This is the third in a series of profiles of Community Planning and Advisory Committee (CPAC) members. Comprised of parents, teachers, students and community members, the CPAC has been meeting throughout the spring and recently completed their final set of recommendations for the 2020 bond and mill levy packages that will go to the DPS Board of Education for approval this month.
Jessica Amedeo-Johnson is a Speech Language Pathologist at Escalante-Biggs Academy and is one of six teachers on the CPAC. Below is Jessica’s first-person account of her motivation for serving on CPAC:
“What is a good school?”
“What is a good student?”
“What is a good teacher?”
A colleague recently asked me these questions for her graduate project. These questions really had me thinking, especially since I have been participating as a member of the Community Planning and Advisory Committee and the Mill Levy subcommittee. Ironically, these three questions led me to volunteer for this committee.
I decided to apply to become a part of this committee because I work as a Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) in DPS. I have been working with the school-aged population for 19 years (four as a bilingual elementary teacher and 15 as a school-based SLP). As a DPS employee and the parent of two children who attend DPS schools, aged 16 and 14, this dual mindset was the focus of my thinking while participating in this group. I understand the needs of teachers, as well as the needs of our children, in order to provide an environment where Every Child Succeeds.
My answers to the above questions and my thought process throughout our CPAC and Mill Levy subcommittee meetings are as follows:
- I believe a good school is a safe place where children learn. I believe that a good school has excellent communication between staff, students, and families. A good school has the materials needed to reach the needs of all the students in the classroom.
- All students are good students. They each bring their own sets of strengths and needs.
- A good teacher understands that all students are good students and knows how to best teach each student.
In summary, our planning for the bond and mill levy will help fund the conditions, programs and people that are needed for students to thrive in a safe, nurturing environment.