Corbett Schools are overwhelmingly positive places to spend time. Kids and teachers work with each other towards common goals and amazing things happen. The kind of 8th grade speeches I see each spring could never have happened in the middle school I attended. Corbett’s high school leadership team spends time on canned food drives, cleaning up the commons, and writing grants to spruce up our weight room. This year’s medieval festival was great – and the list goes on and on. That’s the kind of good we want to build on.

This fall, we built a partnership between Corbett School District, Corbett’s Cheer Club, and a team of Concordia University student researchers led by Corbett Alum Dr. Reed Mueller. The goal of this partnership was (and is) to continue to build a positive school climate that highlights kind and compassionate interactions between all of Corbett’s students. Corbett Cheer Club’s fundraising efforts are an important part of this partnership. At the same time, Reed’s team of researchers set about to answer questions like: what sort of school climate campaigns have been tried elsewhere? Which of them worked well? What are the components of successful efforts? How might we go about measuring our existing school climate? This month, we’re expecting to hear back on the results of this work.

Our intention is to Keep Good Going (to borrow a phrase). The road map is still being built. The members of our team are committed, considerate, thoughtful members of the Corbett community. I’m excited to see what happens next. I’ll keep you posted regularly.