Community Partnerships At Work

Thursday, September 23 was the ribbon cutting ceremony for the opening of the Patriot Pride Branch at Albemarle High School. The Patriot Pride Branch is the result of a partnership between Albemarle County Public Schools and the UVA Community Credit Union. It is designed to benefit the young people in the community by promoting good financial citizenship.

CATEC was fortunate to partner with this project by having our Building Trades students build the cabinets and countertops for the branch.  Thanks to Jim Coyner, CATEC Building Trades instructor and our students, the branch has a great design and look for operation.

The grounds around CATEC have a fresh look now thanks to the efforts of the Day of Caring volunteers from UVA Procurement Services.  Eight volunteers worked tirelessly completing various landscaping projects to beautify our campus.  They mulched, planted, trimmed, weeded and cleaned debris from various areas on the grounds.  Their time and efforts were greatly appreciated by the faculty, staff, and students at CATEC.    Thanks UVA Procurement Services volunteers! 

Walking the Talk with Technology in Schools

Walking the Talk with Technology

Everyone has heard of the saying, if you Talk the Talk you must Walk the Walk.  We’ve modified that at CATEC this year to say simply….Walk the Talk.

Today as part of our bi-monthly Tech Tuesday, our faculty and staff meet to review and get hands-on practice with tech tools to enhance teaching and learning at the school.  Today we focused on the use of GoogleDocs, using Excel-like spreadsheets, to provide both a form for teacher goal setting and a form for tracking student performance in each program.  After our 45 minute session this morning our teachers (who have been working on Goggledocs for over a year) were able to use these documents and share with others.

Not only will our faculty and staff be using this method of reporting for tracking personal and student progress but they will also be creating GoogleDoc sharing opportunities for their students. These ideas will be worked on until our next meeting in two weeks. 

All of our data analysis work this year will be in the form of PDSA which stands for Plan, Do, Study, Act. For student progress checks, the teachers have provided info on the Study to start (how are kids doing) and have now developed an ACT (what can we do to help). This info is also shared with other resource personnel to have more of a collaborative team to assist the student who may be struggling.

Lastly, today we also had teachers assign a student as a Tech Leader in each program area. This student will start by getting training in the use of a FlipCamera and filming a process or demonstration in the classroom. Our hope is that they will be able to train others students and assist the teacher in providing a new means of capturing and learning at CATEC.

One step further along in Walking the Talk.

Guest Speaker Monday at CATEC

Today's guest speaker in Cosmetology was Donna Darrington of Infinity Barber & Beauty Salon in Richmond.  Ms. Darrington also represents Avlon Industries, a leading beauty supplier.  Today's engaging presentation dealt with hair coloring, pigmentation, and the science associated with correct color matching.

Engagement Level- Clear Modeled Expectations

What does engagement look like in a classroom at CATEC? Check out the students in our Firefighting/EMT course thsi morning. An AUTHENTIC example of clear/modeled expectations as students review protocol for both equipment and procedures on a call. NICE!

Real-Life Work in Schools

The image above is from a Friday walkthrough of our AutoBody Class.  Authentic work in action.

Dental Gets a Visit

As we start to post various "happenings" at the school, you will notice the tons of authentic opportunities our students have to connect with business partners in the area. Here our Dental Assistant class gets a visit from a local Dentist explaining the intricacies of making dental impressions.  Very Cool.......

Welcome Inside CATEC

Several weeks ago I was walking the halls of CATEC with a local contractor. While we walking towards our meeting inside the school I asked the gentleman how long had he been in the Charlottesville, Albemarle area. "All my life" he replied. "So how many times have you been in CATEC?" I asked....... I was surprised at his response, "Well, this is actually the first time."

Unfortunately, our visitor's sentiment is the same as many in our area. So instead of sending out post cards and personal invitations to come into our school (which you are always welcome to do, by the way).....WE ARE COMING TO YOU.  Throughout the entire school year we will be featuring, not just the "big splash" events that happen at our school but we will feature the everyday teaching and learning that exists.

We are doing some wonderful things in our school and our students and teachers are at the core of this work. We're not going to keep them a secret any longer. So subscribe to our blog, and prepare to step into our world of learning.