Month: September 2011

Categories
8 Keys of Excellence

In Search of Excellence

By Bob Yttredahl
Upper School Coordinator

Two weeks ago, just before our first Upper School Retreat, I presented the 8 Keys of Excellence to the students. I wanted to present the information in a manner that not only reiterated the importance of being good people, but also the impact the keys can have on each person’s life. In doing so, I presented data from years of research to support the notion of the importance of traits like character and integrity and apply them to their everyday life.

The research outlined the following top ten qualities that employers look for in applicants:

  • Communication Skills
  • Honesty/Integrity
  • Teamwork Skills
  • Interpersonal Skills
  • Self-motivation/Initiative
  • Strong Work Ethic
  • Analytical Skills
  • Technology Skills
  • Organizational Skills
  • Creative Minds

The research also focused on what colleges look for in applicants, outside of grades and test scores. The top ten list included students who:

  • Are well-rounded, yet dedicated to the cause/subject/activity they love
  • Work hard
  • Take advantage of the opportunities given to them
  • Are willing to try something new
  • Are critical thinkers
  • Are good communicators
  • Are independent and group workers
  • Are authentic
  • Can honestly represent themselves well
  • Understand and stick to their values

This information really stressed the importance of working on the eight keys and striving to be the best person one can be. As principles, the 8 Keys of Excellence do more than create a more positive environment—they change lives. Becoming aware of these eight principles and committing to them is both exciting and challenging, pushing us to strive for excellence and positively impacting the world we live in. For as we learn to model our beliefs, other people in our lives are influenced by our behavior and often follow the examples we set.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”   ~Aristotle

 

Categories
College Readiness

Faring Well at College Fairs

By Heather Dondis
Director of College Placement, Lakehill Preparatory School

Fall is an extremely busy time for college admissions officers. They are on the road for weeks at a time trying to visit as many students as possible. Admissions officers schedule visits at individual high schools, attend college fairs, and set up information sessions at local hotels or public meeting places like libraries or community centers. Some will also schedule one-on-one appointments or interviews at neutral locations – Starbucks is a favorite.

I encourage everyone in high school to attend a college fair. Students and often their families attend to collect information and ask questions. Don’t be afraid to approach the table of a college you don’t know much about. With over 4500 different colleges and universities, there are many wonderful places to learn and live.

One tip that will make a college fair visit more productive is to bring labels or note cards with your basic information pre-printed on them. Be sure to include your first and last name, mailing address, email address, name of high school, and year of graduation. This allows you to spend less time filling out forms and more time speaking with the admissions representatives.

Check with your local guidance or college counselor or the universities themselves to find out more about local events and fairs.

Categories
Lower School Traditions

Monday Moments

By Patti Brooks
Lower School Coordinator, Lakehill Preparatory School

We have begun a new tradition in Lower School this year called the Monday Moments assemblies. Many goals are in place for this weekly K-4th meeting, such as:
1. Spotlighting the patriotism shown by our Lower School children when they stand tall and begin the assembly with the Pledge of Allegiance….(I must admit the first time I heard all of thier voices ring out, I felt like crying. It was so moving to see 140 children so respectfully pledging their allegiance to our flag!)
2. Recognizing the individuality of the FOCUS students in each of the 5 grades. We introduce them and their parents to kick off a week of special attention showered on every Lower School student each year. This special, fun week really gives us insight into the many talents of each student as they enjoy the spotlight in their classroom each year they are in Lower School.
3. Celebrating the accomplishments of students who have said their Memory Work for that six weeks or have done exemplary work on their Reading or Math Folders. Lower School teachers are always watching for outstanding work to praise.
4. Fostering school spirit in many ways such as singing the school Alma Mater and learning a cheer from the Middle School cheerleaders. (We raise our hands, pound our feet, and blast out “Lakehill Warriors Can’t Be BEAT” with exuberance and excitement.)
5. Bragging on the accomplishments of individual students who have won competitons, medals, trophies, awards, badges, etc. outside of school. We have a wonderfully talented group of children, many who excell at several sports and have varied talents. We like to “sing their praises” often!
6. I have found that everyone has some talents, but not all children know their talents. One of the most important goals of the Monday Moments assembly is to point out the talents of those who are kind, unselfish, and compassionate. The Rachel’s Challenge links  are helping us accomplish this goal. Children turn in links to their teachers, praising and thanking their peers for “playing with me when I was lonely at recess”, “walking in with me to get a bandaid and help clean my cut”, “smiling encouragement at me when I got the answer wrong”, etc.  These heroes in our midst are being noticed and recognized in front of the whole Lower School each week. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if every Monday in every office or place of business this was done?
I’m proud of our wonderful Lower School students and the outstanding teachers that make this assembly possible. “It takes a village” and ours is working smoothly.
Categories
Service Learning

