Last spring, as a part of Corbett’s accreditation process, two staff members from the Northwest Accreditation Commission (NWAC) visited our school. As a result of this visit, NWAC approved Corbett’s accreditation and made two recommendations for school improvement. Their second recommendation was that Corbett investigate the use of specific tracking tools that NWAC makes available to its member schools. The first recommendation was that Corbett redouble its efforts to “share the good news” about our schools. I thought that was a really good recommendation, so here goes:

Last year, Corbett High School was listed among the top 100 public high schools in the nation by Newsweek, US News and World Report, and the Washington Post. This isn’t new news, I guess, but still worth mentioning.

This fall, school officials from Louisiana will be visiting Corbett so they can see for themselves the great things that are happening here. It’s worth noting that last year a different group from Louisiana visited and the lead teacher from that group returned home, led sweeping reform efforts in her school, and became teacher of the year.

Later this year a Colorado school district will be providing the funds to fly a few Corbett HS teachers out to observe in classrooms and offer help and suggestions.

In November, Corbett’s MS teachers will be presenting at the National Middle-Level Association about the fantastic things happening in our middle school.

These things are great, but they’re not my favorite ones. Here are some of my favorite ones:

MS morning meeting every single morning. I’ve never seen anything like it.

The way the HS commons looks during class time – it’s empty. Kids are in class.

Kids working with their teachers to get help at all hours. The last one I saw was Mrs. Duprey working with freshman in her room during lunch time.

The fight the JV volleyball team showed last Thursday against Valley Catholic and the fact that they bounced back to beat Valley Catholic on Saturday.

“Math explosions” during my MS math class and the “shockwave” bit that Carah Kerslake added this morning.

Staff members every day doing the extra things to make stuff work.

And then my all time favorite hands down – my daughter attends CAPS, and this morning when I woke her up to go to school she jumped out of bed (I’m not exaggerating) and said “Yeah! I was wondering what was taking you so long.”

Good call NWAC – our hands are filled up with good things and we should keep talking about them.