the amount of teachers we produce, but serving first generation college students, populations of color, and those of lower socioeconomic status by lifting them into education because this is the greatest profession on earth.”
The Diverse Workforce Pipeline program educates locals who have desired to become teachers but struggle because of financial ability. It provides relief through the district’s use of some of its ESSER funds to pay tuition, books and fees for candidates enrolled in the program.
“These are teacher aides, substitutes, personal aides, and volunteers who’ve shown commitment to District 186. So the district and UIS will be helping those folks who want to become licensed teachers get to that point which is going to improve their salary, give them the professional license they need, and have them turn around and be employed immediately in district 186 to cover the many classrooms that don’t have a teacher right now,” Magoulias said.
The program offers courses at the University of Illinois Springfield or Millikin University based on the candidate’s choice of study. It officially started this spring and so far eight people have enrolled.
Palmer is one of the eight and is taking courses in special education through the University of Illinois Springfield teacher educator program. She said she was appreciative of the Diverse Workforce Pipeline targeting candidates of color because if students of color see teachers who look like them, it makes a difference.
“One of my first students in the district was a student of color and we are very close. To this day he looks for me, he wants to know where I am, and what took me so long to get to work because he identifies with me so I think it’s important for them to not only see a person of color, but someone who understands culturally about the things they deal with,” Palmer said.
“While other people may not understand why a child is doing a certain thing, saying a particular saying, or understand that they don’t mean to be ‘hood,’ I can. I know that’s all they see at home and in their communities so I have a duty to help them overcome and see that they can be better,” she said.
Palmer looks forward to the benefits the program will provide for the community and the boost of confidence in her career. She said she hopes to still make an impact even if she does stand out.
“I’m hoping it’ll help me overcome the challenge of being a minority in a field predominantly carried by Caucasian women,” Palmer said. “ I want to learn how to not only fit in with the community but make an impact as a person of color and lead colored children in a way that works for them. It’s not about assimilating them to a particular way but allowing them to still be themselves and learn.”
By spreading the word and sharing her experience, Palmer has faith that her presence will inspire more people to enroll in the program. She starts classes in pursuit of her license to teach special education in the fall and is eager for the future of representation.
“I hope it encourages men and women of color to look into this program because our kids are scattered throughout the district. Hopefully me being in the program will encourage people to know that even if they don’t work in education but they want to, there’s room.”
Among the drivers of the Diverse Workforce Pipeline program is the education committee of Springfield’s NAACP. Sherri Hamilton, chair of the committee, said it is important to hold the district accountable to the desegregation order. Her team has worked with Scott to make sure the district stays on its job.
“The NAACP has not stopped watching, we know that it hasn’t been fulfilled and the district has an obligation to do that. Mr. Scott has been very proactive in his role since he’s been there and it’s exciting to see that the funds are coming forth to put some action in place,” Hamilton said. “We’d like to see District 186 become one of the best educational systems in the nation and making priority proactive decisions such as the pipeline to recruitment and retention of the intellectual, emotional, and social excellence that diversification can offer, will move us forward in that direction.”
Scott said the NAACP’s help made a huge difference in the strategy of the program.
“They have the oversight to make sure that this continues as a goal and the support they provide is important. It helps us to think outside of the box about whether we can use money to work towards a certain effort, so I’m looking forward to where we go,”
He said hopefully in the next five years there won’t be talks about being in compliance with the order, and the amount of district teachers will match where the student population is.
“We’re in a good place and have a good team in our district office and this is something that’s important to all of us so we want to live to see the reality and not just hope for it,” Scott said.
Sixty people have expressed interest in the program so far. Scott hopes the program will become permanent and help more candidates. He hopes to find more sources of funding.
Updated Lanphier Renovation Planned Unveiled | 92.7 WMAY
By the WMAY Newsroom, February 23, 2022
District 186 has rolled out an expanded renovation plan for Lanphier High School that will speed up the timeline for major improvements to the building and the adjacent Memorial Stadium.
After initially budgeting $66 million for the first phase of improvement, the district now plans to spend $93 million to upgrade the building, including a new auditorium, gymnasium, and commons area. The money will also pay for a new entrance, locker rooms, and ticket office for Memorial Stadium.
Some of the work is already underway, and the project should be largely completed by the fall of 2023.
Act of God days clarification from the Reg. Supt.
Please see the message below from Shannon Ferholz, Regional Superintendent of Schools regarding clarification about Act of God days.
Each school board is required by law to annually prepare a calendar for the school term that specifies both the opening and closing dates of the term. The proposed calendar must provide a minimum term of at least 185 days that includes five emergency days.
Emergency days may be used at the discretion of the district. An emergency day must be made up prior to the end of the school year. The School Code mandates that a minimum of five proposed emergency days must be built into the proposed public school calendar. Any unused emergency days must be taken off prior to submitting the final public school calendar (105 ILCS 5/10-19).
Act of God (AOG) days may only be applied for after the district has exhausted all the proposed emergency days built into the proposed calendar. AOG days are used for a condition beyond the control of the district that poses a hazardous threat to the health and safety of the students. These days must be approved by the Regional Superintendent and the State Superintendent of Education. AOG days reduce the required number of student attendance days in the public school calendar (105 ILCS 5/18-12).