Serving Others

By Kaye Hauschild
Middle School Coordinator 

On Wednesday of last week, we had the first meeting of this year’s Community Connections club. The club is made up of Middle School students who want to spend their spare time doing projects that serve needs in our school and in our community. It is my pleasure to get to work with Gigi Ekstrom on planning and executing our efforts. She will lead a group of Lower School students who also want to help others. We have an ambitious plan for our fall semester, filled with opportunities to reach out to a variety of groups, including a small neighborhood food bank, an assisted living community for senior citizens, a preschool and an elementary school, an organization that supports families in need of a new beginning, and our own efforts at White Rock Lake.

As we began planning for this school year’s efforts, I could not help but remember the many projects that I have been honored to participate in throughout my years at Lakehill. As a new member of Lakehill’s faculty, I assisted Evan Higgon, English teacher, Senior Class sponsor, and unofficial service guru, at the East Dallas Senior Citizens organization. We held annual canned food drives that supported the group’s monthly deliveries to area senior citizens in need. We also helped some of those seniors with home and yard care. We included their membership in our invitations to our annual Holiday Luncheon. When the organization lost their grant money and closed their doors, we created our own food bank and continued the monthly food deliveries that the seniors had come to rely on. Over time, we were able to find agencies to assist the remaining membership and our impromptu food bank shut its doors, but the memories, the sense of accomplishment, and the true joy of making a difference are still alive in my heart as I suspect they are in others who gave their time and energy to this project.

So I take extra pleasure and pride in sharing in the continuation of this worthy tradition. Service is the focus of Community Connections, but it is also one of the top priorities of our class organizations and clubs like Sisteens and Pan American Student Forum. It is not a requirement for anyone, but sharing our time, talents, and energy with others lives on as a memorable and impactful part of the Warrior experience.

Categories
Family and Community

Family Pride

By Lara Gajkowski
Assistant Head of School, Lakehill Preparatory School 

Growing up in a large family certainly has its benefits. I was undoubtedly never alone or without built-in playmates and I rarely can remember a time when my nuclear family of eleven lived alone. Grandparents, cousins, aunties and uncles, my sister, her spouse, and their child all lived at my house at one time or another and it was not uncommon to have overlapping families living with us at one time. It was a rich, active, boisterous, loving household. I am still very close to all my siblings, my ninety-year-old mother, and my extended family. However, being one of twenty as a nightly crowd for dinner or sharing one bathroom among the myriad of people does have its challenges!

My father was a high school science teacher and coach and a very good one at that. My mother stayed home and managed the crowd, the meals, the laundry, the conflicts, the holidays . . . in a word, everything! In her spare time, she made most of my clothes and those of my sisters and cooked all of our meals. She was and remains a remarkable, formidable woman.

The values instilled in me at home as a child – loyalty to family, commitment to hard work, taking care of others, showing gratefulness for the things given, and enjoying the spirit of a high energy community are the values that drew me to Lakehill as a professional.

When I first entered the halls of Lakehill years ago, I was warmed by a community that seemed so child-centered, warm, nurturing, and spirited. In many ways, I felt like I was coming home. What I most value about Lakehill is the opportunity children of all ages are given to try on different hats. It is an environment that challenges and encourages students to strive, to give, to learn, to play, and to work hard. I love seeing the same faces on the athletic fields, in the plays and musicals, in the choirs, in various competitions, as well as on stage receiving recognition for academic accomplishments.

It is an environment where kids may squabble like siblings yet revel in each other’s accomplishments. Our children grow up together and form relationships that last a lifetime.

Lakehill isn’t a school that just cranks out highly skilled students but rather a school that helps to create well-rounded individuals who are confident, poised, and competent. I love it when our college students come back to visit us and tell us with pride how well prepared they are for their new lives.

It’s the moments when I see our children excel, blossom, and most importantly feel happy that my motherly pride wants to pop the buttons off my shirt. I am proud of our community and of our beautiful children.

Categories
Family and Community

Saying Thanks

By Roger L. Perry
Headmaster, Lakehill Preparatory School 

As we celebrate the 40th Anniversary of Lakehill, I thought it might be of interest for you to know some of the people who have made the many facilities we enjoy possible. People who have attended basketball games over the years are probably familiar with a tall, lanky fellow with a light colored beard, who generally has been one of the loudest and most vocal supporters of our basketball teams.

His two sons, Andrew and Austin, have both been great contributors to the success of basketball at Lakehill over the years. This will be Austin’s senior season for the Lakehill team and Andrew is now in Graduate school at Wichita State University. I would guess that virtually every current student has been taught by his wife, Tina, as she has been a prolific substitute teacher for us over the years. She also served the school well as the president of the Parent Faculty Club.

Now on to Grant, the man who has always – and I mean always – come through for me when the school wanted to build something. I want to focus on a few of the major projects, as there have been so many times that he has helped us that I am sure I would forget a few if I tried to list them.

Grant Simpson is an architect. He is a celebrated and well respected expert in his field, as noted by his AIA fellowship. He has generously given of his and his firm’s time and expertise, and has convinced specialists in their respective fields to do work for us at no cost to the school. He has done this over and over again. The value to the school, over the years, has been several hundreds of thousands of dollars of architectural work. Realistically, many of the projects would not have been done if we had to pay the architectural fees.

He has drawn the auditorium and the Upper School wing, the layout of the entire Ferguson Road campus, the football field, the baseball field, the softball field, the tennis courts, the locker room facility, and most recently, the new Sports Court on the main campus. He also did the earliest drawings of the Environmental Science Center.

When asked why he does all of this, he always says, “I do it for the kids to enjoy”. I can assure you that the kids are enjoying the wonderful facilities that he helped make possible for them. So if you see Grant Simpson at an athletic event or around campus, please take a moment to just say “thanks”.

Categories
Learning and Leading

A Love for Learning

By Katie Becker
Social Studies Chair, Lakehill Preparatory School

I love Lakehill. I love Lakehill for its family-like atmosphere, its teachers, and its students. But most of all I love Lakehill because of what it has given me. During my time here, Lakehill has instilled within me a love of learning and a confidence to help me accomplish my goals.

When I entered Lakehill in the third grade I knew nothing about the be-verbs. Mrs. Brooks had drilled the sing-song recitation into her second-graders the previous year and I was lost as the entire third grade class repeated the list for review on the first day of class. Man, did I ever feel lost.  I was terrified that I would never be able to catch up. However, through the support of my new friends and my teacher, Mrs. Edwards, I was able to not only pass the third grade but leave the year with a new confidence in my abilities and excited about learning.

When I entered into middle school a whole new fear captured me. The stakes were raised; not only did you have to change classes, but there were sports, and clubs, and socials that were added to the mix. There were so many things I wanted to participate in, yet I didn’t have the first clue about things like volleyball, cheerleading, or well, anything really.  I wanted to try it all and what was incredible was that I got to participate in everything. It was through the encouragement and passion of teachers like Mrs. Hauschild, Mrs. Mackner, and Mr. Higgon, that I was able to learn, play, and succeed. And the by-product was an additional layer of confidence.

My junior year was my favorite year in high school. By this time I had helped to take my basketball team to the final four, I had learned the importance of helping out the community through my involvement in a myriad of service projects, and I felt confident that I was going to be able to go to college prepared and ready to successfully continue my learning. And, I did. Lakehill gave me the confidence to approach my professors, ask for help, and meet my goals.

But the story doesn’t end there. In fact it is still going on. When I was looking for my first teaching job eight years ago, I took my confidence and my love of learning and hit the pavement looking for any teaching job I could snag. It almost didn’t seem real when I found the perfect teaching position open at Lakehill. When I shook Mr. Perry’s hand as he welcomed me to the Lakehill faculty, I felt so honored to be back at the school that had helped me to get to that exact moment.  Now I continue my journey, striving every day to help instill a love of learning and a layer of confidence in my students.